AGILE LOCALIZATION
Quick, agile multilingual delivery of products and services is gradually becoming the norm across numerous industries. The focus in this case shifts from traditional expectations, i.e. translating large volumes within reasonable timeframes to translating small and tiny pieces with an extremely aggressive turnaround, typically between 2-3 and 12-24 hours, often during weekends or holidays.
Logrus IT offers flexible Agile location services.
Agile localization is a special approach to the localization process based on the principles of flexible project management. It can be used to quickly and efficiently adapt a product or service for an international release. This flexible approach is especially useful for localizing websites and software in the constantly changing and highly competitive digital realm.
Flexibility and iteration The localization process can be broken down into a series of short cycles or “iterations.” In any given iteration, specialists focus on a small amount of work and submit proofread fragments one at a time. This makes it possible to react quickly to changes in the source text and adjust the translation as the project moves forward. To maintain consistency, Agile localization assumes that specialists are using and updating terminological glossaries on an ongoing basis.
Communication and collaboration Agile localization entails active communication and collaboration among project participants. Linguists, developers, and clients work together closely, exchanging information, identifying requirements, setting deadlines, and so on.
Ongoing quality monitoring and feedback When using Agile localization, specialists constantly track the quality of the translation and the efficiency of work-related processes. Regular feedback from the client and end users makes it easier to optimize the process and implement feedback immediately.
Automation and integration Agile localization also entails the use of translation managements systems. These systems make it easier to automate routine tasks, increase work efficiency, and facilitate integration with other content-management systems.
A TMS allows the team to:
The primary advantages of Agile localization include faster translation delivery, the ability to make changes and manage requirements more flexibly, active communication among project participants, and high translation quality.
Logrus IT offers several types of agile localization solutions that cover the whole spectrum of potential expectations. In all cases we are talking about providing small or tiny, standalone and relatively urgent (24-hour or less turnaround) translations to clients.
Logrus IT has already established a robust agile multilingual production chain covering more than two dozen languages. This chain includes people and teams all around the globe who have already committed to participate in our agile model. We are actively working on involving more translators and teams to extend the list of languages and further improve performance on agile projects.
Each person or team participating in the program signs a special SLA which is an Appendix to our Master Services Agreement. This SLA includes guaranteed limited availability afterhours, during weekends and holidays and well as a commitment to react to urgent requests within a pre-agreed timeframe and provide services, if required. The SLA also contains emergency contacts (email alias, Skype or other messenger, phone, mobile) and special payment agreements for each supplier.
Logrus IT has not made this appendix mandatory, but we obviously favor more flexible suppliers and individuals, even in cases that do not involve urgent turnarounds.
Logrus IT provides an online, cloud-based platform for translating and editing materials in a simple format that does not require special training and makes it possible for all involved PMs and linguists to complete their tasks with minimal overhead.
Logrus IT PMs are monitoring the status of each project and automatically reassign tasks that were not acknowledged or completed on time based purely on their status.
The client can check on the status at any time or download completed materials immediately when they are ready.
We will perform a full set of quality checks for all agile projects during our normal hours of operation between 08:00 and 20:00 (GMT+3). During afterhours, weekends and holidays the number of checks performed can be limited by those built or integrated into the tools, and strongly depends on the expected turnaround time and urgency. Logrus IT is actively working on extending the number, depth and coverage of instant and self-checks on the translator/editor end within an agile environment.
