Why Your Translation Vendor Should Be ISO Certified

To enjoy the best translation services possible, you need a provider with an objective, measurable standard of high quality. ISO certification provides this elite standard, but fewer than 1 percent of all translation companies worldwide have achieved it. McElroy is one of them.

 This infographic describes our commitment to quality management and details the minimum quality objectives we’ve implemented for the benefit of our clients.

Doing Business in Argentina

Are you currently doing business in Argentina, or do you plan to in the near future? Consider this…

• Argentina is the eighth-largest country by landmass worldwide, and the second-largest country in South America after Brazil.
• Argentina has the third-largest economy in Central and South America with a high GDP per capita, and it’s is one of the G-20 major economies.
• Argentina is a country founded on immigration with strong remnants of European cultures. Though Spanish is the official language, English, Italian, German, and French are commonly spoken.
• Argentina is a major agricultural producer. The country is the third-largest beef exporter in the world after Brazil and Australia. Other major industries include consumer durables, motor vehicles, textiles, petrochemicals, printing, metallurgy, and steel.
• Argentina is one of the top media markets in Central and South America. It has more than 150 daily newspapers and dozens of commercial radio and TV stations. One of the newspapers, Clarín is the best-selling daily in South America and has the second-highest number of subscribers among Spanish-speaking countries.

With diverse cultures based on European influences and strong economic pull in the region, Argentina is attractive to foreign businesses. However, Argentina has many social and cultural differences compared to the United States. Here are some pointers for successful business relationships!

Important tips

• Most of the population considers themselves Roman Catholic, which influences basic perceptions and behaviors.
• Argentines have a different naming structure from other Spanish-speaking countries. They use their father’s surname instead of using both parents’ surnames. When you address people, use job titles with surnames. If your counterpart does not have a professional title, use Mr., Mrs., or Miss with their surnames.
• Both men and women commonly greet one another by shaking hands and nodding slightly. Close friends kiss each other on the cheek.
• Compared to North Americans, Argentines speak at a closer distance. If an Argentine puts his or her hand on your shoulder or lapel, don’t be offended. Patting on the shoulder is an expression of friendship.
• If you give gifts bearing your company logo, the logo should not be obvious. Also, do not give knives; knives signify the end of a friendship.
• Eating food in the street or on public transportation is considered rude.

Appointments

• Appointments should always be made ahead of time.
• When going to a business meeting, be on time and be prepared to wait patiently. Important people tend to arrive later than the scheduled start time.
• If you are invited to a social event, ask what time you are expected to show up, not what time the event begins.
• Keeping irregular business hours is common for executives. Argentine executives often work late, so scheduling a business meeting in the evening is quite acceptable.

Negotiations

• Make personal contacts who can refer you to business prospects and focus on building your relationship with a prospect before doing business. The higher the level of the prospect, the better.
• When you are doing business with the Argentine government, you need to have an Argentine contact to introduce you to them. Without this intermediary, you are unlikely to get an appointment.
• The country is based on bureaucracy; negotiation processes are slower than in the United States. Even after a final decision maker agrees to a contract, that person still needs to get approval from other people.
• Argentines can be stubborn and have a decided tendency to avoid risk. Expect little yielding in negotiations.
• Before you sign your final contract, you should be prepared to renegotiate items.

Entertaining

• Business dinners are common and usually held in restaurants. However, except Buenos Aires, business lunches are uncommon; most people still prefer to go home for lunch.
• Argentines do not mention business over meals. They believe meals are social events.
• Dinner is not served before 10:00 p.m. If you have a meeting from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m., you will be offered pastries, tea, or coffee. It is polite to accept the offer.
• Flowers (especially bird of paradise flowers), imported chocolates, and whiskey are the most popular gifts when you are invited to an Argentine’s home. Since Argentina is a major producer of leather, don’t bring leather as a gift.
• Argentina has the world’s second-highest consumption rate of beef. Many Argentines eat meat twice a day, and most dishes include beef.
• Argentina has great liquors, including wine. Also, domestic products are cheaper than imported. Usually a host pays for the meals, so don’t order imported liquor without the host’s suggesting it.
• Don’t pour wine with your left hand; it is considered an insult.

For your business document translation needs in Argentina, contact McElroy Translation. Visit our website to learn more about how we can help you and your company become successful in your international business ventures.

Morrison, Terri, and Wayne A. Conaway (2006). Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands, 2nd edition. Massachusetts: Adams Media Corporation.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ar.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Argentina
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/country_profiles/1192478.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_in_Argentina#Newspapers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_beef

McElroy’s In-Country Review Process

It has often been noted that a key characteristic of language translation is its handcrafted nature. While machine translation has its place, depending upon the quality of the desired deliverable, human judgment and terminology preferences are translation issues we consider carefully in our industry.

