The statements made and opinions expressed herein reflect only my personal views on the topic under discussion. In no way do they represent or convey the official position or doctrine of any official body or organization of any country on these matters. And I take responsibility for any error, inaccuracy, omission, or misjudgement found herein.

Polish your translation style, and win more jobs from your clients! That’s right-“win” more jobs. Clients have a wealth of resources in the Internet, and they can easily find countless translators online for their projects by doing a simple search in Yahoo! or Google. Minor improvements to your translation style will ensure that clients think of you before going to the major search engines. Read on and profit!

If you do not already have one, start by developing a translation methodology. A methodology, especially one that suits your work style, will enable you to translate more efficiently and accurately. For illustration purposes, I have included below the translation methodology that I use for Japanese to English translations.

Using a systematic approach in translation can help achieve better results. Abiding by a few key principles will lead to translators with better skills who can produce higher quality translations which leads to higher customer satisfaction and higher rates of return.

The quality of the brief from our clients directly affects our ability to achieve their objectives of speed, value for money and effective communication in local markets but, unfortunately, not all clients fully appreciate this connection.

Translation is not only a mechanical work. It requires skills and artistic approach. It's not enough to know all the rules, there are additional secrets of success, which can make your translation better. These several tips will help to improve the quality of your translation and make the process simpler.

1.      Good equipment. Before starting your translation make sure you have all necessary equipment, which can simplify the process of translation. Bilingual dictionaries, encyclopedias, electronic dictionaries, dictionaries of idioms and jargonisms can be very subservient and you will save a big amount of time if you prepare everything in advance.

In the past few years, a new trend has emerged: standardizing procedures for a contractual relationship between the client and the service provider. The idea is this: following certain pre-established procedures when producing a translation will increase the likelihood of good quality.

In fact, the fundamental assumption in quality standards (namely ISO 9000) is that business processes can be improved to ensure the desired level of quality at each pass. And for this approach to work, general criteria are necessary to standardize the production process and appraise the quality level.

ASTM International is one of the largest voluntary standards development organizations in the world, known for its best-in-class practices for standards development and delivery.¹ And in June 2006, it finally published a translation standard, F 2575-06, entitled “Standard Guide for Quality Assurance in Translation.” This guide has been many years in development, an effort wordsed by the American Translators Association (ATA), and is an important new resource for the translation industry and its clients.

 If we examine the word quality, its meaning in the translation world has many possibilities, although they agree on what is the most important. For as many customers, businesses or translators as there may be, quality can be summed up in two words: customer satisfaction. In order to deliver this, though, we come up against a very subjective concept that can be measured by many standards.

When you reach non-U.S. markets, however, the picture is often very different. In many instances (perhaps in the majority of cases), developers spend as little as possible to prepare their software for international markets. They may even relegate QA and functional testing to the “nice to have” category or rely on the companies that provide translation and localization services to do quick spot checks to make sure no major problems are found. When problems are found in localized versions, they may not be fixed, even in the next major release, and there is often a significant time lag between when fixes appear in the localized versions.

The age-old question of “translation quality” tends to run in cycles in the language services industry. Regardless if it is at a peak or a trough, it is always lurking below the waterline. The approaches used by service providers to “guarantee” quality are myriad, which is a direct result of the enigmatic nature of the issue. The only true standard, involving translation quality, is that the claim of “excellent translation,” which is the standard bullet item used by a language service provider (LSP) marketing its services. The fact is that translation quality is in the eye of the reader. In the corporate context it is more apt to say, “Translation quality is in the eye of the one who writes the check.” When starting in the field of corporate translation over 15 years ago, I would have considered such a statement to be vulgar! The passage of time, however, has a way of imposing a pragmatic point of view. Translation quality as defined by the business context and the end-user’s requirements is a perspective which I have come to appreciate, since it is consistent with both the needs of our clients and the marketplace as a whole. This is a critical point to understanding the importance of ISO 9001:2000 certification for LSP’s.

It is the accepted wisdom of the translation world that translation quality, speed and cost are all locked in some sort of zero sum game. Any improvement in one comes at the expense of one or both of the others. If you need to improve quality, translation takes longer and is more expensive due to extra quality assurance steps. If you need quick turnaround, you pay a premium, and if you want cheap, you might as well throw quality and speed out the window. This so-called “quality-speed-cost triangle” is a staple of books on translation and is taught to students of translation around the world.

Based on the triangle, one would expect that implementing a quality assurance (QA) process would improve quality, but raise costs and turnaround time, since it represents an additional process that translation suppliers must carry out. General Motors (GM), however, has found that stressing quality and implementing QA steps as an integral part of the translation process leads not only to significant improvement in quality, but also to dramatic improvements in cost and turnaround time. In this article GM’s Don Sirena, Language Translation Manager in GM’s North American Services and Parts Operations division, reports on how GM utilized the SAE J2450 quality metric to help reduce translation errors by 90%, reduce turnaround time from weeks to days, and lower costs tremendously.

FDA regulations and ICH guidelines both require that "the information that is given to the subject or the representative shall be in language understandable to the subject or the representative." ^{1, 2} Obviously, if an Informed Consent Form (ICF) is written in a language that the subject does not understand, it must be translated into a language the subject does understand.

For every company requiring translation, the need for a quality service with rapid delivery and technical expertise is paramount. This is especially true for clients within the life sciences sector such as Johnson and Johnson, AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline.

As manufacturers of medical and surgical products, these companies export on a global scale and are committed to providing the most accurate information for their intended audience. They also have a legal requirement to produce labelling or instructions in every language spoken within their target markets - Whether prescribed dosage directions or product description, any incorrect translation of this information could be extremely detrimental and potentially fatal.