LQA 2019 on 30 January 2019 in Zurich
Place: Zurich Marriott Hotel, Schweiz
Time: Wednesday, 30 Jan 2019, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Topic: Focusing on people: performance and competence in translation quality management
Advances in informatisation and flexibilisation within Industry 4.0 are continuously setting new standards for modern work systems. This also applies to the translation industry and its professional settings due to its increasing interconnection with production. For example, greater product diversification and shorter product life cycles are placing high demands on the quality and topicality of multilingual content. Such information is expected to be adaptive and multidirectional, while also remaining consistent and retrievable at all times.
The need for agility, consistency and availability is being met by the development of ever-smarter tools for terminology, knowledge management and quality assurance and ever-more sophisticated system infrastructures. Combined with the increased use of machine translation in recent years, this has led to an unparalleled reorganisation of how tasks are distributed among people and technology, even in the traditionally tool-oriented translation industry. Against this background, the paradigms of man-machine interaction as well as the professional roles and profiles of those involved have been redefined from the ground up in many areas.
The process of adjusting to these “highly interactive socio-technical systems” (Deuse et al., 2015, (translation)), as today’s work systems are often called, is not always met with a positive response, it can even provoke resistance. Various studies have already pointed out that the pace of technological innovation can exceed the ability to cope of those involved in translation departments (cf. Declercq 2014:480, among others) or that the progressive automation of human tasks has in some places raised fears of human employees being supplanted. At the same time, the future-proofing of the technologies used and the benefits of the change management involved have often not been sufficiently clarified.
At the fifth LQA Symposium, we will investigate the consequences of these changes for the action fields and competencies of those involved and highlight the significance of translation quality assurance in this challenging interplay of factors. There can be no doubt that the field of translation quality assurance has now become an established parameter that plays a decisive role in optimising increasingly complex linguistic production processes. This means that the foundation has been laid for innovative activities and competencies, which can be conceptualised as a shift away from mere operational functions towards monitoring, controlling and strategic functions of the stakeholders.
The fifth LQA Symposium will focus on the following key questions:
- How do technology-induced transformations impact linguistic, operational and strategic activities in our field, and how are they being dealt with?
- As a consequence, which new systemic, methodical and conceptual competencies are required from the stakeholders?
- What does this mean for the qualification and professionalisation practices in academic institutions and for recruitment, talent management and life-long learning at the workplace?
- Which new professional roles are emerging for employees and departments and what are the reactions?
- How can a comprehensive understanding of the interdependencies along the translation value chain be promoted among those involved despite automation and the risk of particularisation?
- How can translation quality assurance be conceptualised from a holistic perspective and generate noticeable added value for all parties?
- Which features are essential so that users will accept these technologies in the long term and recognise the benefits they offer in facilitating their tasks?
- How can technologies help users create dependable data and information to support decision-making and planning?
These and other questions will be discussed together with experts from business and science and with decision-makers from international language departments on 30 January 2019 in the Marriott Hotel Zurich. Current challenges and opportunities will be examined from various professional and industry-specific perspectives. Participants are invited to approach the topic from a human-centric stance where tools are not an end in themselves, but are designed to support the utilisation of knowledge as a key company resource along the linguistic value chain.
Literature references:
Deuse, Jochen, et al. 2015. “Gestaltung von Produktionssystemen im Kontext von Industrie 4.0.” Zukunft der Arbeit in Industrie 4.0. Springer Vieweg. 99-109.
Declercq, Christophe. 2014. “Editing in Translation Technology”. In: Chan, S. W. (Ed.). (2014). Routledge encyclopedia of translation technology. Routledge. 480-493.