Sandberg is certified to the translation services standard ISO 17100 which specifies requirements for all aspects of the translation process directly affecting the quality and delivery of the company’s translation services. The ISO 17100 standard includes provisions for translation service providers (TSPs) concerning the management of core processes, minimum qualification requirements for translators, revisers and project managers, the availability and management of resources, and other actions necessary for the delivery of a quality translation service.

For our in-house and freelance translators this means that you are expected to have the following professional competences as described in ISO 17100:

1. Translation competence: the ability to translate content in accordance with the tasks listed below under Translation, including the ability to address the problems of language content comprehension and language content production and the ability to render the target language content in accordance with the client-TSP agreement and other project specifications.
2. Linguistic and textual competence in the source language and the target language: the ability to understand the source language, fluency in the target language, and general or specialised knowledge of text-type conventions. This linguistic and textual competence includes the ability to apply this knowledge when producing translation or other target language content.
3. Competence in research, information acquisition, and processing: the ability to efficiently acquire the additional linguistic and specialized knowledge necessary to understand the source language content and to produce the target language content. Research competence also requires experience in the use of research tools and the ability to develop suitable strategies for the efficient use of the information sources available.
4. Cultural competence: ability to make use of information on the behavioural standards, up-to-date terminology, value systems, and locale that characterize both source and target language cultures.
5. Technical competence: the knowledge, abilities, and skills required to perform the technical tasks in the translation process by employing technical resources including the tools and IT systems that support the whole translation process.
6. Domain competence: the ability to understand content produced in the source language and to reproduce it in the target language using the appropriate style and terminology.

These competencies may be acquired by degree studies in translation or languages from an institution of higher education or experience in translating, as outlined below, and maintained and developed by CPD (Continuing Professional Development) activities.

Translators carrying out revision tasks are expected to have the same competencies and translation or revision experience in the domain under consideration.

You should also meet at least one of the following qualification criteria:

1. degree in translation, linguistics or language studies or an equivalent degree that includes significant translation training, from a recognised institution of higher education;
2. a degree in any other field from a recognised institution of higher education plus the equivalent of two years of full-time professional experience in translating;
3. the equivalent of five years of full-time professional experience in translating.

More information regarding these five areas of competence or required qualifications can be requested from Sandberg’s Vendor Management team.

For each assignment you accept from Sandberg, your acceptance means that you consider yourself to have the necessary competence to carry out the assignment as outlined above. You must always deliver a thorough and properly executed translation. You are expected to work according to good industry practice and research the topic as necessary, have the required technical tools and dictionaries at your disposal, proofread your own translation and run a spellcheck and any other necessary checks before delivery. We are always happy to help you with any technical or other questions relating to your work for us.

CPD is short for “Continuing Professional Development” and it can be defined as the “systematic maintenance, improvement and broadening of knowledge and skills, and the development of personal qualities necessary for the execution of professional duties throughout the working life” or life-long learning.

CPD activities are required in most professions. In the translation industry, CPD is promoted at industry associations, and required by translation service standards such as ISO 17100. ISO 17100 requires all translators, PMs and other staff involved in production to undertake CPD activities and maintain their competences by continuing practice.

Sandberg requests you to confirm you undertake CPD activities when you join our freelancer database, and after that you should continue to undertake CPD on an annual basis. By continuing to accept tasks and use the functions of Passport you are confirming that you undertake CPD regularly. We support you with this by providing articles, translation tool training, MTPE training, and more on the Knowledge Base. There is no limit to the amount of CPD activities you should undertake annually. Internally at Sandberg we recommend 2–3 days per year, which together with on-the-job learning and continuous practice, is what most translators can easily achieve.

• Formal training
  • Webinars and training sessions organised by Sandberg
  • Webinars, training and courses organised by any other companies or associations, e.g. Proz.com, translator associations
• On-the-job learning
  • Learning to use a new translation tool
  • Learning to work with machine translation
  • Reading instructions on a new type of task, for example, content creation or search engine optimisation
  • Researching new subject areas or text types, for example, wind power
• Following industry news and developments
  • Proz.com Community Choice Award blogs and articles
  • LinkedIn translation/localization industry groups & discussions
• Membership of industry association
  • Joining an industry association and following or participating in their work
• Keeping in touch with source or target language culture when abroad
  • News
  • Language, terminology and linguistic institutes' recommendations and newsletters

At https://wiki.stptrans.com/ you will find our Knowledge Base, an extensive collection of useful tips and tricks on how to use different translation-related applications, how to solve problems relating to these applications, alongside useful links to glossaries and other linguistic resources.

