A report, , issued in 1983 by the State Historical Records Advisory Board recommended the formation of an organization to "foster the exchange of ideas among professional archivists, librarians who bear the responsibility for historical records, and other persons involved in the care of manuscripts." Acting on this recommendation, Dr. William Price, Jr., chairman of the board and director of the North Carolina Division of Archives and History, called a meeting of archivists and manuscript curators from throughout the state. Approximately thirty archivists and curators, representing religious, academic, and governmental repositories attended the exploratory meeting in Raleigh in October 1983. This group formed a steering committee that began work drafting a constitution and bylaws for the creation of a statewide archival organization.

The first meeting of the Society of North Carolina Archivists was held in Chapel Hill on March 9, 1984. At that meeting the membership adopted the constitution and bylaws and elected a slate of officers, with Richard Shrader serving as the first president. A listing of the presidents and their tenures can be found below.

The original Executive Board was made up of five officers: the president, vice president/president elect, secretary/treasurer, and two members-at-large. In 1989, in response to a report from the Society's Long-Range Planning Committee, the board expanded to include a Publications chair, and the position of secretary/treasurer was split into two. Since then the board has further expanded, and now includes a Membership Chair, an Electronic Resources Chair, a Nominating Committee Chair, and a Development/Education chair, bringing the total board membership to eleven.

The constitution of the Society states that it will sponsor two meetings each year for the full membership, one in the spring and another in the fall. At each meeting the Society invites speakers and offers programs of interest to archivists at all levels of experience, who work with many different kinds of materials, and who operate in varying kinds of repositories, large and small. Speakers for these programs have included experts from within SNCA's membership as well as nationally known speakers, such as conservator George Cunha, and former presidents of the Society of American Archivists David Gracy II and Steven Hensen. The Society has cooperated with other organizations with similar interests, such as the Mid-Atlantic Archives and Records Conference and the South Atlantic Records Conference, to hold joint meetings to facilitate communication with archivists in other regions and states. SNCA also sponsors workshops at many of the twice-yearly meetings, including some offered through the Society of American Archivists and some created and offered by members of SNCA.

In addition to the twice-yearly programs and workshops, SNCA publishes a quarterly newsletter, The North Carolina Archivist, to inform its membership of the Society's activities and events or publications of interest to SNCA members. In the summer of 2002, the Society began publishing The Journal for the Society of North Carolina Archivists. The journal is scholarly in nature, with articles and book reviews contributed by the membership, and is published twice each year. SNCA has also published Archival and Manuscript Repositories in North Carolina: A Directory in 1987, and a revised edition in 1993.