Multilingual meetings: transcribing and getting the summary in the right language

Your meeting went perfectly well in French. Then you open the summary… and it is in English.

Or worse: everything is correct inside Leexi, but the summary automatically sent to your CRM arrives in another language.

This is one of the main problems with multilingual meetings: recognising what was said is not enough. You also need to control the language of what comes out after the meeting.

And that is exactly what Leexi IA users report.

Among requests related to multilingual meetings, around 43 % concern the language of the summary, compared with 29 % for the transcript itself. And 21 % specifically concern the translation of the summary and the tasks.

In other words, the problem is not only:

"Does the tool understand several languages?"

But rather:

"Which language will my transcript, my summary and my action items come out in?"

These are three different things, and they are not set in the same place.

What a multilingual meeting actually means

The term can cover several fairly different situations.

It is worth telling them apart before configuring the tool.

Several languages are spoken during the same meeting

This is the typical case of an international team, or of a Belgian company where French and Dutch naturally cross over during a meeting.

One participant starts in French, another answers in Dutch, then the conversation switches back to the first language.

The tool then has to identify the language changes correctly without mixing up the transcript.

Each participant speaks their own language

Another case: participants do not necessarily switch languages, but each one uses their own.

The difficulty is then to recognise each person's language correctly and attribute the right content to them.

The meeting and the summary are not in the same language

This is yet another problem.

Your meeting takes place in French, but your summary has to be sent in Italian to a team based in Italy.

Or your call is in Dutch, while the company CRM has to receive a summary in French.

The language spoken during the meeting and the language of the summary are two different settings.

And that difference is precisely what creates a lot of confusion.

What can go wrong in a multilingual meeting

Three problems come back particularly often among Leexi IA users.

The transcript invents or mixes languages

First case: the meeting takes place in a single language, but the transcript shows others.

One user reported a meeting held entirely in French where some passages came out in Portuguese.

Another found Spanish and English inside a transcript although the whole meeting had taken place in French.

The problem can also appear with Dutch.

A Dutch-speaking user found several languages inside a single sentence, with very little Dutch correctly transcribed.

A Teams meeting held in Flemish also came out as a mix of French, English and Dutch.

Requests directly linked to transcription represent around 29 % of the multilingual problems reported by Leexi IA users.

Two settings can help:

• check the language configuration before the meeting;
• add names, acronyms and industry terms to the custom vocabulary.

The summary comes out in the wrong language

This is the problem that comes back most often.

Around 43 % of requests related to multilingual meetings concern the language of the summary.

And the case is sometimes very simple: the whole meeting runs correctly in French, but the recap arrives in English.

One user reported exactly that, while his meetings usually took place in French.

The language of the summary has its own setting.

And inside a company, that choice can also become an administration matter.

One manager wanted the summaries for his entire organisation to come out in Italian, systematically.

So the point to remember is simple:

a correct transcript does not guarantee that the summary will come out in the language you expect.

The summary changes language on its way into the CRM

This is probably the most puzzling case.

You open the summary in Leexi: it is correct.

You then open the client record in your CRM: the same summary appears in English.

Users have run into this with Zoho and HubSpot.

The language of the content displayed in Leexi and the language of the content sent to the CRM therefore have to be checked separately.

If you automate your sales summaries, this is a point to test from the very first meeting.

Setting the languages before the meeting

A few settings before the call save you from discovering the problem once the summary has been sent.

Turning on multilingual handling

Leexi has a dedicated setting for meetings in which several languages are spoken.

It is configured at company level and requires administrator rights.

A single user may therefore not be able to turn it on for their own account.

This setting improves how multilingual meetings are handled, but it does not remove the need to check the result.

The more often participants switch languages, the harder the meeting becomes to transcribe correctly.

Adding your industry vocabulary

Languages are not always the real problem.

People's names, companies, cities, product names and acronyms are often the hardest terms to transcribe correctly.

The custom vocabulary lets you enter the correct spelling once.

For example:

"Leexy" → "Leexi"

or an industry acronym your team uses regularly.

When an error comes back, you simply add the term to the vocabulary for the next meetings.

Problems linked to correcting terms represent a small share of multilingual requests, around 7 %, but it is also one of the easiest things to fix.

Some language switches remain harder

The most complicated case is a person switching language in the middle of a sentence.

