Introducing language technology in the editing process: How to do things right the first time
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The document outlines strategies for integrating language technology into editing processes for technical writing and translations, emphasizing the importance of planning, resource allocation, user involvement, and managing expectations. It covers key topics such as defining strategies and goals, evaluating software solutions, planning budgets, and implementing change management. The document aims to guide organizations in effectively leveraging language technology to enhance communication efficiency, improve quality, and optimize workflows.
Introducing language technology in the editing process: How to do things right the first time
- 1. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Gerald von Stein-Salisbury, Daniel Zielinski
- 2. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 2 Introduction Defining a strategy and setting the goals Managing expectations Defining the requirements Doing proper evaluation Planning implementation and rollout Agenda Planning a budget Managing change Involving the right people Continuous improvement
- 3. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Introduction 3
- 4. “What makes organizations decide to implement a language technology solution for technical editing and technical translations?“ Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 4
- 5. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Pain! 5
- 6. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Language technology in technical editing and translation Authoring tools Schema ST4, TIM RS… Controlled language tools Acrolinx, Congree… Translation management systems Across, Déjà Vu, MemoQ, Memsource, Plunet Business Manager, SDL Trados Studio, Wordbee, Wordfast, XTM, XTRF… Terminology management systems Coreon, EvoTerm, SDL MultiTerm, TermWeb… Machine translation systems Asia Online, Kantan MT, Lucy LT, SDL Language Cloud… Quality assurance tools ErrorSpy, QA Distiller, Verifika, ApSIC Xbench…
- 7. “Implementing a single solution is often seen as a straightforward project. However, it quickly becomes very interesting as well as complicated when integrating the solution into the workflow with other tools.“ Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 7
- 8. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time MDM ERP PIM CMS DAM MAM TMS / TVS CAT CAD / CAE QA tools
- 9. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Defining a strategy and setting the goals 9
- 10. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Strategy – What is the internationalization strategy of the organization? – What is the strategy for technical communication? – What is the role of technical documentation and technical translation in the organization? (core processes vs. support processes, criticality) – What are the publication channels? – What is the translation strategy? (Insourcing vs. outsourcing, centralized vs. decentralized management) – Who are the stakeholders? – What are their responsibilities? – What is the short-term, mid-term, long-term strategy? – … 10
- 11. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Analyze – Where is the biggest potential in terms of • Process optimization • Automation • Savings? – Which parts of the organization will be affected? • Technical documentation • Translation • Product management • Content management • Marketing – Which existing systems will be affected? 11 Implementing language technology is not always the (only) answer! A project to assess the current practice and technology might be in order before jumping to conclusions and kick off a new implementation project.
- 12. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Goals – What are the goals when implementing language technology? • Make communication more effective. • Improve overall efficiency for all people in the organization. • Increase quality. • Save time. • Save money. – Define KPIs 12 Align goals with strategy for i18n, l10n, t9n. Define SMART and realistic goals. Set a clear target (X% cost or time savings)
- 13. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Managing expectations 50%+ productivity increase! 50%+ savings! Increased quality! Faster turnaround time! High degree of automation! Plug and play! Care free! 13
- 14. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing expectations – Example: Authoring tools – Clients expect: • to use authoring tools without any defined processes. • authoring tools to adapt to the organization‘s crazy processes. • that authoring tools work out of the box. • to just dump all existing documentation into the new tool and do some magic. • the authoring tool to render the documentation in any complex layout. • to get high quality documentation for only a fraction of the standard price. • to use an authoring tool without any training. • … 14
- 15. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing expectations – Example: Translation Memory – Clients expect: • to use translation memory systems without any defined processes. • to get high quality translations for only a fraction of the standard price. • that high matches from the TM (100%, 101%, 102%, CM) don‘t need to be reviewed. • that 100 minor changes of a text have no effect on translation memory reuse. • that TM technology works equally well for all text types and domains. • that TMs don‘t need to be managed and maintained. • that TM content can be exchanged between any TM system without any data loss. • … 15
- 16. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing expectations – Example: Terminology management systems – Clients expect: • to use terminology management systems without any defined processes. • not to find any terminology issues in translations anymore when using a terminology management system. • that target language terminology can straighten out the source language quality. • terminology management to be nothing more than a two column Excel spreadsheet. • that termbases don‘t need to be managed and maintained. • that automated terminology recognition and terminology checking works (perfectly and equally well for all languages). • that termbase content can be exchanged between any terminology management system without any data loss. • … 16
- 17. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing expectations – Example: Machine translation systems – Clients expect: • to get high quality translations for only a fraction of the standard price. • that MT output doesn‘t need to be reviewed. • that MT works equally well for all text types, languages and domains. • that MT substitutes human translators. • … – Language service providers expect: • that out of the box MT solutions will produce good results. • unrealistic productivity gains using MT. • unrealistic savings from using MT. • … 17
- 18. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing expectations: How to do it? – Involve all stakeholders right from the start. – Communicate and discuss expectations. – Educate stakeholders. – Inform stakeholders. – Don‘t believe everything you hear or read! – Do a reality check (research). “Google announces to radically improve the functionality of its translation service. Are we getting close to human translation quality?“ m.faz.net, 28 Sept. 2016 18 “Google‘s Neural Machine Translation System: Bridging the Gap between Human and Machine Translation“ Google Research Blog, 27 Sept. 2016
- 19. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Planning the budget 19
- 20. “The cost of implementing language technology is often underestimated due to the lack of knowledge and experience in the organization.“ Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 20
- 21. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Evaluation 6.000 EUR Software purchase 10.000 EUR Support & maintenance (yearly) 2.000 EUR Preparation of IT environment 500 EUR Installation 1.000 EUR Configuration & data migration 2.000 EUR Process definition 3.000 EUR Testing 6.000 EUR Training 4.000 EUR Cost for services amount to 65% of total implementation cost in the first year. It‘s two times the license cost. Case study: Implementation of a server-based translation memory system 21