A task is confirmed once it is assigned to you in Passport and is visible on your “Current Tasks” page. Do not start until Sandberg’s project manager has launched the task in Passport. When this happens you will receive an email notification and the task will appear as “Launched” on your Passport “Current Tasks” page.

Always follow the project instructions provided to you. You are welcome to submit queries or request additional reference material in good time prior to the agreed deadline; we will contact the client and do our best to help you. You can find Sandberg's query management guidelines for translators in our Knowledge Base article Handling queries - Guidelines for translators. Do not under any circumstances contact Sandberg’s client or the end-client directly.

We expect translators to translate in accordance with the purpose of the translation project, including the linguistic conventions of the target language and project instructions. The translation process should take into account the following, as outlined in ISO 17100:

1. compliance with specific domain and client terminology and/or any other reference material provided and ensuring terminological consistency during translation;
2. semantic accuracy of the target language content;
3. appropriate syntax, spelling, punctuation, diacritical marks, and other orthographical conventions of the target language;
4. lexical cohesion and phraseology;
5. compliance with any proprietary and/or client style guide (including domain, language register, and language variants);
6. locale and any applicable standards;
7. formatting;
8. target audience and purpose of the target language content.

We expect translators to proofread their own work against the source text for possible semantic, grammatical and spelling issues, and for omissions or other errors, before delivery, regardless of whether the translation is scheduled to be revised by a second linguist or not.

Revision by a second linguist should always be carried out against the source. If the work is done in memoQ, the PM and translators need to follow the memoQ revision instructions. If the work is done in another tool or file format, revision changes should usually be marked by tracked changes, otherwise the changes can be made directly in the translated files.

Revisers are provided with and should read all the relevant translation instructions and query answers and make sure the translation has been carried out according to them. Reference material should be consulted where necessary, and the reviser should attempt to check any terminology either with the translator or from alternative sources if they suspect something is wrong. Otherwise, it is the translator’s task to ensure all specialist terminology is correct. The reviser’s role is to make sure that the text is suitable for its purpose, does not contain any mistranslations, spelling or grammatical errors, and that the translation is complete and carried out according to instructions provided for the project. The reviser should inform the project manager of any significant issues in the translation.

Your revision task will outline the time estimated for the revision. When calculating this, your PM will take into account the total word count and not the weighted word count, since all segments must be read and checked. However, revision of in-scope 100% and 101% matches will be estimated at a faster speed, since these have been checked and approved previously. The same applies to repetitions, if these have not been locked. The PM will also consider aspects which may necessitate increased revision time such as:

• the translation is split between multiple translators;
• a demanding or challenging source text;
• extensive instructions or reference materials.

If you have any concerns about being able to complete a revision within the allocated time once you have started work on it, for example due to poor quality, please flag this to the PM who will either allow more time, or may ask you to do your best within the time allocated and provide the corresponding quality. In the latter case, responsibility for the final quality is shared between Sandberg, the client and the reviser.

In achieving an idiomatic and fluent translation, you may feel tempted to make stylistic and preferential changes. However, Sandberg cannot agree to compensate for additional time spent due to preferential changes outside of what is reasonably necessary and expected, so please bear this in mind when considering such changes.

“Finalisation” is a term used at Sandberg to denote the last stages of a translation project, where the finaliser readies the translation files for delivery. The project instructions provided will specify who has been asked to finalise the project before final delivery. This will be either the translator, or the reviser, depending on circumstances.

If the project is finalised by the translator after the reviser has finished, the translator is expected to review all changes suggested by the reviser, and confirm they accept the changes. They are free to reject changes they feel inappropriate. They should ensure all changes have been made globally in the files. They should run a final QA and spelling check. No comments should remain in the files and the files should be ready for delivery to the client, once the finalisation process has been completed. The translator should complete both the “translation” and “finalisation” parts of the QC checklist.

If the project is finalised by the reviser, they should make all their changes globally in the files, and then run a final QA and spell check. No comments should remain in the files and the files should be ready for delivery to the client, once the finalisation process has been completed. The reviser should complete both the “revision” and “finalisation” parts of the QC checklist.

