Strategy for success – why proactive planning is crucial for translation departments

It’s not often you see “strategy” and “translation department” in the same sentence. Although state-of-the-art tools, the latest trends and future developments are always being discussed at trade conferences and elsewhere, proactive strategic planning hasn’t been considered important in translation departments. We’d like to change that – find out how and why here.

Giving in-house translation departments the recognition they deserve

Within a business, it’s often unclear to people in other departments what exactly an in-house translation department does. As a result, it usually doesn’t get the attention and recognition it needs. Strategic planning for translation departments can easily get ignored in favour of other priorities – but it really shouldn’t be. Many people don’t realize that translation departments are responsible for managing valuable business assets, such as translation memories and term bases. So not only do they offer their businesses the potential to save money, they also have a key role as Asset Managers.

The aim of this post is to highlight the value and relevance of in-house translation departments and help you unlock their full potential for your business.

Strategic planning: as important for the translation department as for any other department

Imagine you’re applying to your manager for the budget to acquire a new CAT tool and employ a new member of staff in the translation department. They aren’t just receptive to your suggestion: they sign it off there and then. Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? We think exactly that should happen much more often than it does. The following example will illustrate how strategic planning can help make it a reality.

Ms Miller, head of the in-house translation department at business X, conducts an evaluation of the department and identifies a number of problems and areas where there is potential for optimization. Her main finding is that an inadequate CAT tool and inconsistent source texts are making the department less efficient than it should be and causing staff considerable stress and frustration. And she doesn’t let the matter rest: using an advanced CAT tool to analyse the source texts and investigate the impacts of this inconsistency, she discovers the following:

• Business X has spent several thousand euros over the last few years purely because punctuation in their source texts was inconsistent.
• Even more money has been wasted because sentences were often changed slightly without these changes affecting the content. 

Armed with these findings, Ms Miller now has a number of options:

Option 1: Negotiate with the translation service provider

The first option is to pressure the translation provider to lower their prices across the board, or to negotiate a new CAT grid which reduces the previously high rates for fuzzy matches.

Option 2: Convince other departments that their source texts need to be better

The second option is to use her analysis to illustrate the impacts of inconsistent source texts to her colleagues in other departments, so that they start producing better source texts. 

Option 3: Convince management to increase capacity and invest in a better CAT tool

The third option is to use the figures she has obtained to make the case for employing a new member of staff to ensure consistency of source texts before they’re sent for translation. Ideally, this option would also include management agreeing to invest in a new, advanced CAT tool that can help check for these inconsistencies.

So far, so good. But which option should Ms Miller go for? The answer depends on her long-term strategy.

Option 1 is the right choice if the aim is quick results. It will certainly make her popular within the Accounts department, though it will also make relations with the translation service provider more strained – they might start charging for the tiny jobs they previously did for nothing to try and get back some of the money they’ve lost.

Summary of option 1:

• Gives Ms Miller a quick career boost
• Not helpful in terms of long-term working relationship with the translation service provider
• The department’s work doesn’t get any easier

Option 2 results in better source texts, reducing the workload for the in-house translation department (and their stress levels). This could also benefit Ms Miller’s career.

Summary of option 2:

• Good for Ms Miller’s career
• Good for the translation department staff
• Good for the business as a whole
• Possibly not good for everyday working relationship with other departments

Option 3 is of worth considering if she urgently needs both a new CAT tool and more capacity in the department and can think of no other way to get them.

Summary of option 3:

• No career boost for Ms Miller, as the big added value for the business is often not immediately obvious
• Long-term benefit for the translation department in the form of the additional staff member
• Good for the business as a whole, as it improves their source texts, helps them save money and optimizes their workflows     

Top tip: If option 3 sounds like the right option for you, we recommended reading the book “Managing Up”.

Ms Miller’s situation shows that there is considerable potential for translation departments to save money and optimize workflows, which in turn can have huge benefits for the business as a whole. But identifying and unlocking this potential requires long-term strategic planning. 

OK, I’m convinced. But what’s the best way to start strategic planning?

To help you get started with strategic planning for your translation department, we’ve created a 4D assessment which will indicate the areas where action is most urgently required.

If we’ve sparked your interest, and you’d like to find out more about how we can help with your translation department’s strategic planning (e.g. with detailed guidance and recommendations), contact us today. We’d be delighted to hear from you!