What the client needs, not what they think they need.

There is a new tendency to hold everything the client wants as a priority over interpreters’ needs. This idea of focusing on what clients need, hurt interpreters’ working conditions, fees, and the quality of the rendition. Our job, as professional interpreters, communication experts, and cultural advisors, is to listen to the client, explain what a professional service looks like, and spell out everything that is required to achieve that goal. Clients rely on us to give them an informed answer. Only then, clients will know what they need. It is not what clients think they need that is important, it is about the things they really need. We inform, educate, explain. That is a professional service, not a race to the bottom.

Videorama,