The COVID-19 outbreak is a human tragedy with a growing impact on all our daily business operations. This may bring profound changes as well as maybe uncertainty for you.

We are working closely with industry organizations and experts, continuously assessing the impact of this situation, to find the way forward to make it  through these difficult times.

We will update you regularly with informational pieces, tips on the crisis response.

Stay safe and healthy!

COVID-19 is top of mind for nearly everyone in the world, including

our members and our collective clients. A number of translation firms are offering free services for coronavirus content, including some AILIA members - and the requests are coming in quickly. As language industry professionals, we are very lucky to be able to work remotely at times like these. But how do we stay connected securely if we are used to working in an office outside of the home? Here are a few tech tips for those who may have to work remotely for more than a few days.

1. Make More Use of Microsoft Teams or Install Slack

Slack is a communications tool that allows for easy collaboration on projects as well as water-cooler style chats. While Microsoft Office 365 has Teams, which can also be used as a collaborative team tool, Slack has less of a learning curve and can be made easily accessible to clients and subcontractors. Slack and Teams can act as a conduit for those small interactions that usually only take place in an office, such as quick questions or ideas about how to do something better. On Slack, you can also arrange various projects in different channels to keep everything organized and on-task.

2. Secure Your Logins

If staff or subcontractors/Freelancers are working remotely, there’s a chance they may have to work in a coffee shop or other public space where hackers are known to lurk. Consider forcing two-factor authentication for Microsoft, Google, and other important account sign-ons to protect your company data. Two-factor authentication requires both the password that you are used to providing and another piece of data, which is usually an SMS code texted to the user’s phone. Physical devices, such as USB dongles, can also be used as the second piece of identification and are more secure than using an SMS code.

3. Upgrade Legacy Systems

If there are systems or programs that you absolutely can’t work remotely with, now is the time you will find out about them. Consider upgrading them to cloud solutions that you can work with outside of the office.

4. Make Sure Your Employees Can Be Productive and Recognized

High performers may be concerned that their work may not be noticed, and some people may not thrive outside of an office because there are too many distractions at home. Make sure to keep in touch with everyone through weekly phone calls and/or video chats, and offer to solve any issues you can solve for employees working from home, technological or otherwise. It’s easy to see the volume of work being produced, and you will likely notice if anyone’s usual volume goes down and you can address it with them directly. There are also non-invasive monitoring programs, such as Prodoscore, Teramind and Time Doctor if you feel they are necessary.

On behalf of AILIA we encourage our members, their staff and families to use health precautions, stay safe, we will get through this together, if you have any questions or if you would like to chat about a specific situation don’t hesitate to let us know.

Sincerely,

Robin Ayoub

President

Maryse Benhoff on the importance of standards for quality language translations

At Capacity Podcast with Jacob Monash

 https://jmonash.com/podcast/maryse-benhoff

We talk about the importance of structure and standards to translation workflows, how ISO has been instrumental in helping the translation industry self-regulate worldwide, and how Maryse and her team have coded their own translation ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system. 

Jump ahead to the following times if you’re interested in a specific topic:

1:42 - The history of BG Communications

7:41 - What is ISO?

15:49 - How BG Communications coded their own translation tool

And as always, you can reach me at jacob@jmonash.com.

 https://jmonash.com/podcast/maryse-benhoff

Le Conseil supérieur de la langue française rappelle que la date limite pour soumettre une candidature à l’Ordre des francophones d’Amérique et au Prix du 3-Juillet-1608 est le 3 avril 2020.

L’Ordre des francophones d’Amérique reconnaît le mérite de femmes et d’hommes, issus de différents milieux, qui se sont consacrés ou qui se consacrent au maintien et à l’épanouissement de la langue française en Amérique, ou qui ont accordé leur soutien à l’essor de la vie française sur le continent américain. Jusqu’à sept nouveaux membres en provenance de plusieurs régions des Amériques et du monde sont reçus annuellement : ​

• Québec (deux récipiendaires) 
• Acadie des provinces de l’Atlantique (un récipiendaire) 
• Ontario (un récipiendaire) 
• Provinces de l’ouest du Canada, Territoires du Nord-Ouest, Yukon et Nunavut (un récipiendaire) 
• Ailleurs en Amérique (un récipiendaire)
• Autres continents (un récipiendaire) ​

Le Prix du 3-Juillet-1608 rend, quant à lui, hommage à un organisme œuvrant en Amérique du Nord qui a rendu ou rend des services exceptionnels à une collectivité de langue française et à l’ensemble de la francophonie nord-américaine. ​

Un jury, dont les membres sont nommés par le Conseil, choisira les récipiendaires de chaque catégorie ainsi que l’organisme lauréat du Prix du 3-Juillet-1608. Ils seront récompensés en octobre 2020 au cours d’une cérémonie qui sera tenue à l’hôtel du Parlement, à Québec. ​

Notez que les dossiers des candidatures non retenues la première année sont conservés et soumis au jury l’année suivante. ​

Le formulaire de mise en candidature, qui indique les conditions d’admission et les critères de sélection, est disponible sur le site Web du Conseil au www.cslf.gouv.qc.ca/prix-etdistinctions. 

The Translation Bureau and the Canadian General Standards Board signed a new partnership agreement with AILIA, the Language Industry Association.

AILIA has entered into a Project Agreement with the Translation Bureau for the development of a new edition of Canada's CAN/CGSB 131.10 Translation Services Standard.

