Speaker 1: In this video I'm going to quickly explain the three types of translation review. For each one I'll cover what it achieves, when you need it, and how to go about it. Now this will give you the information you need to always adopt the best review option for your translations, and so get the quality you want. Keep watching. The first type of review is a translator self-review. This is a full review of the translation by the translator before delivery. It's to ensure the translation is both accurate and well-worded. Now you need this review whenever you need a reasonable degree of translation quality. That's because without it, a translation would generally be considered just a draft. You could have some translation mistakes, or phrasing that's a bit unnatural. Why is that? Because translation involves pretty complex mental processing, and this makes it hard to get everything spot-on first time through. A self-review process is needed to identify and fix any issues. Of course in some circumstances you may be happy with just a draft translation. For example, if you just want to get the gist of what a document says. But you'll need this translator self-review any time you don't want to risk a mistake or unnatural wording in your translation. It's the starting point for your risk management when getting a translation done. A translation self-review should be completed in two separate steps, with a break in between. The first step checks translation accuracy. The translator systematically works through the translation, phrase by phrase or sentence by sentence, comparing it with the original text. This allows them to make sure no meaning has been missed or incorrectly translated. And they should work from hard copies here, not on screen where it's way too easy to miss things. The translator should then take a short break just to refresh and clear the mind. The second step is then to read through the translation to improve wording wherever necessary. For more detail on these steps and how they fit into the full translation process, check out our blog article. Now experienced professional translators should always self-review their work. That's because they know it's essential for producing consistent, professional quality. So if you engage the right translator or a quality-focused translation company like ours, this type of review will automatically be included. The second type of review is a translator peer review. As the name suggests, this involves a full review of the translation by a second translator. So it's a separate and additional step carried out after the first translator has completed their translation. The aim is to make sure the translation is high quality. What does this mean? Well, that the translation is completely accurate, so all meaning is correctly expressed, that it's appropriately worded, that it doesn't have any errors, and it's internally consistent. Now you may be thinking that a professional translator should produce a high quality translation every time anyway. So why bother with an additional review? Well, simply because translators are human, and even the best of them make mistakes sometimes. So the peer review process is essentially a safety check to confirm there are no errors and the translation is well worded. You should insist on this type of review whenever a high degree of translation quality is needed. At the very least, this will be for all your client-facing materials and your business-critical and key internal documents. But more generally, it's whenever any shortcomings in the translation could have a negative impact, particularly financial implications or damage to your reputation. This practice is a three and sometimes four-step process. The first step reviews translation accuracy using the same method as a self-review. Step two reviews quality of expression, again in the same way as a self-review. And the third step checks there are no errors, so that's spelling, grammar, numbers, proper names, formatting, etc. Now depending on the nature of the text and the reviewer's experience, a fourth step may be necessary to check for consistency of vocabulary and style. For more detail on each of these steps and the typical issues that arise during the process, check out our article on assessing translation quality. Now it's important to know that translations delivered by a quality-focused translation company should automatically include a second translator review. We call these our quality-assured translations. In contrast, translations supplied by freelance translators will seldom have been peer-reviewed. Translation companies may also offer an option without a peer review. For us, these are our budget professional translations, and we say they're more suited to non-essential documents. The third type of review is a post-translation client review. Here the client gets an internal or in-country native speaker to review specific aspects of a completed translation. There are six different possible objectives. The first is a simple check to confirm there are no spelling or grammatical mistakes. The second is a check that all meaning has been correctly expressed in the translation. That is, that the translation is accurate. The third is to make sure the translation reads naturally and well. In other words, that it's got good quality of expression. Now all three of these checks will have been done in a translation peer review, so any further client review here would be an additional and second safety check. Fourth is a technical review. This confirms everything makes sense from a technical viewpoint and that the most appropriate technical terminology has been used. The fifth possible objective is to make sure you're happy with how your brand has been communicated. And the final possibility is to check that the translation is consistent with your other materials or communications. So as a client, when might you want any of these reviews? Well, the first three checks should already have been done in a peer review. So for them, only when the second translator review hasn't been done or you're not confident in it or the materials are business critical and you feel a further safety check is warranted. Consider a technical review if the materials are tech heavy and terminology needs to be 100% correct or you use internal terms or jargon that need to be translated a certain way or there are technical aspects that you think the translators could have misunderstood. A branding review makes sense if it's essential your company or your products and services are portrayed in a certain way. And consider a consistency check when the translation must match other materials in some way, such as layout or formatting, writing style, vocabulary, document design, etc. So how should your reviewer carry out each of these types of client review? You can check for errors by running a spell or grammar check tool or simply by carefully reading through the translation. To check translation accuracy, you need to systematically compare the meanings of corresponding chunks of text in the translation and source document as I described earlier. You can review quality of expression by carefully reading through the translation, looking out for any wording that's a bit unnatural or hard to follow. And there are two ways to do a technical review. Your expert can simply read through the translation, checking it makes sense, is easy to follow and uses appropriate vocabulary. Or you can create a glossary or list of key terms and systematically check how these have been handled throughout the translation. For branding, it's a matter of reading through the translation, checking it has the right tone and will generate the effect and impact you want. And for consistency with other materials, a reviewer will generally use a checklist or a style guide and systematically check the translation for conformity. So that's the what, when and how of doing a client review. But an equally important question is who should do it? What skill set does your reviewer need? Well for a technical review, you'll need a native speaker who is an expert in that field or is totally familiar with your technical product or service in the translation language. Plus they'll need to be an attention to detail person. In fact, this is a key requirement for any review. You need someone who's systematic and will focus on quality, not rush through the task. To review branding or consistency, you'll need someone with good language skills who clearly understands your requirements and again, has the personality to do a thorough job. If you want your reviewer to check translation accuracy, it's essential they go about it in the right way, so they'll also need to understand best practice methodology. And finally, anyone you authorise to make changes to the translation will need excellent writing ability. This is to ensure any changes they make are clearly and naturally worded using appropriate vocabulary. Now, don't just assume someone is a good writer. The reality is that most people aren't. To judge this, you'd need first-hand experience of their formal writing skills. And beware what we call the over-editing syndrome. That's the tendency for people to want to make way more changes than is necessary. So there you have it. Everything you need to know about the three types of translation review. For more detail on anything I've mentioned here, or to grab a useful summary PDF, head over to our more comprehensive blog article. And of course, our blog has many more practical articles and guides you'll find useful. If you liked this video, give us a thumbs up and subscribe to our channel. Thanks for watching.