[6stringmerc]

Very worthwhile deliniations you've put forward - matters of policy and employment agreements, to me, aren't able to address every single instance of good or bad judgment by an employee.

I've worked with several highly regulated industries, and while data preservation is a big deal, very frequently compliance officers have said "Just don't store personal-type or non-material information like calendar meeting requests for off-site dinners" because they're simply outside the purview of what's needed to satsify the rules.

On the other hand, it was quite clearly stated that if doing filing/archiving one comes across correspondence that reflects an error of judgment (intentional or not), say relating to giving a "personal" gift to somebody above/beyond the accepted corporate policy or legal mandates (ex: local government officials), then by all means, that's in the company's interest to review and address.

There's a perfectly fine reason some sensitive conversations should take place over the phone instead of in writing (most notably "OUR IT SAYS WE'VE HAD A BREACH OMG OMG OMG"), just like there's ample reason talking about something sketchy is frequently performed over the phone. Funny creatures, us humans.