In the modern world, translation and localization can play a decisive role in a business’s success by allowing it to break into new markets and interact with customers from various countries. A crucial part of the translation process is finding and recruiting translators. At Logrus IT, this is Anna Gulenkova’s job, and we’ve decided to talk to her a little about how she does it.

Can you tell us how vendor recruitment works at Logrus IT, Anna?

We always start by analyzing our current vendor base and discussing our needs with them. We prefer to invest in developing established business relationships, so the first thing we do is talk to linguists who have impressed us in the past. Almost all of our vendors have extensive experience in a number of different fields, so the search often ends there.

But if we can’t find the vendor we’re looking for right away, we start looking for new ones. We begin by analyzing the market in the target country, i.e. the country where the target language is spoken natively and/or where the finished product will be distributed. We try to answer two questions during this phase: can we find the specialists we need in this country, and what are their rates?

Then we choose vendors based on several criteria, including:

• resume (qualifications, experience, recommendations, equipment)
• price (is it appropriate for the target market, and does it fit our budget?)
• portfolio

We send any linguists who satisfy all of these criteria a test assignment (we develop these tests ourselves based on our largest clients’ requirements). These tests help us determine how a given translator works with various kinds of content, whether it be game or software UI, contracts, press releases, store catalogs, or articles about cybersecurity. The tests are then reviewed by editors who specialize in the corresponding fields. They’re all native speakers who have worked with Logrus IT for a long time, so they know our clients’ requirements well and have undergone regular training with us. Our LQA methodology is used to evaluate the tests.

Sometimes we have to recruit translators to work in a field or language pair that’s completely new to us. When this happens, we rely on recommendations from trusted expert linguists, reliable partners, and colleagues.

So what do the numbers say? How many candidates pass the test?

We review about 8,000 translators per year from all over the world. They include translators who apply on their own, as well as linguists found by our team on specialized resources. About 700 candidates take the test, and only about 250 of them usually pass. As you can see, our standards are pretty rigorous – over 60% of applicants don’t pass the test.

Is recruiting new translators your only responsibility? After all, the company doesn’t always need new translators, right? What do you do when that happens? Do you just sit there twiddling your thumbs?

Of course not. Vendor recruitment is far from the only thing our department does. We’re also responsible for any questions our suppliers might have while working with Logrus IT. Signing contracts, changing payment information, expanding or paring back service lists, obtaining feedback on translations, or just talking about future projects – we do it all. We’re also constantly monitoring the quality of our suppliers’ work – we conduct regular evaluations and systematize the results, then use those results to provide project managers with recommendations on how to choose the right vendor for each specialization.

Can you talk a little more about how you handle quality assurance?

We use a special rubric to evaluate the quality of our translators’ work. For new vendors, our LQA managers review their first, fifth, and tenth projects. Once a vendor has translated a certain number of words, we choose one of their projects at random and perform LQA on it.

The results are factored into the vendor’s rating. A positive review increases that rating, as well as the number of words before the next review. A negative review reduces the translator’s rating, and their reviews become more frequent. If a translator fails a review, our specialists talk to them, providing them with detailed feedback and an opportunity to defend their work. If a translator fails several review in a row, we might dissolve our contract with them. But this doesn’t happen very often – I’ve been a vendor manager for nine years now, and I can count the number of translators we’ve fired on one hand.

Expectations can vary from client to client, so how can you tell if a translation is “good?” Are there universal standards you can apply to all translations?

There are a few core requirements, but I’ll stick to the three most important ones. A translation should:

1. accurately communicate the meaning of the source text in full without distorting it
2. meet the grammatical, technical, and terminological standards of the target language
3. achieve the source text’s goals – for example, a marketing text needs to grab the target audience’s attention regardless of the language it’s written in

To wrap up, could you share a few secrets for successfully interacting with suppliers?

Sure, I can give you a few tips.

1. Learn about the culture of the region in which you’re looking for vendors. In other words, make sure you know and respect their local traditions. So if you’re talking to linguists from Europe or the US, you want to use gender-neutral language and avoid coming on too strong. But with specialists from the Middle East, you want to be as friendly as possible – ask them how they’re doing, mention local holidays, etc.
2. Analyze the linguistic services market in the target region. If a translator’s rates are too low, be careful. And if they’re too high, try negotiating. If you underpay a supplier, you run the risk of getting poor results or working with an irresponsible vendor, and if you overpay them, you can end up losing your competitive edge.
3. Check the information in translators’ applications. Non-existent addresses, copied from another linguist’s resume, a cover letter written in broken English, an email address listed on a spam database – these are all very bad signs.
4. Stay up to date on current events and attitudes in the industry, and keep an eye on professional communities. Negative reviews of agencies in translator communities can give you an idea of what not to do. You don’t want to repeat your colleagues’ mistakes.

Vendor managers at Logrus IT are responsible for more than just recruiting translators. Our specialists also recruit copywriters, designers, voice actors, and other professionals in the fields our company specializes in. We’ll describe our criteria for recruiting these vendors in an upcoming article.

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