"This place is really important for us – many of our partners are within a 5-minute drive. Also, the location itself has long been a symbol of innovation and development prospects. For these reasons, we decided to establish our office in Ülemiste", Member of the Board of Krabu Grupp Jekaterina Tšikova said.

Krabu Grupp’s expansion is in response to the growth of the company – thanks to developments that have taken place in the company in recent months, both the number of our employees and external partners are increasing.

As our linguistic analysis shows, their opinion is based on a mistaken belief. The text of the resolution could be translated into English as follows: “Today marks the 75th anniversary of a tragic day, 14 June 1941, when thousands of the people of Estonia were affected in a bloody reprisal by the communist Soviet regime. On this tragic date, armed members of the occupation forces arrested more than 10,000 Estonian inhabitants in the dead of night and early the following morning.”

The key phrase here is “Eesti inimesed” (people of Estonia), which some Riigikogu members interpreted as meaning only “ethnic Estonians.” They concluded that the resolution excluded other nationalities that were victims of the deportations. In this case, however, capitalisation of the word “Eesti” is key. When the word is used as an adjective to denote nationality, the first letter is not capitalised. Had the resolution referred only to ethnic Estonians, the text would have read “eesti inimesed” (“Estonian people” or “people who are Estonian”), which could be interpreted in different ways.

This linguistic issue is familiar to many professional translators, and the Institute of the Estonian Language has also weighed in, noting that place names are written with a lowercase first letter when referring to peoples and tribes. As a result, it is incorrect to accuse the authors of the text in question of discriminating against anyone on the basis of ethnicity. As a capital letter is used in the word “Eesti,” it is clear that the text refers to all inhabitants of Estonia without prejudice to their ethnicity.

We enjoy working with different languages and appreciate the differences. Our goal isn’t to disparage or accuse anyone but only to spread the word about correct usage.

Similarly, multilingual interpretation management is no less important than the translation process. Any snags or glitches can get in the way of the interpreting or even bring it to a crashing halt. If all that needs to be translated is a short text from one language to another, a more casual approach might work. However, for more complex projects involving many languages or many interpreters, a lack of high-quality management could impair all facets of the service.

For customers, it’s always more convenient to deal with just “one turnkey solution” – not with all of the dates, deadlines, order specifications, names of interpreters and partners or other details. Our job is to make sure that our customers find us an effective, streamlined option – and we try to be that single solution for our customers. This allows your business to focus on its main activity.

Let’s say you need to organise a conference where the proceedings are in Estonian but the participants need simultaneous interpreting in two languages – English and Russian. It’s likely that the main organiser of the event will have to shoulder the responsibility of arranging the interpreting. They have to find interpreters, agree on the time slots and budget and provide them with all the essentials – even accommodation, food and transport. In addition, the interpreters will need all of the information on terms and the background needed to prepare for the simultaneous interpreting. They also need to be furnished with booths and headphones, the conditions for installation of the equipment need to be agreed, a suitable location found in the conference hall and the participants must ensure they have all that they need

The person preparing the event as a whole has to focus mainly on the quality end result, which means there is the probability of overlooking a particular detail. For example, interpreters might not receive the texts of the presentations ahead of time. It’s just a little detail, but it means the interpreter has to improvise due to a lack of sufficient preparation. Improvising is not compatible with the overall quality of an international event. There are many fine details that need to be considered; for this reason, it is more important to delegate the “sub-project” to professionals and then focus on the main issues related to organising the event.

Naturally, every customer wants to get results as quickly as possible, and at the lowest price. That might even be possible, although unlikely. If a customer places a text without an urgent deadline, and the translator happens to have some time during that period without other pressing deadlines, the work will get done rapidly even though the customer didn’t expressly request so. This rarely happens because translators are usually quite busy. It’s easier for translators to plan their work if customers know how quickly they need the finished translation or – even better – the customer gives some advance warning that they’ll need a text translated in the near future. That gives time to prepare the translation and set aside time to fulfil the order. This would be an ideal situation, ensuring both the maximum quality of the translation and the lowest possible price.

Occasionally, a translation is needed “yesterday.” In such a case, the translation bureau will realise it is an exceptional case and the job will be fast-tracked accordingly. However, rushing can end up costing customers more. Usually, an expedited order means overtime, the need to change (and grind) gears and other inconveniences, all of which end up being reflected in a higher price. To keep the price at a reasonable level, it’s worth asking the bureau how fast the job would be translated if it were a standard order. Perhaps the standard pace will be sufficient to satisfy the customer. If a translation has a very short turnaround, the price-quality ratio becomes an important consideration.

The time allotted for the translation determines how much the translator has to rush and whether the proof-reader will be able to look over the text carefully. Sometimes, proofreading isn’t even needed, such as when the customer wants an overview or summary of a text and precise phrasing is not important, yet machine translation is not desired either. In general, we don’t favour that kind of work, but we are ready to work with the customer and consider various options to see what can be done. This type of work usually costs less, because proofreading is not included, but one shouldn’t expect particularly high quality. Nor will the price be low if the translation is needed quickly. But if the customer already knows the basic gist of the text, it might be a reasonable course not to order a full translation of the text.

The format of the text also has a consequence. A .pdf file can’t be edited and has to be converted to text. Working with files for specific applications used by the customer can be more complicated. The translation service has little in common with conversions in other formats, and so we recommend that files be sent in common text formats. Most translation providers have the basic suite of Microsoft Office applications for text, presentations and spreadsheets, but they’re unlikely to purchase licences for specific and expensive programs to fulfil a small order. Large companies have a solution for this: they can provide translators with access to the specialised programs, but it comes down to mutual trust. When it comes to data protection, we follow a consistent set of principles and work in an atmosphere of mutual trust – that’s the path to the best results.