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By Andres Heuberger

Many companies find that the single biggest factor contributing to translation delays is the process of reviewing translations in their respective target countries prior to finalization. Vacation schedules, internal politics, and miscommunication across time zones make translation reviews an expensive and time-consuming process.

Frustrated by this, some firms have moved away from in- country reviews by:

a) skipping reviews completely "because they don't add any value"; or

b) shifting translation responsibility overseas.

Unfortunately, these solutions usually create as many problems as they solve. Consider the following:

Specialization

A company's in-country staff rarely includes professional linguists. Staff members are typically involved in sales, marketing, and administration. This (lack of) specialization is important: while in-country personnel will know the products, they may not be good at writing, let alone translating highly technical text.

Regulatory Requirement

In some industries, standards mandate reviews. However, even when not required by law, many companies view reviews as part of the validation process.

In-country reviews provide a valuable system of checks and balances: A person with product know-how (the reviewer) checks the translation for technical accuracy and a professional linguist then inspects the reviewer's changes for linguistic accuracy.

Even Longer Delays

If vacation and absences were an issue when affiliates were reviewing, they will cause even longer delays when affiliates are translating. At this point, there is often a lack of centralized control, leaving in-country staff to fit time- consuming translation tasks in between regular duties.

Jeopardize Your Brand

Your global brand is a fragile and expensive asset. Eliminating in-country reviews puts your brand at risk by increasing the likelihood of technical errors finding their way into the final translation and reducing customers' trust in your product.

By transferring translation responsibility to overseas offices, significant differences between English and translated texts are bound to crop up as in-country folks take "liberties" with the text when translating.

More importantly, there will be differences among target languages. These differences may be minor (the removal of US contact information in favor of mentioning the local office) or major (differences in document size and layout, variations in colors, images, and tag lines used, etc.).

Not all is lost though: while off-loading translation management or omitting reviews is not advisable, there are concrete ways that you can improve the process and reduce your review headaches.

"R.E.V.I.E.W" to the Rescue

A process I call, appropriately, R.E.V.I.E.W provides a step-by-step approach to optimizing your review systems. R.E.V.I.E.W consists of the following six steps:

R esearch the situation

E valuate the nature of overseas office

V isit to build personal relationships

I nvolve reviewers in process development

E nable the technology

W atch for opportunities to improve the process

1. Research the situation

Too many companies "improve" their review processes without fully understanding the supposed problems with the old system. The first move in avoiding missteps is to perform a thorough situation analysis and to document what "is."

The person managing translation efforts should consider the following areas:

• Analyze communications between reviewers, headquarters staff, and translators for trends, recurring themes, and obvious problem spots.
• Discuss the situation with engineers, developers, and other internal customers. What is their perception?
• Invite feedback from your translation vendor. What roadblocks do they encounter?
• Of course, listen to the reviewers themselves. What challenges do they face?
• Quantify the costs of the current in-country review process and evaluate the average time required to complete reviews. If performance metrics are available, obtain them and include them in your analysis.

2. Evaluate the nature of overseas office

Make an honest evaluation of each overseas office's capabilities and staffing.

What function does the affiliate play? Is it a sales force or an inventory warehouse? Is their staffing level sufficient to adequately take on review responsibilities?

Does the office have appropriate technology in place? This includes hardware and software to perform the actual reviews but also includes communication technology to easily communicate with headquarters and the translation vendor.

Are local staff trained and up-to-date on company policies and procedures? Are the relevant quality systems in place? Does the team include a quality or regulatory affairs manager?

3. Visit to build personal relationships

Nothing beats a face-to-face meeting to build rapport and gain insight into another person's situation. This is doubly true when dealing with people from other cultures and in other countries.

While manufacturers of video-conferencing equipment tried to convince us that the business trip was destined for extinction, the opposite has happened: in the age of technology and "e"-everything, the power of interpersonal relationships is greater than ever.

People like to do business with individuals whom they know and like. By knowing you, the person, instead of you, the faceless drone at headquarters, reviewers are much more inclined to grant favors (read "super rush turnaround") and to work with you in a solutions-oriented manner.

If your company is large enough, consider organizing an annual international translation event, inviting reviewers and your translation vendor. And be sure to make time to meet with overseas staff who visit your office.

4. Involve others in process development

This is an extension of the last point: Affiliates are greatly impacted by translation. Obtain their buy-in, not just to the actual translations but also to the process and the vendors handling the translation.

Likewise, your translation vendor has a lot to offer. Ask them for suggestions on how to streamline the process. Meet the people working on your projects and ask them questions about the review process. Invite a representative to do a "lunch and learn" at your company.

When developing an effective in-country review process, consider these specific suggestions:

• Be sure to clearly establish the role of the review (i.e., sign-off, edit pass, FYI).
• If at all possible, establish a steady, predictable review schedule. This lets your reviewers help you -- by informing you of planned absences, office closings, etc.
• Consider establishing an "auto-approve" mechanism. For example, this procedure could state that if review comments are not received within the time allocated, the affiliate is deemed to have accepted the translation without change.

5. Enable the technology

Your situation analysis performed at the beginning of the R.E.V.I.E.W process will have shown you what technology each office has. Often, companies find that affiliate offices use hardware and software and systems that are different from headquarters and from other affiliates.

Enabling technology can be as straightforward as ensuring that everybody in the review cycle uses the same version word processor. Alternatively, it can involve the building an Intranet site dedicated to translation reviews.

At a minimum, systems should exist to allow reviewers to:

a) receive and enter changes into electronic translations (as opposed to marking changes on hardcopy documents);

b) access the latest terminology glossary and style guide for that reviewer's language; and

c) submit documents, terminology changes, and content questions electronically to the appropriate headquarters staff and the translation vendor.

6. Watch for opportunities to improve the process

Language is an art, not a science. Likewise, translation is not exact and will never be perfect -- you would have a difficult time specifying what a "perfect" translation is.

You can, however, put in place a process to document, measure, and audit translation activities. In many companies, this falls within the realm of ISO 900x or similar standards. Even if an organization is not ISO-certified, a continuous improvement process for translation reviews is essential to long-term success.

A prerequisite for this is that the vendor, the reviewers, and the client company have auditable, documented systems in place. These systems should detail responsibilities, work flow, required documentation and approvals, as well as quality measurements.

Once all involved agree on appropriate quality and performance measures, hold the vendor responsible for measuring and reporting this quality data. Working together, the partners can now review historical data and set future performance goals. This will remove ambiguity from the process and further improve communication amongst the parties involved.

As the World Shrinks, Reviews Grow

As companies expand into more and more countries, the review process will become even more critical to your organization.

The review process may never be an easy process; but well managed, it can be an efficient and effective process. With proper planning, communication, vendor relations, and a good R.E.V.I.E.W, you'll be able to improve turnaround time, keep translation costs manageable, and you may even avoid a few headaches.

Andres Heuberger is an editor at multilingualwebmaster.com. He frequently writes on issues related to technology, translation, and regulations. Rants and raves can be sent to aheuberger@multilingualwebmaster.com.

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