Translation is a product or service and the translator is the service provider. And when talking about providing services and products, quality always comes to mind. It does not matter how small a service or product is, what matters to clients and consumers is the quality of the product they are paying for. How then could the “quality” of translation be assured?

As a translator, it is your duty to maintain excellence in every translation work you do. In a capsule, quality of translation is not only about correctly translating sentences and words. When talking of high quality translation, it means that it addresses the individual language requirements that each client needs. It must be accurate and should seamlessly adapt to the reading levels of the target audience.

While translation, for the most part, is intuitive, there are still standards that govern the language industry. Depending on the location, these standards may be the norm or just serve as guideline, leaving the final decision for the translation work and its conformance to their own company’s quality standards to themselves.

However, since there are legal and ethical obligations between the translator and the client, both should be protected, hence, standards have been created to state the mutual duties of each party. Of course, there are always two sides to a story. On one hand, some members of the translation industry think that over-reliance of the translation standards can give a false sense of security for some, as this can also mean that the quality of the translation may not be assured, although the translation conformed to the given set of standards. For this group, the quality of translation depends on feedback from employers and clients and on-going training of translators. More.

See: Multilizer Translation Blog

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