The signing ceremony took place  on Monday, February 24, 2020.

AILIA's working group was Betty Cohen, Maryse Benhoff, Kim Pines, Sharon Steinberg, Lola Bendana and Donald Barabé. President, Sharon Steinberg signed on AILIA's behalf.

This is an important step forward for Canada’s translation industry and a direct result of all of the hard work that AILIA has done to advance the profession.

Signatories

Lucie Séguin
Chief Executive Officer, Translation Bureau
Public Services and Procurement Canada

Sharon Steinberg
President
Language Industry Association

For CGSB:
Jean-Pierre Blais
Assistant Deputy Minister, Receiver General and Pensions Branch
Public Services and Procurement Canada

Witness:
Steven MacKinnon
Parliamentary Secretary
Public Services and Procurement Canada

We have a jam packed agenda for Rendez-vous Ottawa.. It will be a busy, informative and interesting event. Register today.

     Preliminary Agenda       

La maison d’édition  Lambert-Lucas a décidé de mettre en ligne en PDF, téléchargeables gratuitement, 71 ouvrages parmi tous ceux qui ont paru entre 2005 et 2015 (soit 230 titres). Plusieurs de ces ouvrages sont d’un intérêt certain pour les linguistes et traducteurs. Une trentaine d'autres suivront chaque année à partir de 2021.
Pour avoir la liste de ces livres et les télécharger, allez sur la page "TOUS LES LIVRES" du site de Lambert-Lucas et cliquez sur le bouton "Open PDF". Soit l'URL : http://www.lambert-lucas.com/livre/?tri=open

Merci Dr. James Archibald

Closing Keynote Speaker

Renato Beninatto, CEO, Nimdzi Insights LLC

AILIA is thrilled to welcome back Renato Beninatto to our Rendez-vous Ottawa event. Renato will be presenting "Future-Proofing Your Business.” While some people complain about how awful the market is and how artificial intelligence is going to kill the language industry, those in the know look at what happened in the past and see how these patterns can apply to the future. Are you ready? Are you an energy generator or an energy consumer? Learn how to future-proof your business.

Renato is an internationally recognized expert in all things related to the language industry. Instigative, controversial, thought-provoking and opinionated, Renato Beninatto is the co-author of "The General Theory of the Translation Company" and driving force at Nimdzi Insights, a think-tank and consulting company that focuses on growth strategies for localization leaders. A former executive in some of the leading companies in the industry, Renato is also the co-host of the Globally Speaking podcast.

As always with Renato, it will be an informative, timely, and thought-provoking presentation with a global perspective. Don’t miss it.

Opening Keynote Speaker

Esther Bond, Research Director, Slator

AILIA is excited to welcome Esther Bond, who will be giving Slator’s first presentation in Canada at our conference on February 28. We know that most of our members subscribe to Slator’s newsletters for interesting industry news.

Esther’s presentation is “Loc 2020: Technology and Trends Shaping the Language Industry” which examines some of the key demand drivers for language services in 2020, taking into account both customer and regulatory drivers.

The presentation also delves into the role that capital is playing in shaping the language industry's competitive landscape. And, as recent innovation in language technology has become productised, we look at the hype cycle of machine translation adoption and consider what's next in scaling MT, and what's next for the industry at large?

Esther has a background in languages, having graduated with an MA in Translation & Interpreting and a BA in French and Linguistics. Esther heads up Slator's Research desk, where she leads diverse research projects and provides bespoke research and advisory services to Slator's partners across translation technology, language industry M&A and funding, and a variety of end-customer verticals.

This is a wonderful opportunity for the Canadian Language Industry to hear from Slator in-person for the first time! 

 

Localization Mini-Unconference 
Space is limited to 35 participants, register now. This will take place Friday February 28th, 2020 at the AILIA Annual Conference.

AILIA is delighted to provide the opportunity to experience a Mini-Unconference. We welcome back Richard Sikes and Oleksandr Pysaryuk who have organized and moderated the full-day Localization Unconference in Toronto for 6 years. Come see why participants from all over Canada and beyond attend their events.

Spend 2.0 hours with your language industry colleagues discussing localization-related topics, learning from your peers, and networking! The Unconference format is designed to facilitate a spontaneous, free-flowing exchange of ideas in an informal, non-sales environment.

This time-limited Mini-Unconference session is based on the full-day Unconference format in which participants suggest topics, then vote to prioritize the most popular topics that emerge. The ensuing discussion is moderated to ensure fluidity, but is not structured, per se. Prepared presentations are not given, but participants are expected to engage in the conversation to put forth concepts, commentary, and counterpoint.  Learn more about what an unconference is, go to https://sites.google.com/site/localizationunconference/whatsanunconference.

We are limiting the session to 35 participants to ensure everyone attending can fully participate.  

The Unconference moderators are:

Richard Sikes - Solution Architect, memoQ

• 35 years of experience in the technical translation and localization industry

• regular contributor to MultiLingual magazine

• frequent speaker at international translation events

• founder of the Localization Institute’s Translation Technology Roundtable 

• co-organizer of the annual Toronto Localization Unconference

 

Oleksandr Pysaryuk - Localization Manager, Ceridian

• 12 years of experience in software localization

• held localization-related roles for BlackBerry, LanguageScientific,  Logrus, and Achievers

• MA in linguistics and translation studies

• taught translation at the University of Ukraine

• co-organizer of the annual Toronto Localization Unconference