Category: LangOps

Nonprofit Translation Services: Supporting the LEP Community

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

Throughout history, lack of access to adequate healthcare information has left the Limited English Proficient (LEPs) community vulnerable.  The Great Pandemic of 1918 (Spanish Flu) illustrated racial and ethnic disparity in mortality rates that have echoed since.

The SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) epidemic in 2003, despite its relatively quick containment, presented the same issues for LEPs. Piedmont Global team member David Evseeff reflects on his experience, noting ‘I know the feeling when it comes to being in a foreign country during a pandemic (SARS, when I lived in Taiwan) and needing to get information. Now, fortunately, I spoke fluent Chinese at the time, so it wasn’t an issue so much for me, but for many of my expat compatriots, they had no idea what was going on or what the instructions were that the government was providing.’ 

Likewise, in 2009, Spanish and Chinese speaking members of the LEP community found it more difficult to access proper information relating to H1N1 (Swine Flu). In fact ‘In 2017, a major report confirmed what we expected: People with limited English proficiency do not receive adequate health information, which ultimately exacerbates health disparities.’ These frightening examples underscore the vital role that equal access to critical healthcare communications plays in times of crisis.

 

Discrimination Reform: Title VI, Civil Rights Act of 1964

In an effort to curb intentional discrimination, the US Government enacted Title VI as a part of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964. Under Title VI, national origin discrimination against LEP persons was prohibited.

It is during times of crisis, like the COVID-19 pandemic, that exemplifies the critical role of meaningful access to health and government communications for all Americans. Rather than a matter of congeniality, failure to provide equal access has proven to be a matter of safety and security. As such, unbiased inclusion should be a priority, and not weighed against supposed cost. For example, resources expended to provide ASL interpreters for press conferences are vastly outweighed by the price paid for failing to do so. Avoiding ineffective communication and the associated negative impacts on our society are paramount.

Advancements made in support of eliminating discrimination recently took a fatal blow when the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) announced the administration’s intent to roll back protections from discrimination for certain individuals seeking medical care, most notably those with LEP.

With the government coming under fire for limiting LEPs ability to protect themselves, many LEPs are turning to trusted local community groups and nonprofit organizations that advocate for immigrants to get the information they need. Needless to say, the efforts of these organizations have been, and will continue to be, invaluable in the effort to protect the 1 in 5 Americans classified as LEP. Unfortunately, many of these organizations are small, maintain limited budgets, and often rely on federal grants to support their services. With the federal and state governments failing to provide the necessary language resources for the LEP community, these organizations are struggling to bridge the gap with limited resources and funding.

 

Nonprofit Language Services: How Piedmont Global Can Help

By ensuring equal access to vital communications, we can mitigate miscommunication errors that lead to strained resources, delays in service, higher costs, and public scrutiny. Specifically, as we continue to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic, timely and effective communication can positively impact containment much more effectively and ultimately kickstart our economy much faster than by leaving a significant portion of our population (approx 25 million people) ‘in the dark’, unprotected and less equipped.

Piedmont Global has been providing language solutions to community organizations, nonprofits, and NGOs since its inception in 2013. Our clients include educational and relief organizations, advocacy groups, as well as civic and trade organizations to name a few. This experience has proven that efficient response in times of need is paramount, especially for members of the LEP community.

At Piedmont Global, every word matters. In support of this mission, we are committing to do more to keep the lines of communication open. Contact us today to find out how we can help.

The Importance of Terminology in Legal Translations

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

With our world becoming more connected each day, business transactions and even legal proceedings are now regularly considered cross border affairs. However, this globalization doesn’t change the highly specific rules and regulations that need to be adhered to within each unique legal jurisdiction. That’s where legal translators come in. Whether we realize it or not, we interact with legal translations on a daily basis. From translated terms & conditions for services or apps we use on our smartphones, to international banking and even online shopping. These translations are vital to the smooth operation of international trade and cross border travel that we, in this digital age, often take for granted.

Legal translation is an integral part of society, ensuring a smooth transition between legal systems. Translating marketing content from one language into another requires insight into how the target market thinks and feels, and how to resonate with them on a personal level. This creativity is matched in legal translations with a demand for accuracy so high that some translators must first be court-approved and can be called to testify to the accuracy of their translations of important legal documents. This is a highly-specialized niche with expertly trained and experienced translators (and interpreters).