- 22. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Planning the budget OR Planning a budget. – Common misconception or problem is that either no budget or a too small budget is planned for the implementation of language technology. – One of the reasons is that either the goals of the project are not clearly defined. – Another reason is that the time required to do a proper introduction of language technology is often underestimated by clients AND by software providers. – There is no such thing as a standard installation. 22
- 23. Internal resources External resources Defining specifications Evaluation Testing Data migration Maintenance Documentation Change management Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Planning the budget OR Planning a budget for your tool AND: Hardware and software requirements License costs or subscription fees Installation and configuration Customization Training Support
- 24. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Involving the right people 24
- 25. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Involving the right people (Who is affected by the project? Whose interests are affected? Who will benefit from the project? Who will support the project?) – Upper management – Middle management – Departmental managers – Team members • Involve people as early as possible • Involve enough people and not too many • Involve external experts if necessary • Don‘t forget to involve external service providers ;-) 25
- 26. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time ? ? Text / Content creation Content Management Customer Relationship Management Product information Publishing (Print and digital, social networks) Language & translation management © 2010-2016 Loctimize GmbH 26
- 27. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Defining the requirements 27
- 28. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Defining the requirements – Business requirements • Which business processes does the software need to support? • Which business goals should the software help to achieve? – Functional requirements • What functions does a software need to provide? • Collect requirements from all relevant stakeholders • Group requirements into categories (by processes, stakeholders, components, supported file formats for input and output, interfaces, system requirements, licensing etc.) • Align business and functional requirements • Define priorities (Must have, need to have, nice to have) 28
- 29. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Defining the requirements: Typical problems – Processes are not defined and/or documented – Very common: People involved in the project are no experts in the specific field – People involved are no experts in the selected technology (do not know what is possible, which features exist, which processes are supported, how exactly processes are supported, how data is managed etc.) – Requirements are often based only on the experience with one technology or product (reflected by product-specific terminology in the specification documents). 29 Sometimes leads to premature decisions on which solution to choose.
- 30. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Doing a proper evaluation 30
- 31. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Doing a proper evaluation – Evaluating software solutions can be a complex and tricky task. – Comparing feature lists is often used as a starting point for pre-selecting solutions. – Comparing feature lists comes with a risk: A lot of software providers claim to provide a feature (e.g. supporting PDF files for translation). However, there can be big differences between how software products implemented that feature and what exactly are the options. – A proper evaluation needs to include proper software testing. – Software demonstrations are no substitute for testing. 31
- 32. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 32 Case study: Selection criteria for selecting a translation management system for a global corporate client
- 33. Case study: Evaluation of a translation management system for a global corporate client Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 33
- 34. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Doing proper testing – How does the selected system fit into the work environment? – How are certain features implemented? How do they work? – How does the system support certain file formats? – How are interfaces with other systems defined? How do they work? – How easy is it to onboard and use the system? – How easy is it to customize the system? 34
- 35. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Types of software tests – System testing – Performance testing – Functional testing – User acceptance testing – Usability testing • Test planning – What kind of tests to run? – Define testing environment, procedure and expected results – Select software testers – Define documentation template for test results – Define how to evaluate test results – Define timeline – Define how to deal with test feedback 35
- 36. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Sample test report template 36
- 37. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 37
- 38. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time 38 Test results by business requirements
- 39. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Planning implementation and rollout 39
- 40. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Planning implementation and rollout – Proper planning is the key to success – Define rollout strategy: simultaneous rollout throughout the whole organization, rollout department by department or site by site – Prepare IT environment – Install and configure software systems – Customize software systems – Migrate existing data – Test systems – Involve key users and product champions – User qualification – Run pilot projects 40
- 41. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Planning implementation and rollout: User qualification – Customized training targeted for specific user groups – Task-oriented instead of feature-oriented training – Decide on the type of training (onsite vs. online, face-to-face, e-learning, blended learning) – Plan enough time for users to learn new processes, new user interfaces etc. – Assess training outcome – Provide support throughout initial implementation phase 41
- 42. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Planning implementation and rollout: Monitoring – Define specific goals for different users or user groups – Constantly monitor the implementation progress – Collect feedback from users – React upon feedback immediately – Take corrective actions as soon as possible (provide support, solutions, workarounds) 42 42
- 43. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Managing change 43
- 44. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing change: Risks – Implementing language technology solutions means a lot of changes for an organization and its employees: New concepts, processes, workflows, systems, products, user interfaces, tasks and responsibilities. – Employees can quickly be overwhelmed by all these changes, feel insecure and get frustrated. This increases the risk that they start boycotting or undermining the project and go into active or passive resistance. – The newly introduced software then does not produce the expected results. – An active change management is required to mitigate these risks. 44
- 45. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Managing change – Assign a responsible change (or project) manager – Prepare a change management plan – Identify all departments and stakeholders in the organization directly or indirectly affected by the change – Make sure to inform all stakeholders about upcoming changes, the reasons for the changes, the improvements for all affected stakeholders etc. – Involve stakeholders in the process – Allow stakeholders to provide feedback 45
- 46. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Continuous improvement 46
- 47. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time • Continuous improvement – Implementation of a feedback process – Define and measure KPI – Regular assessment of current practice – Evaluation of new features coming with new software products or upgrades – Alignment with market needs and business requirements 47
- 48. Introducing Language Technology to the Editing Process: How to do Things Right the First Time Questions? 48
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