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Alison Toon

I'm a Senior Research Analyst with CSA Research. I specialize in language process automation including TMSes, translation workflows, and multimedia, and I deliver trusted advisory services to global enterprises for all aspects of their language needs.

What I Cover

I focus on the intersection of process optimization with the human and cultural requirements for access to information through language. Today, it might be enabling a global enterprise to engage and support more customers when spending the same amount of money - or less. Tomorrow, helping more people to understand multimedia through enabling a business to provide captions, subtitles, or dubbing in the language each person needs. I analyzing the data we collect to understand the story it tells the localization industry, from enterprise localization leaders and the C-suite, the teams involved at language service providers and technology companies, or feedback directly from translators, interpreters, and the other language experts involved in enabling global communication.

My Background

I started my career as a (mostly) self-taught computer programmer working in a startup and designing, implementing, installing, documenting, and troubleshooting financial systems for small businesses. I then spent several years as a documentation analyst, designing and delivering user documentation for a consumer and B2B electronics company. My next move introduced me to usability engineering and localization - which then became my home for more than 20 years, designing, implementing, centralizing, and managing a global high-tech enterprise's entire set of language needs. I then took a couple of years to explore working on the supply side of the localization industry, taking in marketing, account management, and product management roles, before starting to work for CSA Research in 2018. My career has seen me living working in the UK, the Netherlands, France, and on both coasts of the USA, plus travelling extensively around the world. I speak several flavours of English, plus French, a little Dutch, and a smattering of Polish.

My Ethics

I adhere to CSA Research's ethical code, and I have also been licensed by the Board of Realtors in the USA - business ethics training that remains meaningful to me today - along with Standards of Business practices instilled from all those years at a highly ethical enterprise. You can send me gifts though. A big, black, great dane puppy for example. (Just checking that you read this far! No bribes accepted!!!)

Away From Work

You can often find me taking photographs at concerts or out in nature at the beaches, working in my garden, or investigating my family tree.

Contact Me

You can reach me via direct message on Instagram and Linkedin.