What are the values of a good translation?

In the progressive integration of today’s business, the importance of quality translation has been evaluated more properly. There used to be an assumption that a multilingual person is certainly a good translator, which is absolutely incorrect. Very often do enterprises utilize in-house employees in translation task, but this should only be limited to a few projects whereby translation of medium precision is acceptable. It is highly recommended to have a professional involvement in important and/or big projects, leading to the fast development of several translation companies and agencies. Why is a good translation so essential? What is the impact of a poor translation? Why should we not underestimate such a job which sounds simple enough for a person speaking multiple languages?

1.    Ensuring effective communication
Good communication plays such an obviously important role in all aspects of life. It is a tool in ensuring productivity and retaining strong relationships at all levels. The world without communication would be a complete chaos. Culture could not be transmitted, commerce exchange could not be made and so on. Effective communication is at the same time exceptionally crucial in the workplace. Employers who are capable of delivering clear communication will rapidly gain trust among employees while poor communication can form negativity. Translation is a communication process, thus, its influence is as vital. Precise translation will ease the chance of possible misunderstanding. In a foreign company, all directions and requests must be translated correctly so that staff can implement, while collaboration can only proceed if a good translation is provided when working with a foreign partner.
In addition, good communication in general and good translation, in particular, is the only way to enhance relationship and partnership. A wrong translation will deliver a totally different message, which not only results in a loss of the relationship but also leads to other potential risks.

2.    Boosting working performance
A good translation is also a stimulation for better working performance. In nowadays business, foreign elements have more and more engaged in a domestic market, which means you will have more chances of working with foreigners. Precise translation will bring great motivation for staff when being able to understand their foreign boss’s encouragement or receiving helpful advice from overseas colleagues. Besides, how can an international enterprise move forward without employees understanding thoroughly its vision and mission?

Quality translation reduces much time consumption in your work. Along with the development of technology, the internet has become a store of knowledge for you to do research and study. However, without accuracy, extracting information from the internet will be a total disaster. Precise translation helps you understand the information without looking up, again and again, the information on various websites. Similarly, email, a popular communication way these days, requires correct translation to reduce much of user’s time sending back and forth for clarifications. Working performance certainly decreases when the time is wasted otherwise.

3.    Building a professional image 
Most companies invest a considerable budget and time to ensure that all their written products in line with their direction, and translated texts are not exceptional. Their caution is for a reason.  There are many cases whereby an error in translation was made and caused the corporation a huge loss of million dollars. Even big brands such as Pepsi, KFC, Coca-Cola have been made miserable due to a lack of context attention when having their marketing materials translated. The important thing is that the following consequence of this mistake was not just a failed marketing campaign, but the image of the whole corporation was tremendously damaged.

Moreover, correct translation also shows your respect to readers speaking that specific language. Not many things annoy people as much as non-sense or meaningless texts. It would be better not translated at all rather than negligently done.

4.    Promoting future development 
Another value of good translation is to keep you up with what is happening around the world. Since everything is changing rapidly in this dynamic life, you will be left behind if not updating yourself with the current trends. Everything now has gone online. Frequently will you find translated news and information when you search through the internet? If they are not correct, the information you just read is absolutely useless.

The expansion is a must for any company or it will find a lot of difficulties thriving in the competitive market.  Finding a new suitable market is not easy, but being able to access its habitats is even harder. Quality translation is the only way to ensure your products or services can reach to foreign customers by localizing marketing materials. Again, it was stated that wrongly translated marketing materials will lead to a complete disaster.

There are a lot more to say about the true values of good translation. Language has its undeniable role and so does the translation. This fast integration scenery makes correct translation even important than it has ever been. Do not waste your and others’ time in poor translation. Time is money, hence, invest wisely.