Futurallia, an international business-to-business networking event for professionals, will be held in the United States for the first time ever next month. The location just happens to be the city where I live, Kansas City. I found out that this event was coming to town several months ago when searching for events geared towards the international business community. It is truly a great win for Kansas City to serve as the host for this event. Just last month, the International Trade Council of Greater Kansas City was among four groups that created the OneKC World Trade Center as part of efforts to position the city as a centre for exports. Having Futurallia in Kansas City is certainly a good step in that direction.
With business professionals from 30 countries said to be attending, interpreters will certainly be a must and, indeed, the event's promotional video states that "fully qualified interpreters" will be in attendance. So you will understand how disappointed local professional interpreters were to be offered the following for one day's work at Futurallia:
· a unique and beneficial networking opportunity;
· a stipend of $80 for each day (8am to 5pm) of participation;
· a lanyard with your name;
· a t-shirt to wear while interpreting and yours to keep;
· lunch, snacks and parking provided while interpreting:
· 10 business cards with your information to use for networking opportunities;
· your name and contact information in the Futurallia catalog;
· a certificate recognizing your contribution as an official interpreter/moderator for Futurallia;
I'm not sure which is most insulting: the stipend or the t-shirt that's yours to keep? Behind the scenes, local interpreters describe this offer as a joke, and I can only agree. The rate offered is not only barely above minimum wage in our state, it is also well below the hourly rate charged by any serious professional interpreter. And as for the ten free business cards, what serious interpreter doesn't have his or her own cards?
Acting as a bridge between people of different cultures, professional interpreters have invested in the training needed to deal with the many complex language issues that can arise when people of two completely different backgrounds meet. They know their culture's business etiquette, aren't fazed by tough situations and perform painstaking terminology research in advance so that they can handle any tricky terms that might arise during meetings. Using foreign language students or any random bilingual speakers that the organisers can track down will certainly not provide the high-class experience that the organisers promote in their videos. With registration starting at over $1,000, it does not seem to be a budgetary issue, but rather an unfortunate case of trying to cut corners where it matters most.
As one local interpreter wrote: "Attendees are going with the expectation of being provided with professional services (interpretation is mentioned as one of the items included in the packages that people buy). They will go in assuming that they will have an opportunity to expand their international business, as that is the whole idea of this event and the reason for going there, but what they don’t know is that most likely they won’t be able to properly communicate or, even worse, they will miscommunicate while being under the impression that they have been understood. There could be long-term financial and business repercussions for them. Not to mention the attendees who are paying for travel from overseas and will have the same expectations."
Our local ATA Chapter, MICATA, is writing to the organisers of Futurallia, asking them to reconsider their approach to hiring interpreters. I can only hope that they choose to invest in professional service providers and don't squander this unique opportunity to let Kansas City shine in the international spotlight.
5 comments:
Excellent post, Abigail! Unfortunately we've had similar experiences when major events have come to Denver. Some are clued-in and hire top-notch professional interpreters (including flying people in for languages not available locally), but some commit the double blunder of recruiting volunteer or near-volunteer interpreters *and* advertising that the event will be interpreted by highly qualified professional interpreters.
The hard part is that haranguing is counterproductive in those types of situations. As you pointed out with MICATA, I think that the best approach is to compliment the organizers on having the right idea ("Congratulations on taking the initiative to reach out to non-English speakers attending your event!") and then gently guide in the right direction ("Using professional interpreters and offering competitive rates can be a revenue generator for you rather than a cost center"). But it's true, it's discouraging. The "yours to keep" shirt is definitely the icing on the cake!
Wow, that's crazy....here in Spain at least, the going rate is 450-500 euros for a full day's interpreting work and nobody bats an eyelid! =0) I really don't think $80 would literally be worth gettin gout of bed for, better to stay at home and invest your time in marketing your services, worth 100 times more in the long run!
*getting out of bed, damn typo!
=0)
It's been a long morning!
Abigail, thank you for this article. As I always say, plumbers and electricians have better wages and are more respected. People understand they don't want to see their houses burnt or fired by a pseudo professional. Unfortunately, they still don't realize that a pseudo interpreter or translator can also "set their houses on fire"!
Thanks for the comments, everyone. I am really hoping that we can use this as an opportunity to raise the profile of professional translators and interpreters in our area.
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