 

How is Legal Translation Different from General Translation?

Legal translation is the translation of documents from one language to another that are used in a legal context. It often means translating legal documents from one legal system for use in a completely different one. Legal structures can vary widely between regions, let alone countries and sometimes even continents. The pressure is truly on to produce 100% accurate results that are fit for purpose, the first time. It’s vital that only qualified, experienced professionals work on these types of documents. After all, the resulting translated texts will be used as an aid in the making of legally binding decisions. They can have a significant real life impact. The consequences of failure are so severe that mistranslation of a legal document could spell disaster for a case, induce huge financial losses, or even come at a human cost.

 

Types of Legal Translations

  • Legal translators deal with a wide variety of legal documents; beginning with the more straightforward educational certificates such as degrees, identification documents like passports, birth, marriage and death certificates, but also including things like work permits, divorce decrees, etc.
  • Next, are more complex court-related documentation for use in international court cases. Businesses of all sizes regularly require the translation of their important documentation when entering new regional markets or entering into cross border trade deals with foreign businesses. These types of translations can include trade contracts, shareholder books, or even company registration information for trade licenses and rely on an in depth understanding of international trade law.
  • Finally, legal translators are often called upon to translate documents for criminal and civil proceedings being transferred from one country’s legal jurisdiction to another, or even cases involving Limited English Proficient (LEP) individuals in the United States who, by law, are afforded language access services. From important witness statements to court records, arrest warrants to evidence files and more; these documents must be translated to be appropriate for use within the new legal structure in which they will be used, without compromising their meaning in any way. There is far less room for interpretation in the area of legal translation than in any other.

 

Legal Terminology

No one would be surprised to learn that legal documents tend to be laden with legal jargon and specialized terminology, difficult to understand and often convoluted in the way they are written. This is done in an attempt to avoid any possible misunderstandings or create unintentional loop holes with the use of vague language. Learning to proficiently comprehend and write legal documents requires a great deal of training and experience. Likewise, the job of a legal translator demands not only fluency in each language, but also a comprehensive understanding of the legal processes in multiple regions.

 

No Two Legal Systems are the Same

The art of translating across language barriers and legal systems is one that bears significant risk. Legal documents themselves can seem impossible to decipher to an untrained eye. The legal translator must similarly ensure that their translation adheres to the same standard of accuracy demanded in any legal documentation, while also compensating for any differences in the legal systems of the two texts.

For example, in the US, the tone of legal documentation is usually straight to the point, utilizing a very active tone of voice. In contrast, legal documents in the UK use a much more passive tone, relying on the content of the text to convey the appropriate importance of any given piece. Here, the difficult task of balancing these responsibilities becomes apparent, especially when translating from one language into another.

Legal systems can also vary in the actual laws applicable in a given context. Some laws may not exist or could differ a great deal between countries. This is referred to as ‘private international law’, or more commonly as a ‘conflict of laws’. To achieve accurate translations that are error free and make sense to those trained in a different legal system, legal translators must rely on their understanding of each system and the terminologies utilized in both.

 

Legal Terms can Cause Confusion

For example, the terms ‘trial’ and ‘hearing’ in the US and UK legal systems respectively can refer to the same stages during similar proceedings. While, in the US, every criminal prosecution has the option of a jury trial, the same is not true in the UK. In the UK, there are stages to the proceedings which include magistrate hearings over a full trial. In translating between these two legal systems, even with a shared language, seemingly straightforward terminology can cause confusion.

 

Using Logical Reasoning

In the translation of legal documents, it’s not just terminology that translators must contend with. With each translation, everyday expressions and colloquialisms in one language must be accurately translated into the target language while keeping in mind the appropriateness of the language used. An innocuous statement in the source language could be offensive in another. A translator must also be vigilant for mistakes in the source text, as undetected errors could cause unintentional miscommunications and ultimately have dire consequences.

 

Mistakes are Never Worth the Risk

Your company may be liable if there are mistakes. To make sure this doesn’t happen, it’s imperative to employ only the most experienced, certified legal translators. It requires years of training and experience to develop the skills and knowledge required to translate legal documents. For your peace of mind, all Piedmont Global legal translators are both highly-skilled native speaking linguists, with the legal expertise necessary to translate your documents with the utmost accuracy. Get in touch with our team to learn more.

