Why you must be outsourcing your translation requirement

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Why you must be outsourcing your translation
requirement
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Translation is everywhere, proclaimed Matthew
Sekac, Senior Director Sales Strategy, Park IP
Translations, at the IP Service World Conference
held in November 2014 in Munich, Germany. In
todays world which is doing everything it can to
go global at a rapid pace, how can language
translation stay far behind when it comes to
being a part of the outsourcing era? Talk about
it and youll find both supporters and detractors
for the same the supporters will vehemently
claim that outsourcing is the only way to go,
while the detractors will be equally vociferous
in their point of view which says the
opposite. Well, why do we actually need to
outsource translation in the first place? First
and foremost, there is an ever-increasing
requirement for translations today, especially in
companies which operate on an international scale.
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But a question may arise in this regardif
companies like these are operating on such a big
scale involving a number of different countries
as clients, cant they afford an internal
translation department of their own, instead of
outsourcing their translation work? They can
but this could have the repercussion of
negatively affecting the overall performance of
the company, since it is a capital-intensive
strategy. Moreover, when one talks about the
increasing volumes of translation that are
required, it doesnt come as a single independent
entity compound it with the time factor, and
there you have the actual scenario. Theres only
a reasonable amount of work that can be done by
an in-house translator per day, which roughly
translates to around 2500 words. Enter, a
Language Service Provider (LSP in short what was
initially known as a translation agency) which
has numerous translators (both human and machine)
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working simultaneously on a number of different
projects. As a result, it provides a broad range
of translation and linguistic services, which can
be customized as per a companys needs and wants.
A point to note here Even though in-house
translators may seem to be more cost-effective at
first glance, if youre looking to manage costs
effectively in the long run, these Language
Service Providers could hold the
key. Translation is not a simple, one-step task
it involves a number of smaller, complex tasks,
each of which needs to be taken care of to get
the result of the desired quality. Here is where
LSPs score over internal translation departments,
at literally each step of the way. Translators
need to be assessed and selected based on their
expertise in a particular field, tasks need to be
delegated and each project needs to be carefully
managed to see that the translation reaches up to
the clients expectations.
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No single company or business is equipped well
enough to handle all types of requirements
marketing translations, UI translations,
financial translations, to name a few except an
LSP which has the requisite resources with it. It
has the technical know-how and expertise to take
care of and deliver the finished product in a
stipulated time period. A translator has many
different roles to perform some of which are
editing, proofreading, copywriting, translating,
even taking care of the layout of the translated
document as well as the graphics involved in
certain cases. Its not rocket science to see
who can take care of the task and optimize the
entire translation process at hand more
effectively a small, motley group of in-house
translators or an outsourced LSP which has the
bandwidth to take care of all this, in addition
to managing budgets, timelines and in fact the
entire project management.
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On the other hand, there are some concerns with
the LSP system as well. For instance, theres the
issue of cost-effectiveness of a single project
(if youre not looking at it from a long-term
point of view). Or, the quality of the
outsourced translation, which can (if done
shoddily) damage a brands reputation. And of
course, the question of maintaining the privacy
and confidentiality of your companys assets in
this digital age is also a major
concern. However, according to the results of a
recent survey carried out by the Software and
Document Localization (SDL) 75 of companies
who translate, outsource either all or a major
part of their translation process. Like there
are two sides to every coin, so is the case with
translation outsourcing. The key is to find out
which side has more benefits and then accordingly
adapt the negatives to serve our purpose. And in
this case, translation outsourcing is too heavily
loaded with benefits to be set aside.
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Taking the services of an LSP to deliver the
finished translated product to your customer in
no way means that one washes their hands of the
entire task and refuses to take up any
responsibility for the same. Its like a mutual
collaboration of sorts - the LSP vendors provide
innovation and expertise to yield the perfect mix
of price, time and quality benefits, which is a
win-win situation for all three parties
involved. To quote American Senator Ron Kind,
Over the last few years, the world has become a
smaller and more integrated place with technology
that is leveling the playing field like never
before. Agreed, thanks to the interconnections
and translations which do their bit in making us
a global economy.
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Thank You...