We also regard our relationship with our clients as a partnership and suggest that a dialogue on terminology preferences serves both parties. It should come as no surprise that a one-to-one correspondence between two languages does not always exist—just as synonyms exist in the English language, they can also be found in target translated languages.

Within industries, companies, even divisions, terminology preferences abound. Taking an example from the project management realm, the business of deconstructing a project at its completion can be referred to as a postmortem, a project wrap, a post-project review, etc.

We strongly recommend in-country reviews on the client side, when schedules and resources allow it. Although referred to as “in-country,” these are often performed by a colleague who speaks the target language and is familiar with the terminology choices, often regarding proprietary products and processes, in use in that language within the company. Reviewing such preferences allows us to incorporate them into our translation memory database, so that continuous upgrades in customizing output can be achieved.

Another helpful technique to ensure the vendor uses the client’s terminology consistently is the development of a pre‑project glossary—a list of terms that are selected either by the client or the vendor, and then translated and reviewed by client-side resources. This process is often less daunting than a full in-country review, but can yield significant results in customization. Ideally, both a glossary and final review can be undertaken; in either case, the gains in both productivity and customer satisfaction accrue over time, meaning that such reviews take progressively less time to complete.

McElroy Translation’s In-Country Review Policy

McElroy Translation will coordinate one in-country review per translation provided that the In-Country Review Guidelines are followed.

·         McElroy Translation should be informed at the time the initial translation is requested that an in-country review will be performed.

·         In-country review comments must be sent to McElroy Translation within 3 months of the translation delivery date.

·         McElroy Translation will review the in-country reviewer’s comments and report back to the client so the client can make a determination on how to proceed.

·         Charges to implement in-country review changes will be determined on a case-by-case basis.

·         McElroy Translation will determine if in-country review changes constitute corrections to errors.

·         When McElroy Translation agrees to implement a client’s in-country review changes, the client takes responsibility for the quality of the resulting translation.

In-Country Review Guidelines

The following guidelines must be adhered to:

·         The in-country reviewer must review the translation against the original English document. The reviewer should not make changes that alter the meaning of the translation when compared with the original English document.

·         If more than one in-country reviewer is used, all the reviewers’ comments must be consolidated into one document before being sent to McElroy Translation.

·         Reviewer comments must be specific and must clearly indicate what the reviewer wants added, deleted, or changed as well as the specific alternative wording the reviewer is suggesting.

·         Reviewer comments must be made in the appropriate file format, as shown in the table below, or McElroy Translation will charge the client to create the necessary files for processing the corrections:

To learn more about how to optimize your in-country review experience, check out our webinar, Tips for optimizing your in-country review experience.

Doing Business in Spain

Currently doing business in Spain, or plan to in the near future? Consider this…

✓ Spanish is the world's second most spoken language.

✓ Spain has an incredible tourist industry as one of the top 5 most visited countries in the world. In 2007, there were nearly 60 million foreign visitors.

✓ Spain is the world’s 14th largest economy and one of the top ten bond markets worldwide.

✓ Major industries include textiles and apparel, food and beverages, metal manufacturing, chemicals, shipbuilding, automobiles, machine tools, tourism, clay and refractory products, pharmaceuticals, and medical equipment.

As a strong economic power and one of the most visited countries, Spain is quite attractive to many foreign businesses. However, Spain has a number of social and cultural differences from other countries that you must be aware of.

Important tips

• Spaniards respect doing business with assertive and distinguished counterparts. Be careful not to become overtly friendly too quickly, and never underestimate a Spaniard based on their perceived role in the organization. Make sure to address your counterparts with their titles and last names.
• Many businesses in Spain have a hierarchical system of management where groups or teams answer to a clear leader. Individuals within a department can make recommendations to their supervisor, but are not allowed to make decisions. Departments tend to be segregated from one another, so quite often line employees and lower management may not understand what happens within other departments.
• 94% of the population practices some level of Catholicism, and religion strongly influences basic perceptions and behaviors. Because of this, Spaniards often make decisions based on subjective feelings.
• Women are considered completely equal under the law and are often leaders in education, politics, and the general workforce.
• Do not give gifts that could be perceived as a vehicle for your company’s logo. If you give flowers, avoid dahlias or chrysanthemums which are related to death.
• The “okay” hand signature in the United States, making an “O” shape with your thumb and index fingers, is considered vulgar.

Appointments

• When going to a business meeting, be on time and be prepared to wait patiently. If it is a social event, ask what time you are expected to show up, not what time the event begins. Make sure if you are planning to schedule an appointment, you do it far in advance and get a confirmation closer to the date.
• Pay attention to national holidays. If you see one falling either on a Tuesday or Thursday, your Spanish counterpart is likely to take a four-day weekend. Additionally, it is common practice to receive 30 days of paid time off, which is typically used during July and August.