How to Localize Your Software: Key Tips for Success

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

We are fortunate today to live in a richly diverse, multicultural society with a high degree of interconnectivity as afforded by the internet. Due to the digital nature of our world, the need for efficient software localization is a priority now more than ever before. The benefits of mastering this process are clear, by allowing each of your target audiences their own language and culturally specific user experience, you ensure they feel just as catered for as your original language market.

Many localization attempts are fraught with frustration when the proper steps are skipped or missed. User experience is paramount, no one appreciates garbled text, language encoding that doesn’t “look” right, concatenation of texts or mismatched formatting. To foster trust in your product with your consumer base, your software must function just as comfortably in any language offering as it does in your native tongue.

Successful software localization requires taking into consideration the localization process while developing the software structure, particularly, but not limited to, all of the user facing components. Here we will take a look at some tips for a smooth and efficient software localization process, setting you up for international success.

 

Plan Ahead

Most software developers are all too aware that forward planning is an absolute necessity, as only rarely does everything go exactly as expected. It would be a mistake to take a relaxed approach to localization of your software, assuming this is to be a secondary step after the initial coding has been completed in the source language. Rather, software localization should be proactively considered from the beginning, planned for and executed by a team of professional linguists in tandem with your development team. If you don’t know where to start, it is recommended to seek the advice from localization experts on how to best develop your software for localization from the point of design.

While localization of software can indeed occur upon completion of the initial development phase, this will cause unnecessary fixing of issues that could have been avoided if localization was kept in mind to start with. Ideally, throughout your design and development process, you should consider any and all segments of your program that may require localization to ensure the end quality of your product in any possible language.

 

Start Small and Scale Up

If you’re not sure if your product will perform, there is always the option to start small and scale up. By launching an impeccably localized product page, you can dip your toes in the water and expand from there.

 

Internationalize

Internationalization is a crucial step to preparing your software for straightforward localization.

The source code should be created with this in mind, separating any potentially localizable components (sound and image files, text strings, even some formats) into folders and files which can then be easily translated and localized by your linguistic team without the necessity for editing the source code.

Similarly, the source code should use a string identifier and the selected language to show the user the required text string, rather than relying on hard coded strings. XML is a good option for this, but there are plenty of database options to choose from. By providing ample comments on strings you will allow your translators insight into the context in which they will be used, to better choose the right translation. Keeping a good file structure for your localizable content is also advisable, for efficient collaboration between your development and linguistic teams.

It is best to connect with a reputable localization partner as soon as possible, who will seamlessly integrate with your development team; working in tandem on your software project, saving you both time and money, not to mention a lot of needless stress.

 

Text Expansion and Contraction Across Languages

Always leave plenty of room for text expansion in your software design. Regardless of how long your original language text may be, this can vary significantly across languages, with many taking between 130-300% more space than English text. You can avoid embarrassing user interface “clunkiness” by allowing for such expansion of localized texts in your original design. This is of particular benefit when working on mobile platforms, designed for smaller screens. In this instance, flexible design can be your saving grace, allowing for seamless integration of many languages.

 

Avoid Hardcoding Time, Date, and Currency Formats

Always be aware of formatting differences in currency, date and time between regions. The obvious example of this is the difference between the UK and USA date formatting where the former uses DAY/MONTH/YEAR while the latter prefers MONTH/DAY/YEAR. There are also other variations between regions, such as which day the week ‘begins’. These will all have a significant impact on user experience and should be considered during development to avoid the headache of changing segments of source code later on. Using locale formatting for these elements will allow your linguistic team themselves to choose what is most appropriate for their language.

A great way to avoid any missed errors in this area would be to undergo “pseudo localization”; replacing language specific text as an easily visible repeated letter such as ‘XXXXXXXX’. This can help you better visualize any hard-coded strings that are not yet properly defined in string tables.

 

Include Punctuation

Avoid the common pitfall of leaving out punctuation to add it in later. Though this can be a tempting approach to “save time”, it can wreak havoc on your localization efforts, as punctuation can have a big impact on sentence meaning in different languages. By leaving it in, you assure that your translations are on point.

 

Avoid Concatenation

Concatenation of sentence strings can make life easier when developing your software in English or for just one region, but as word combinations and even word order in sentences are rarely the same across languages, therefore it is always preferable to work with whole strings for easier localization.

