In-house translations cannot give acceptable quality output that can be used enterprise wide. Whereas, professional translation vendors can assure you of the same.
I have seen few global companies getting their content translated internally with the help of their employees, who know the target language. The reason could be many; one of them being easily available resource (no immediate cost involved), who are familiar with company information. But the question is, are they qualified enough to be depended for professional purposes?
Major Concerns Using Internal Staff for Translations:
No Interest Involved by the Doer:
The person, who is assigned to do translation of a document, most probably views it as an additional job and may not be highly motivated to deliver a high quality output within the given time. In all likelihood, it might be interrupting his/her regular job. Absent-mindedness in the assigned translations and non-performance in the routine tasks will add no value to the company.
Unacceptable Quality:
There are certain standards that need to be maintained while translating the content. A person who is bilingual can only translate the language. But, translation is not completed until back translation is done and the output validated by a reviewer with the original document. It is meant to ensure that the quality of translation is accurate and true to the original. A professional translation service provider follows these steps to maintain standards which may suffer when an isolated person is given charge of the translation. He or she may not have the knowledge on these standards and procedures and the quality of translation may suffer.
Lack of a Sound Knowledge in the Relevant Subject:
If translation is done by a person who does not have expertise in the domain, he cannot translate it seamlessly due to lack of in-depth knowledge in that area. Translating sentences can be done by any bilingual person but, translating concepts can be done by a person who has an experience in working in the given domain. For instance, a sales translation cannot be effective done by an operations executive or manager.
It may appear to be economical to get content translated with available resources in-house, but there is a danger of getting a less quality product and will have huge time overruns. Translating through an experienced translation vendor is a good option to consider. But, how easy or difficult is it to select a good vendor? Follow the next post, to learn about the factors that need to be considered when choosing a translation partner.