Your translation should always follow the standard or current official rules of the target language with regard to grammar and spelling. Avoid a literal translation of the source document. Any spelling or typing mistakes can easily be removed with the spellchecker but remember that not all mistakes are detected electronically. You should always read through your finished work to check for any incorrect wording and spelling mistakes.

The following links take you to basic Nordic and English language guidelines compiled by Sandberg’s Lead Translators. Any style guidelines provided by Sandberg’s clients for a translation project take precedence over these language guidelines.

• Danish http://stptrans.com/style-guide/danish-language-guidelines/
• English http://stptrans.com/style-guide/english-language-guidelines/
• Finnish http://stptrans.com/style-guide/finnish-language-guidelines/
• Norwegian http://stptrans.com/style-guide/norwegian-language-guidelines/
• Swedish http://stptrans.com/style-guide/swedish-language-guidelines/

All work should be checked prior to delivery to Sandberg. Translators are expected to carry out self-revision of the translated target content, before the translation is passed on to the reviser, who carries out a full revision of the target language against the source. In many cases, Sandberg’s clients order a translation-only service, where no revision by a second linguist is scheduled. All translation assignments should be of a final quality, deliverable to the client, regardless of whether revision by a second linguist is scheduled or not.

All work must be spellchecked prior to delivery regardless of file format or tool used. Please ask your project manager if you are unsure of how to spellcheck in the tool you are using.

Quality Assurance (QA) checking is a set of mechanical checks that pick up on errors in translated files that a human eye easily misses. These may be missing translations, inconsistencies or punctuation issues, or inconsistencies with the provided glossary. QA checking is a mandatory step in Sandberg's workflows, and you are asked to confirm that QA checking has been done when you complete a project. Please ask your project manager if you are unsure of how to run a QA check in the tool you are using.

Read more about QA checking in the Sandberg guidelines here: QA checking.

The Quality Control Checklist is a simple checklist intended to make sure that both the translator and the reviser as well as the project manager for the project have carried out their tasks as required, including any final checks. The QC checklist opens up automatically when you mark a task completed in the Current Tasks view on our Passport portal, for tasks that require it. The project manager will verify that the checklist has been correctly filled in and request clarification if necessary. If you mark the translation as “unfit for purpose” you may be requested to complete a feedback form.

Always use the resources, translation memories (TMs), glossaries/termbases (TBs) and reference material provided by the project manager. If there are any issues with the supplied reference material and/or terminology, contact your project manager as soon as possible.

Deliver the translated files or project in the format requested by your project manager, by the delivery date and time shown in Passport, and mark the task completed. Inform your project manager of any issues or delays in the schedule as soon as you are aware of them.

Please use the translation tool and version requested by the project manager. Sandberg’s main translation tool is memoQ, however, we also use a host of other translation tools so please let us know if you upgrade your translation tool or acquire new tools. Some tools have translator versions that we can provide to you free of charge.

If you have any problems using memoQ or any other requested tool, contact your project manager. You can also refer to Sandberg's Knowledge Base at https://wiki.stptrans.com/ for instructions on how to use different tools and troubleshooting advice.

The translation process has greatly evolved over the past few years and is closely interlinked with the development of translation technology and automation. Using machine translation (MT) and machine translation post-editing (MTPE) as part of the translation process is a natural sequel to leveraging and reusing translation data from translation memories, and is widely accepted in the translation industry.

MT is used as part of Sandberg’s translation workflows and you may be asked to carry out machine translation post-editing as part of a translation task. You are requested to read and understand Sandberg's Machine translation post-editing guidelines to know more about this. As Sandberg operates in compliance with the ISO 18587 standard for machine translation post-editing, the machine translation post-editing guidelines act as the primary source of information on how to carry out this type of task and should be considered a requirement for all linguists undertaking MTPE assignments from Sandberg.

• Revision: (ISO 17100) bilingual examination of target language content against source language content for its suitability for the agreed purpose. In these Translation and Revision Guidelines.
• Text-type convention: (ISO 17100) subset of specifications for the target language content related to the content type and domain.
• Domain: (ISO 17100) subject field, sphere of knowledge of activity having its own specialised culture, social context, and linguistic characteristics.
• Locale: (ISO 17100) set of characteristics, information, or conventions specific to the linguistic, cultural, technical, and geographical conventions of a target audience.
• Competence: (ISO) ability to apply knowledge, experience, and skills to achieve intended results.