News Flash!

LISA Forging Ahead on 3 Standards Fronts

LISA is leading the way on three standards fronts:

The Chinese Government has invited Michael Anobile, LISA’s Managing Director, to be among their keynote speakers at the 2007 Open Standards International Convention in Beijing this November. High-ranking members of the Government, along with foreign technology experts, will be attending this first non-governmental event to focus on the application and impact of open standards within the Chinese Government. Click here for a detailed program of the event. (This link requires you to download Simplified Chinese Fonts, if you don't already have them.)

LISA continues to collaborate with ISO TC 37 on the adoption of its TermBase eXchange (TBX) standard. This is excellent news for the globalization industry because TBX will be the first ISO approved, XML-based standard available to all organizations worldwide to enable their terminology to be processed by any software throughout the entire global supply chain. As a result of the recent discussions ISO TC37 meetings in Provo, Utah, discussion is now underway for LISA to submit other OSCAR standards (including TMX, SRX, GMX-V and xml:tm) to TC37 for ISO adoption. Click here to read more about the recent ISO TC37 meetings in Provo, Utah.

LISA’s research has shown that understanding international business processes is a crucial aspect of developing global products/services and supporting local markets. Standards developed by many other industries and countries that affect localization also play a very critical role. LISA will be hosting Defining Globalization Requirements, an Executive Roundtable, during the LISA Forum Europe in Berlin on October 22 that will focus on creating a global business data repository. Click here for more information. We will cover the results of this week’s Round Table in Beijing in next month’s issue.

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Terminology continues to gain ground as people more closely associate words and messages with the successful branding that reaches the bottom line in terms of increased revenues and profits.

Why Intelligent Terminology Management Matters

How many different names does your organization have for its product/service line and the associated terminology for marketing/sales, installation/implementation, and after-sales support? Who is in charge of deciding which terms are official and which are not? Is anyone?

LISA Announces the Results of Its Newest Survey Creating Global Content: Results of the 2007 LISA Survey Are you responsible for developing or executing strategies for global information management? LISA has just published Creating Global Content: Results of the 2007 LISA Survey. Compare and benchmark your company’s content and terminology management processes to strike the right balance between providing a satisfying customer experience in local languages/cultures vs. maintaining and enhancing your brand. Order your copy today.

The issue is actually much larger than this … just think of the digital mountains of data that all of us must sort through every day: e-mails, chats, documents, presentations, calendars, projects, the phone, e-meetings, etc. Our ability to manage the varied types of information that constantly bombard us still depends largely upon our human intellect—which is very inefficient. If machines could help us, that would be great. However, this won’t be possible until we gain control over our lexical resources—the words that make up our knowledge.

In a recent study, Cisco discovered that there were fifty-six variations in English for one of its main product lines. This meant that there were also another fifty-six variations in Japanese, another fifty-six in German, another fifty-six in Korean, and on and on. For a company such as Cisco, which generates more than 90 percent of its annual revenues via the web, reliable search results are critical in terms of facilitating online sales. As companies continue to increase productivity by moving more business functions to the web, it is obvious that managing multilingual lexicons grows ever more critical.

Our challenge is to figure out how to improve this situation in the short-term, and at the same time, move our organizations forward to adopt the appropriate business process for terminology over the long-term.

Tips for Implementing Intelligent Terminology Management

TIP 1. Elect a Terminology Czar

If there is no existing mechanism for terminology management within your organization, assign a team member to be the “Terminology Czar.”

The Terminology Czar can start out small, working within the technical communications or marketing area to win small battles that are visible to middle and upper management. The Czar should also reach out to other teams to attend the appropriate meetings to represent terminology issues (it’s about money, not words!).

Once there is a successful track record, then the “real work” can begin—putting together a small, cross-functional team to arbitrate terminology issues and to eventually develop an organization-wide terminology strategy, backed up by a business case for terminology.

Are you a LISA Sponsor or Corporate Member? Then you can order all of our publications (including surveys) at no charge. Visit Publications and Tools on the LISA web site, and start downloading today. It’s as simple as that.

TIP 2. Stand Up! Talk a Walk!

Every technical communicator and marketing staff person should adopt terminology as a cause.

And every technical communicator and marketing staff person should discard their preconceived assumptions and go spend some time with their colleagues in sales, support, operations, regional offices, legal, manufacturing, engineering, customer service. Learn to walk in their shoes as you figure out how to make terminology relevant throughout your organization.

By adopting terminology as a cause, you commit to work within your own sphere of influence to integrate it into everything that you do. If the message is consistent from all technical communicators and marketing staff people within the same organization, it will eventually be heard.

TIP 3. Find a Fairy Godparent. A Guardian Angel Is Even Better

Identify and recruit an “angel” to adopt terminology as a cause … the angel in question being an upper level executive within your organization.

As you are out talking to people and learning more about their day-to-day challenges, identify and cultivate at least one or two upper level executives to fill the role of “Fairy Godparent” or “Guardian Angel.” These people believe in what you are doing and will support you if and when the going gets tough. In addition, they can articulate your case to upper management under informal conditions when you are not present.

TIP 4. Recruit a Business Case Mentor

When you are ready to put together your terminology business case, find someone within your organization who has recently gained approval for a business case or won an increase in budget and/or headcount after a hard battle.

Review your presentation with that person and pump them for information on hidden agendas, internal politics, how much information to present and in what format, future strategic directions—anything that may help you better understand the mind-set of the decision makers who control the fate of terminology within your organization.

TIP 5. Leverage Expertise Developed by the Globalization Community

In today’s world, there is absolutely no reason to reinvent IP (intellectual property). Leverage other’s ideas and implementations whenever you can, so that you can focus on other challenges. Read What Global Brand Managers Can Learn From LISA’s Newest Survey and use the information in its sidebars to support your terminology initiatives.

In IP vs. Customer Satisfaction, Signe Rirdance of Tilde introduces readers to EuroTermBank and the business case for terminology sharing.

And it gives me great pleasure to inform our readers that Dr. Alan Melby, long-time LISA Member and the original creative force behind standards such as TBX, was awarded the prestigious Eugen Wüster Prize for dedication and contributions to the field of terminology during the recent ISO Technical Committee 37 meetings in Provo, Utah. Professor Klaus-Dirk Schmitz of Cologne University of Applied Sciences in Germany had the honor of delivering the speech for the Awards Ceremony. You can read it here.

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ANNOUNCEMENTS

Join us for the LISA Forum Europe in Berlin from October 22-26. Our theme will be Building Global Teams Locally: Outsourcing, European Integration and Globalization. For information on special packages, please click here.

From December 10-12, LISA and the Lessius Hogeschool in Antwerp will host a unique Forum, Teaching Localisation for Global Business Readiness. The Forum will bring together localization professionals from academia and industry seeking to improve career development and training in today's localization industry. Click here for more information.

There are two conferences this fall for those of you who focus on UNICODE or web globalization. The 31st Internationalization & Unicode® Conference (IUC) is the premier technical conference for both software and web internationalization. Unicode experts, implementers, clients and vendors are invited to attend this unique conference. Click here for more information.

The theme for the 14th Web Site Globalization Conference will be Building, Managing & Maintaining the Global Web Process to Optimize Brand Extension and Global Returns. Click here for more information.

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Editor’s Note: A previous version of the content at the beginning of this editorial appeared in the May 2006 issue of Intercom.