 

Encoding Strings

A great tip is to make sure your software expects texts in the universal standards in text encoding, to avoid mixed up text, extra time resolving bugs or unnecessary extra conversion steps.

 

Test Your Localized Software

This crucial final step in the localization process will give you targeted feedback from your new language markets, allowing you to fix any issues that your audience may finds ‘un-user friendly’. It’s important to thoroughly test the final version of your localized software, just as it was tested in the original language. Have your software tested by native speakers of your target language before launch, who are best placed to flag any potential user experience issues or inappropriate content. You can reuse your English test plan to avoid delays, but there really is no comparison to reviewing your localization efforts ‘in context’ to ensure a perfect end product.

 

Choose the Right Localization Partner

The most important tip for localization success is to choose your team well. By partnering with an experienced, professional localization team, you can achieve optimum results for smooth integration of your software into any language.

At Piedmont Global, our specialized localization team are on hand to provide an unrivalled service that will feel like an extension of your own team. Together, we can build intuitive software that resonates with each of your target markets as though it was created just for them.

Software localization is your key to opening the door of new exciting markets across the world. From the fledgling stages of development to the global launch of your final product, it’s worth doing right. Get in touch with our team to get started.

Machine Translation – How to Use it in Your Company

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

Machine translation is the use of automated software to convert text from one language to another. Perhaps the most common is the use of Google Translate by the general public to translate simple words and phrases when they encounter them in their daily lives. In this post, we’re going to examine machine translation, and its uses in business.

 

Understanding Machine Translation

There are three approaches to machine translation available, all of which face the biggest
challenge in translation: the complexity of human language. Each approach relies on a different set of rules and applications, and vary in the levels of complexity they can manage.

 

Rule-Based Machine Translation

The simplest means of translating is to rely on the grammar and syntax of a language. This has limits, of course: the ways in which people communicate varies wildly from country to country, even when speaking the same language. People are also prone to writing differently to how they speak, presenting challenges in what they mean before translating a word or phrase.

 

Statistical Systems

Pattern matching and statistics are a step-up from the rule-based approach, but statistical
systems suffer from a lack of grammar and other rules of language to follow. Rather, statistical systems choose the most likely words to be suitable.

 

Neural Machine Translation

Designed to learn a language, neural machine translation is a costly but effective approach.
Neural machine translation is used to teach software other languages, at the cost of computing power. As a continually developing method, neural machine translation offers the most potential in the future, with the capacity to learn – and teach – languages in increasing complexity over time.

 

When Not to Use Machine Translation

There are two cases when you should avoid machine translation, and both rely on intention and meaning: legal and medical documents, and text used in branding. With the risk of mistakes still possible with machine translation, it is recommended that when a person’s health and/or well-being is at risk that human translators are used. This is to avoid the accidental misinterpretation of an instruction, medical condition, or legal clause, for example, that could have drastic consequences. At the same time, efforts to ensure branding is consistent should be married with distrust of machine translation in changing a slogan or marketing post from English into another language.

 

What Is Machine Translation For?

Machine translation still has many uses. Volume work – for example, reviews on a website – can be completed with more ease when utilizing machine translation instead of human translators. Simple text, and text with a low priority, can be translated using machine translation, while reserving more important stories for human translators.

 

Advice Going Forward

The primary advice that can be offered when it comes to using machine translation is to
combine it with translation services provided by companies and individuals. The prioritization of tasks and texts means choosing the solution that is best for your company; while machine translation may be faster, the potential for a mistake to be made is too high for many documents.

By combining human and machine translation, you have a second set of eyes – physical or digital – on your most important documents. The use of neural machine translation in particular is useful to developing text that requires fewer amendments as it is exposed to more writings.

 

How To Choose

As you contemplate the utility of machine translation, remember to consider the creative capacity of human translators in interpreting text accurately. Combined with the specific costs tied to each method of translation, and a deadline, making a translation decision can be difficult. Get in touch with our team to make the right decision for your business.

Government Document Translation – What Is It and How Is It Done?

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

With the world getting smaller day by day, it’s no wonder that government document translation is becoming even more important. And, it’s not just internal communication between foreign nations – citizens who may not necessarily be proficient in the country’s language rely on the government for all different kinds of information. So, how is it all handled and how can LSPs like ourselves help?