This is no longer simply a meeting with two clearly separated languages: the engine has to detect the switch within the same turn of speech.

In that kind of meeting, a read-through remains important before sending the summary.

The real question: can you translate the summary, not just the transcript?

This is where expectations have shifted.

Being able to translate a full transcript is useful.

But few people want to share fifty minutes of raw text after every meeting.

What they mainly want to translate is:

• the summary;
• the decisions;
• the next actions;
• the assigned tasks.

And that represents around 21 % of the multilingual requests reported by Leexi IA users.

One user put it very simply: translating the transcript exists, but what really interests him is being able to translate the summary and the tasks.

Another user, working in French and Dutch, wanted his summary available in both languages.

Translation of the transcript is available.

Working across several countries with the same summary

Multilingual handling becomes particularly important when the meeting does not stay between the people in the room.

The summary may then be read by a sales team, a manager, a client or a colleague based in another country.

Making the summary come out in the recipient's language

A meeting can take place in French while the people who will read the summary work in Italian or in English.

So you need to think about the recipient's language before the meeting.

Otherwise you risk discovering the problem after the automatic send.

Using subtitles on the recording

Subtitles also make it easier for someone who does not speak the language of the meeting to go through the recording.

This is useful when a meeting has to be shared afterwards with a team based in another country.

Planning ahead for meetings with several nationalities

When several languages are going to cross over, two choices should ideally be made before the meeting:

Which languages are we going to speak in?

Which language should the summary come out in?

The two answers can be different.

And announcing them before the meeting saves you from having to correct all the content afterwards.

What still needs a manual check

Even with an AI meeting assistant, three habits remain useful in a multilingual meeting.

Check the language of the summary before sending it.

This matters particularly if the summary goes automatically into your CRM or out to a client.

Correct the names and industry terms that keep coming back.

The custom vocabulary saves you from correcting the same error meeting after meeting.

Read through meetings where languages change a lot.

A meeting held entirely in French is simpler to process than a conversation where French, Dutch and English alternate constantly.

Where do the recordings of a multilingual meeting go?

The question matters particularly when several countries are involved.

An international meeting can bring together colleagues, clients and teams based in different countries.

Your conversations are not used to train the model.

Questions about recording, consent, retention periods and the data processing agreement are detailed on our compliance page.

Multilingual meetings: the 3 settings to check

Before your next meeting, simply check three things.

It is mainly the third setting that is easy to forget.

You can perfectly well have a correct transcript and still receive a summary in the wrong language.

Frequently asked questions

What happens if several languages are spoken in the same meeting?

Leexi has a dedicated setting for multilingual meetings, at company level.

It helps handle meetings where several languages cross over.

The faster participants alternate between languages, the more important it remains to check the transcript and the summary before sharing them.

Does Leexi translate the meeting live so that participants understand each other?

No.

An AI meeting assistant does not replace a simultaneous interpreter.

Its work is mainly about what is produced from the meeting: the transcript, the summary and the content you can consult afterwards.

Translation of the transcript and subtitles then make the recording accessible in another language.

How do you choose the language of the summary?

The language of the summary is set separately from the language spoken during the meeting and from the language of the transcript.

So if your transcript is correct but your summary arrives in another language, that is the setting to check first.

Inside an organisation, the language of the summary can also depend on settings administered at company level.

Can you translate the summary and the tasks, not just the transcript?

This is precisely one of the main requests from users working across several languages.

Translation of the transcript is available.

Which language does the summary arrive in inside the CRM?

The language of the summary sent to the CRM can differ from the language of the summary you consult in the platform.

Users have noticed this with Zoho and HubSpot in particular.

If your team automates sending to the CRM, check both sides from your first meeting.

How do you correct a name that is always transcribed wrongly?

Use the custom vocabulary.

You enter the correct spelling of a name, a company, a city or an acronym so that it is picked up better in the following meetings.

This is particularly useful for the industry vocabulary that comes back every week.

Is Dutch supported?

French and Dutch are both supported, and bilingual French and Dutch meetings are a real case among Leexi IA users.

Meetings in which participants alternate a lot between French, Dutch and Flemish do however remain harder to process than a meeting held in a single language.

A read-through is therefore recommended before sharing the summary.

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