A Cautionary Tale: Shape-shifting Agencies

When last we left the Alpha and Omega Global Worldwide Translation Agency, they were busily engaging the best, most proficient translator a pittance can buy whilst assembling their crack team of assorted project managers, proofreaders, editors and supervisors.

[Important Disclaimer/Disclosure/Caveat inserted at the behest of my own legal team and for the benefit of all those truly professional and excellent translation agencies with which I have had the privilege to work or with whom am I yet to work: Alpha and Omega is merely a fictive representation of a subset of translation agencies. Although increasing exponentially in number, this subset is still, thank god, merely a subset.]

You, the client, located Alpha and Omega through their slick, sleek virtual omnipresence. Their content-rich website, strewn with an abundance of Fortune 500 logos representing the caliber of their numerous clients. And now you have been engaging in a pleasant back and forth exchange of emails with your very own “project manager” who assures you that all is progressing as to plan.

You try not to notice that this person appears to be emanating from a time zone quite some distance away from their much vaunted London “office.” Or that there seems to be some creeping confusion afoot as to who is doing what, odd questions about the “real” deadline and the fact that it’s taking longer and longer for your cheery PM to get back to you.

Time to peek behind the veil?

Would we be surprised to discover that the “owner” of the agency, a disgruntled former translator, lives in a small town in Umbria, his ex-girlfriend has a flatshare in London [the aforementioned “office”] and your trusty PM is balancing a 9-5 job at a shop in NYC, a toddler and her - or your, we should say - project. The harried translator is located even further afield, one of those unfortunate souls who was willing to work for 4 cents per word and whose native language is not what your contract stipulates. This is also contributing to the delays, since he is having to post every other sentence of your translation to various and sundry “term boards” for help with the sublimely obvious.

I am chagrined to report that, aside from some small changes as to locale, I have experienced and/or witnessed all the above over the last month alone. As can anyone, if they know where to look.

Truth be told, there are even worse scenarios, with one lone wretch struggling to perform all the above roles, trying to project what he perceives to be the gravitas, professionalism and competence of an “agency.”

But that is another day’s tale.