Negotiations

• It is definitely about who you know. Make personal contacts who can refer you to business prospects and focus on building your relationship with the prospect before doing business. This will make it easier to be chosen for future business, as well as harder for them to choose someone else.
• Spaniards play it close to the vest. They consider information to be highly valuable and may not be forthcoming with it until it plays in their favor.
• Business meetings will begin with small talk. Be patient and do not push to business topics right away.
• Prepare a business card with Spanish on one side and English on the other side, present the Spanish side when handing it to your counterpart.
• Negotiations can be prolonged. Expect the possibility that you will need to renegotiate areas you believed to be settled previously.

Entertaining

• Do not have a business meeting before 8:30 a.m.
• Spaniards prefer to go home for their midday meal, so do not be offended if your offer to take your counterpart to lunch is declined. If you do have lunch with your counterpart, do not mention business until they bring it up; this will often be at the end of the meal over coffee.
• Dinner is not served before 8:00 p.m., but it can be served as late as 10:00 p.m. From 5:00 to 6:00 p.m., “tapas” fill the gap, which consist of mixed olives, cheese or potato omelets.
• Spaniards typically invite people to their homes, but prefer to dine at a restaurant. If you are invited to a Spaniard’s home, do not feel obligated to accept, often the invitation is simply out of kindness. If they continue to invite you, then you should accept. In this case it is appropriate for you to reciprocate the invitation.

For your business document translation needs in Spain, contact McElroy Translation. Visit our website to learn more about how we can help you and your company become successful in your international business ventures.

Morrison, Terri, and Wayne A. Conaway (2006). Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands, 2nd edition. Massachusetts: Adams Media Corporation.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/sp.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Spain

What is a customer portal and what makes McElroy’s so great?

Many agencies that you work with, from print and product companies to SaaS, will have a customer portal (e.g., user login, client portal) where you can log in and access information for all of your product purchasing and service needs. This is simply a personal account page where you can enter your username and password to get to your account history and profile, as well as view numerous options for conducting business.

 McElroy’s customer portal provides access for requesting quotes, placing orders, uploading source files, downloading completed projects, viewing status reports, and invoicing. The portal that our clients log into is the same portal used in-house to develop quotes, manage orders, assign work to translators and vendors, and track projects. This ensures real-time status updating and ultimate efficiency in project management, thus increasing project expediency without sacrificing McElroy quality.

 So what are the top 5 benefits and reasons why clients love our portal?

 1. Account history: All translation projects have been processed through BusinessManager since January 1, 2011; all data on quotes, orders, and invoices are easily retrievable via secure login. Both source and translated files for projects completed since January 1 are available for download at the client’s convenience. Access to this information allows our clients to reference past project turn times and costs when planning for future projects, as well as providing backups for all past translation project files.

 2. File retrieval: Files are easily uploaded when requesting a quote or placing an order via a browse option. Files are also easy to locate along with each record they correspond with for downloading via the portal upon completion of the project. The BusinessManager folder structure is set up by language/locale combination for clarity on multilingual projects.

 3. Status reports: The progress of a quote, order, or invoice has never been clearer! Clients know when a project manager has received their request and if it is being processed. It is immediately apparent whether a quote is new, in preparation, pending, expired, revised, rejected, accepted, changed to order, or canceled. Order statuses include new, in preparation, in progress, deliverable, delivered, approved, invoiced, paid, or canceled. Additionally, each order references a quote number, and each invoice references both the quote and order number, so clients can easily review each stage of their project.

 And it gets better! For each project the multiple steps or tasks involved are identified as jobs. Each service that will be performed on a project will have a job name associated with it. For example, a standard project may include four jobs: translation, setting up the file, editing/proofing, and shipping. Clients are able to see a project’s status at each individual job level as it progresses through our workflow.

 4. Proactive communication: When a request for a quote is submitted, a client is notified that the request has been received and when to expect the quote. When an order is placed, a confirmation is sent to the client with the expected delivery time. Special requests per project can be made by clients when submitting the quote or order, and all requests specific to a given project are saved on the account level, allowing our clients to make sure that we have all special instructions. All project status information is continuously available, as well as project history dating back to January 1, 2011. By proactively ensuring that our clients have all of this data at their fingertips, we save them the time usually required to request basic information.

 5. Individual and Group login, access hierarchy: Each contact who orders with McElroy will receive a private login, providing access to information regarding projects that have been submitted by that individual. If there are multiple people within a department submitting projects, there will be an additional level that allows managers to view all projects within that department. This makes it possible for them to easily monitor translation volume within the department, as well as fill in for any staff members who may be out, should a quote need to be approved or a project delivered.

 To get started, contact your account representative or customer service for you login information. You can also visit http://bm.mcelroytranslation.com and submit a support ticket requesting your login ID.

Also, for a quick video on how to log in and submit a quote, check out McElroy’s Customer Portal:Getting Started

Want to discover how easy it is to log in and submit a quote? Check out this month's Essentials Videoblog entry McElroy's Customer Portal: Getting Started by Susan Andrus, McElroy's marketing manager.