Our Analysts' Insights

The topic of automation has taken the interpreting industry by storm. On the one hand, enthusiasts believe in artificial intelligence as a way to broaden language access at an affordable cost. On the other hand, skeptics worry about all the things that could go wrong in the implementation. But where does it all settle when it comes to organization-level implementations?

Back in the day when I first began working in localization, we didn’t have a translation management system (TMS) – they didn’t exist – and our LSP was refusing to use translation memory because it created “too much overhead” for the first venture into producing a customer care website in more than one language. Knowing that the advent of the internet was likely to produce masses of new content in – hopefully – all the languages in which the company operated, we took a huge risk. We found...

Hybrid work models tend to bring issues related to trust, accountability, productivity, and equity to the forefront. All of this adds even more pressure on middle managers to function as the glue to ensure execution of organizational goals. Yet, many companies continue to depend on extremely lean middle management layers. Expecting overworked staff to hold everything together without at least upskilling them to manage remote teams is a recipe for failure.

When friends and family hear what I’m working on these days, they typically ask: 1) won’t AI eliminate the need for translators and interpreters? and 2) won’t that eradication of the language sector do away with your job, too? The first question has taken the air out of the room in a lot of discussions over the last couple of years, especially given media coverage of humans in the loop that amounts to job descriptions that are little more than janitors cleaning up after bad MT outcomes.

The rising frequency of discussions about AI has led to much unease among interpreting service providers about the impact of automated solutions on language access and on what that means to the future of their profession. In this blog, we explore the concept of meaningful language access, why automated interpreting struggles with that concept, and how it relates to deciding and defining the role of the interpreter.

It’s the end of 2023 and, rather than contemplating a bright and happy new year, many enterprise localization groups are looking at another year of austerity measures. Through most of 2023 they told us they were either holding steady on spending or cutting it. Here’s the rub though: By saving a bit on language services now, they may block substantive contributions to revenue in order to save comparatively small expenses. In this blog we review why this penny-wise approach could be pound foolis...

Some people feel that using artificial intelligence (AI) to interpret human speech is a curse because individuals using the service could suffer harm due to mistranslations or because interpreters might lose their livelihood. Others embrace AI for all the possibilities it creates, first and foremost the ability to offer language access on a much greater scale and at a reduced cost. So which camp is right? Like so many techno-ethical questions, there is no right or wrong. It really depends on th...

While the goal for project management has long been full automation (“lights-out”), few organizations achieve it – not for translation nor interpreting services, neither at LSPs nor enterprises. Many teams have tools and processes in place to enable touch-free workflows, yet our research demonstrates a huge gap between “we have the system” and “we are using it.” While some organizations use lights-out processes for a vast amount of translation work – even most of their projects – genera...

Whether or not product managers have direct responsibility for the international success of their products, they still want them to do well worldwide and are often held responsible for international revenue numbers. But what if they have little or no international experience, don’t understand how to build the multilingual training data required by their product, or simply lack the resources to research international markets, analyze product functionality, and beta test properly?

Every CEO knows they must develop three core elements to business management: a mission statement that explains the fundamental purpose of their company, a vision statement that plots a destination for their business, and core values that represent the fundamental beliefs and principles defining the company and its culture. Executive teams will commonly invest significant time developing these elements, even hiring consultants or advisors to help them. Yet, once satisfied with the results, these...