 

Government Document Translation Requires Expertise

Not just anyone can translate for the government. Depending on which agency you’re translating for, there may be certain requirements and regulations. For example, some translators are required to have a security clearance, whereas others may need a different kind of expertise, such as military/defense, economics, or open-source intelligence. It is important that your translation provider understands all of these varying requirements so they can pick the right kind of team for your project.

 

You’ll Need A Wide Array of Languages

With government document translation, you’re going to need a wide array of languages. You can’t just rely on languages like Spanish to get you by. You might need indigenous languages,  such as Quechua and Guarani, or Middle and Far Eastern languages like Khmer or Farsi. Trying to find professional, qualified resources for some of these languages can be tough, but they can be sourced by reputable and experienced firms.

 

What Types of Services are Needed?

From translating government health materials to dealing with court issues, there are so many different needs for government document translation services. Immigration is an area that has a huge need for multilingual documentation services, where translators are under a great deal of pressure. One mistranslation could be the difference between someone being denied their visa/asylum, which is why quality is so vital. Then you’ve got the likes of business law, international diplomacy, and everything else related to international development.

 

Why Piedmont Global?

While there are many different agencies out there who specialize in government document translation services, Piedmont Global is able to offer a wide array of services in all major world languages, including many of the extremely low-density languages mentioned above. Moreover, while we specialize in document translation, we can help with interpreting, language analysts, and even language training classes, meaning we’re truly your “one-stop-shop” for all things language-related. Get in touch with our team to learn more.

Pharmaceutical Translation: Everything You Need to Know

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

 

Medications and pharmaceuticals are something we all need and make the most of. However, how are pharmaceutical translations handled? When documentation this important can have a direct impact on someone’s life, it is vital that pharmaceutical translations are handled the right way.

 

Choosing the right team for your pharmaceutical translations

When you’re dealing with medical translations and pharmaceutical translations, you have to make sure you work with experts in the medical industry. Translators need to have a mix of linguistic and pharmaceutical expertise so that they know how to deal with the technical terminology and industry regulations.

 

Regulations

When pharmaceutical companies look to expand the reach of their products, there are a number of different rules and regulations with which they have to comply. In other words, medications are required to go through an exhaustive approval process and multilingual documentation plays a vital role in that process. When you’re dealing with these regulations and regulatory agencies, you have to make sure that you meet the requirements of:

  • The Food And Drug Administration
  • The European Medicines Agency
  • Ethics Committees
  • Review Boards

 

Types of Pharmaceutical Translations

There are a number of different types of pharmaceutical translations that all need to be handled with the utmost attention to detail and subject matter expertise. The following services are some of the types of translations you might find yourself handling if you’re from a pharmaceutical company:

  • Glossary development
  • Document translations, including making sure they meet regulations
  • Clinical trial documentation
  • Medications
  • Medical devices
  • Source text editing
  • In-country validation
  • Back translation
  • Readability testing for patient information leaflets

 

Partner with Piedmont Global

As you can see, dealing with pharmaceutical translation services isn’t something that should be taken lightly. You need expertise and industry knowledge, which you can only get from a professional partner.

Piedmont Global is here to help with all of your pharmaceutical translation needs in all major world languages. We’re also here to help and advise you in which route to take to get your pharmaceuticals registered and approved abroad. Get in touch to get started.

Using Bilingual Staff vs. Professional Translators & Interpreters

Posted on by Piedmont Global Marketing

Translation is like a cleaning service – no one notices it when it is done well nor wants to pay for it, but it makes a big splash when things go wrong. It can be highly entertaining to find poorly translated Chinese menu items, like “Assorted Risk Dish / Spicy Bacteria Soup” or “Roasted Husband.” Poor or inaccurate translations can become a serious issue when it concerns matters of life or death. For Willie Ramirez, one word defined the rest of his life. In the case that became known as “the Seventy-One-Million-Dollar-Word,” the incorrect interpretation of the Spanish word “intoxicado” as “intoxicated” — instead of figuring out what this Cuban Spanish word truly means, namely “ill from something ingested” — left Ramirez quadriplegic; a mistranslated word rendered the wrong diagnosis that resulted in the wrong treatment.

