Driven To Localization 3.0
Driven to Localization 3.0: How a Growing Demand for Professional Service Consistency Requires a Change in the Way Products and Services are Brought to the Global Market
Localization, the process of modifying products and services to account for cultural differences in global markets, is coming of age before our eyes. As customer requirements surrounding process and best practices mature, a business must adapt or be left behind.
What is now a strategic business driver for businesses and corporations with an eye towards success in a global future requires thought and planning for proper execution, and many businesses are unprepared.
What would Localization as a Strategic Business Driver mean to your business model and customers?
How Localization has changed over time
Though a relatively young discipline, Localization is an industry that has matured rapidly. In examining the roots of how the industry developed, you need to look at both internal events (e.g. the development of localization infrastructures) and external events (e.g. the development of the Internet) and how they affected the way localization was approached by businesses.
Due to many of these events, crowd-sourcing became a viable option for many companies looking to take their products to the global market and achieve a maximum return on investment. The pros and cons of this model are many, and with the impact the global financial crisis has had on research and development budgets, it was clear businesses would need to transform their thinking surrounding localization and begin to see it not as a tactical process in product development, but a strategic business driver leveraged to maximize product development return-on-investment.
The process of redefining Localization as a strategic business driver
When redefining Localization, businesses must look at existing processes and best practices as a first step in maximizing return-on-investment in product development, and this drives the implementation of Enterprise Project Management tools into the localization space. Enterprise technology provides businesses with metrics necessary to define best practices and processes to minimize risk and maximize return, and standardize these practices with an eye towards more successful localization strategies.
The defining and enforcing of best practices then requires the creation of Localization Project Management Offices (“PMO’s”) to staff and manage localization projects according to standards of excellence and also to serve as centers of excellence businesses can rely on for support and guidance as they make the transition into Localization 3.0.
Finally, the new importance placed on Localization Project Management changes how project management is seen, proposed, and priced, and alters the expectations of customers. Despite all these changes, the traditional models for translation and localization, and the integration of crowd-sourcing, will not necessarily be replaced when localization becomes a Strategic Business Driver; however, companies that don’t transform their business models to treat localization as a key element in their sales and marketing strategies will be left behind by those that do.
Looking at the challenges of transforming the way Project Management is seen in the localization industry in general, adaQuest understands how the localization industry has allowed weak business practices to become the norm. Despite professional associations like the Project Management Institute and Prince that have developed high-end certifications around project management and methodology, as well as other industries that treat project management as a mission-critical business function, it is the norm in our industry to shove it to the side and charge 10% of the cost of the localization initiative, such as translation, for example, as “project management”, regardless of what is actually involved to execute the initiative successfully.
This is why adaQuest is leading the charge to take our industry back – not by defending past ways of doing business nor opposing crowd-sourcing, but by understanding the value of localization to a global expansion business strategy, leveraging what worked out of previous strategies, and then providing professional localization project management to ensure localization achieves the strategic goals.
Whether you are an executive in a translation or localization company or an executive at a company expanding into new markets, you will need to build a solid business strategy around the future of localization, and just like traveling to a foreign country for the first time, hiring a tour guide to show you the ropes of localization as a strategic business driver will help maximize your experience and prevent costly and unpleasant mishaps.
adaQuest is that tour guide.
How adaQuest helps businesses move into Localization 3.0
To address the problem of transforming localization from a tactical activity to a strategic business driver, adaQuest developed a process approach to localization to help businesses transform what it means to “go global.
In the quality movement, a movement to achieve operational success in business, there is a process outlined for continuous process improvement called the “Shewart (or Deming) Cycle.” adaQuest applied this concept to localization and modeled our business after this cycle to help companies achieve operational success when approaching localization, internationalization, and globalization initiatives.
A diagram of the Shewart (or Deming) Cycle:
“Act” – The act phase of Shewart Cycle is represented by our PMO Solutions Business Unit, which helps companies look at current processes and “act” upon them to create new, more efficient processes for localization, internationalization, and globalization.
“Plan” – The plan phase is also addressed by our PMO Solutions Business Unit in the sense that it helps companies develop Localization PMO’s (Project Management Office), which become the owners of how localization projects are “planned” and delivered within the organization. The Localization PMO is responsible for the adherence to the processes developed in the Act Phase.
“Do” – The “Do” phase is where companies typically start their relationships with us. With our Localization Business Unit we provide localization project managers to “do” the work for our customers.
“Check” – To understand what is happening on current projects, businesses need to implement scalable technology solutions, such as Microsoft Project Server or EPM Live, which let key personnel track project history and make decisions to improve the use of resources and the bottom line. This is exactly what our Project Portfolio Management Business Unit does for customers.
Finally, with a project history, one can go back to the Act Phase and start another round of improvement.
The 3 pillars of the adaQuest Business Philosophy
To ensure our business units provide customers with the highest level of quality and service, adaQuest employs Centers of Excellence to research, develop, maintain and transform our own business and ensure we are leveraging best practices to meet only the highest quality standards.
- Project Management – The Project Management Center of Excellence has developed adaQuest Best Practices by combining the PMI (Project Management Institutes) processes and standards with localization, internationalization and globalization requirements to create a new best of breed process for managing localization projects efficiently.
- Technology – From tools that enable globally executed and locally managed translation efforts to tools that manage projects, programs and portfolios and guide and mentor project managers on best practice processes, our Technology Center of Excellence makes sure both adaQuest and our customers can make success systematic.
- Training – Without world-class training, change cannot occur. In turn, adaQuest has developed a Training Center of Excellence to seek the best of breed courseware and when it does not exist, develop it ourselves and use it to transform both our own as well as our customers’ staff. We offer training within each of our business units so our customers go from requiring our services to being able to execute the processes themselves.
