What could be better on a cold January day…
than a room full of people you communicate with on a regular basis, but you’ve never actually met in person, or necessarily even know what they look like, accompanied by:
- a warm, chatty vibe,
- a few drinks,
- and some delicious food (including salads – we wouldn’t want to be responsible for any broken New Year’s resolutions)?
The translator get-together will go down in ALM’s history as one of our favourite events.
The ALM Translations team met with translators from far and wide at an event expertly organised by our Vendor Manager, Irene Martinez-Celis.
People flew in from the Netherlands, Poland and Germany and others travelled from various parts of the UK to meet us at the Hotel du Vin, in the wonderful city of Birmingham.
We had been talking about showing appreciation to our hard-working translators; freelancers and remote workers can often be overlooked.
So, the great ALM Translator Get-together became a reality.
January seemed like the perfect month, as people are in need of some post-festive cheer.
We also understand that a day away from work isn’t always possible, as a translator’s life is a busy, deadline-driven one and time is always money.
We put the feelers out about the event back in the autumn of 2017 and the response was positive, and so the organising began in earnest.
On the day, ALM staff moved the office into the warm and cosy Hotel du Vin in Birmingham for the afternoon, and in between work, met some of the translators they speak to and work with on a regular basis.
After drinks in the courtyard, we enjoyed a buffet lunch in the Krug room, followed by a particularly difficult language-related quiz devised by Irene.
The two deserving winners were Helen Tyson and Tom Warne, who won large boxes of chocs from Hotel Chocolat.
We also sent everyone home with goody bags which included delicious truffles and chocolates from local chocolate maker, Henley Chocolates. We wanted to give our translators a little something that had been hand-made locally, in turn supporting a local business. Sampling the gorgeous truffles and chocolates was one of the toughest jobs in the organisation of this event, of course.
The event was a great success, with wonderful feedback from translators including:
“Lovely people and it’s great to have that relationship with you. All the best for the future”
“It was great to meet people face to face and would love to come back”
“Love it! It’s the most fun I’ve had at a professional event”
“Really enjoyed meeting the team and other translators”.
Having spoken to several translators, it seemed that no-one had attended an event specially organised for translators before.
Relationships with the people you work with are so important. We like to treat our freelance translators as members of our team and in the same way as our own staff. We believe this is why we have some of the best translators in the business working for us.