Bilingual ≠ Professional Translator

 

There are certain situations when having a bilingual staff member can be highly beneficial and does not create any legal, ethical, or technical concerns. For instance, many bilingual employees would be happy to offer their insight into the company’s foreign-language content. It’s very convenient to be able to turn to a coworker who can help discern whether an email in Chinese is an actual inquiry from a potential client in Singapore or another candidate for the spam folder. A conscientious French-speaking colleague will keep you from over-ordering at a business lunch, because they know that entrée — what most of us assume is the main dish — is actually just the first course on a French menu.

For tasks that are somewhat more complicated than filtering spam or ordering lunch, it is best to remember that translation and interpreting are highly-specialized career fields requiring extensive training and experience. Professional translators and interpreters spend years honing their skills and do not take any assignments lightly. Most choose a particular area of specialization, becoming subject matter experts (SMEs) in their field of study.  For example, medical translators will not generally venture to translate legal texts, court interpreters will not be able to take medical interpreting projects, and conference interpreters will not translate works of literature. There are countless hours of not only language training, but also professional, ethical, and continued specialized education that goes into building proficiency not only in a particular language, but also in a specific subject matter.

Here are some (by far not exhaustive) reasons why your bilingual staff is NOT your best language resource:

 

1. Bilingualism ≠ Proficiency

Being able to understand more than one language is not the same as being able to convey messages between them in a coherent and idiomatically appropriate fashion, or be able to fully express oneself in both. Many people who are fortunate to be bilingual are stronger in one language over the other. They might be able to understand a second language, and may even be able to speak several phrases, but are not able to carry on a basic conversation in it. Some bilinguals can understand both languages fully, but will struggle for words when trying to render their understanding to others. Even the most fluent bilinguals are not trained as writers to render a smooth translated version of the original text in keeping with its tone, register, or level of formality, or as interpreters, to be able to know how and when to take notes and how to train the memory to retain just enough information to interpret successfully and accurately.

 

2. Translation and Interpreting Require Subject Matter Knowledge

Being able to successfully interpret or translate content between languages does not happen outside of the message context. Even the most fluent bilingual will struggle to correctly convey conversations on macroeconomics or real estate, or to translate papers in nanophysics if they are not proficient in those subjects. Professional translators and interpreters spend a large amount of their time researching and preparing for every project they take on in order to provide the highest quality of work. They understand their responsibility to be accurate and relevant. Communicating incorrect or imprecise information could have severe financial, legal, or safety impacts.

 

3. Quality Translation is Based in Cultural Knowledge

Bilingualism does not always mean biculturalism. Someone who was born in Spain and moved to the United States as a young child could reasonably maintain both Spanish and English languages and be fully fluent in both. However, their knowledge of the culture of origin might not be as deep as their knowledge of the language. Conversely, language professionals make it a point to study and stay in tune with the cultures of their professional languages. They stay up to date with the latest news in those languages, they know proper ways to refer to geographical, political, economic, and social concepts in those languages and can explain any lack of equivalents of such concepts between the languages.

Professional linguists also work hard not to fall prey to false cognates – those “false friends of interpreters” that may sound alike across different languages, but indeed mean very different things. For example, an English speaker may recognize the Spanish word “embarazada” as “embarrassed” when indeed it means “pregnant.” A “sensible” person would mean different things for English, Spanish, and French speakers – one would be “reasonable” in English, but “sensitive” in French and Spanish.

 

4. HR Rules

Often, it is just as simple as remembering an employee’s job description. A person is hired based on their qualifications to do a particular job. Unless that job has to do with foreign language knowledge, as convenient as it may seem at the time, it is best not to fall into the temptation of using that sideline language talent and to hire a professional linguist instead. An organization can open itself up to all sorts of employee and client discontent (not to mention liability) when trying to skimp on the proper resources for a project or task. To keep your employees and customers satisfied and to avoid any legal or ethical violations, it is best to remember what qualifications and requirements fall within a job description and stick to those.

Would you ask a plumber to fix your tooth? A math teacher to diagnose your dog? An interior decorator to make you a dress? A mechanic to cater your next party? That’s not to say they couldn’t! There are plenty of amazingly talented people who seem to be able to do it all, and with equal professionalism and grace. Yet they cannot be reasonably expected to excel and be proficient at something other than what they are hired to do. The same is true for the translating and interpreting professions – there are experts you can trust and expect to give you their highest quality of service. Save yourself a headache (and a bunch of money from correcting mistakes) – hire one!