by Samuel Gitukui

Everyone experiences off days when their motivation to work simply isn’t there. You might feel frustrated, groggy and while that voice at the back of your mind is telling you to get grinding, your body simply wants to laze.

For those who have the slightest will to push themselves to work, they won’t be operating at maximum efficiency.

But there is a way around this!

Let’s find out 5 top tips on how to boost our motivation to work.

1.      Remind yourself of your goals and visualize

Research has shown that reminding yourself of your long-term goals puts you in the mood to achieve them. However, our minds are designed to focus on small term goals.

To keep yourself motivated, visualize your long-term goals and work your mind backward to the small steps that are required to achieve the big goals.

2.      Simply begin

Once you start on a project, keeping the momentum going. it far easier than trying to convince yourself to do it when you haven’t already begun. Instead of thinking too much about the task ahead, focus on actually beginning the task ahead.

5 minutes into the project, you just might find that you are looking forward to seeing it complete. The sooner you begin, the sooner you will complete the task.

3.      Add a timer to your schedule.

Everything is so much simpler once broken down into smaller bits of tasks. You can do this by setting a timer where you will work for just a set amount of time and then take a break.

You will be looking forward to the breaks and by focusing on the short task ahead keep you motivated. Suddenly the task doesn’t look so huge anymore as you are only focused on the next bit of work time

4.      Let others know

One of the most effective ways to keep yourself motivated on a project is to speak about your plans to your peers. You will want to prove to them that you’ll indeed do what you said which will push you towards accomplishing your goals. Nobody, after all, wants to be looked at as a failure.

You can even take things a notch higher by letting the whole office know about your plans. This is sure to keep you motivated.

5.      Improve your “self-talk”

Self talk is the internal dialogue that you make with your mind. It can be positive or negative and this has a great influence on your motivation.

If you are not used to telling yourself things like “I can do this” then start now and you'll quickly notice how effective it is.

6.      Make a list
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Write down a list of all the things you want to accomplish during the day including small tasks. Then set out to complete them one at a time. Each time you finish a task, cross it off the list. the feeling of accomplishment of finishing one task will motivate you to finish the next task.

by Samuel Gitukui

When you first hear the world co-working, the thing that comes to mind is a group of freelancers sharing office space on second hand furniture.

Think again!

Modern co-working has seen great improvements with amenities such as a fitness center, coffee and tea places, bars and cafes and high-tech security.

Freelancers and remote workers now come together to share working space that is also comfortable. Some of the best services can be found here, something that has caught the attention of large companies and enterprises.

This is why.

1.      It is now possible to recruit form anywhere in the world

Companies may not be in a position to have all their personnel working at their headquarters. Coworking provides an alternative where the organization can still find the best services from anywhere in the world and hire.

As opposed to a freelancer working from home, co-working provides a similar social setting to that found in the office which has been showed to improve motivation.

Regular interaction with peers and like-minded individuals is fun and enhances the quality of their work life. There are also amenities similar to those found in at home.

2.      There’s better creativity

Research has shown that co-working can boost creativity. Stepping away from a bureaucratic setting to a freer and more relaxed atmosphere breathes new ideas and life into the work.

And by interacting with others with different skills sets, co-workers learn how to do things better and more efficiently. Updated companies are aware of this and its one of the reasons they seek the services from a co-working environment.

3.      Companies can expand with minimal hassle

Think of a company that seeks to venture into a new market place. How simple would it to start of with co-working facilities and employees? The answer…very simple.

There’s a lot saved as opposed to renting office space and conducting the recruitment process.

In fact, moving to a new geographical area often begins with a few individuals who then grow to 5, 7, 10 and so on. Co-working takes advantage of available space until the number of employees grow to where getting office space is inevitable.

Often a team of co-workers will include 2 to 20 people.

4.      Its cost effective

Okay granted, co-working is more expensive in terms of office space compared to more traditional settings. However, it is cost effective as many an organization has found out.

Normally a commercial lease is between 3 and 5 years. This can prove beneficial for organizations that are not sure how long they will need the space. Often companies rent more space that they initially require which is inefficient.

Co-working is flexible. Most co-working organizations have memberships between 30 days and a year. Companies get the chance to easily scale down or up as need be.

And remember what we said about coworkers being comfortable in their work environment? They are more productive and can be retained for longer which saves the company the expense of recruiting more workers.

by Samuel Gitukui

Social media has revolutionized the way we interact and communicate with one another. And with technology, it is now possible to access data on different areas.

Social network platforms can be a great way to develop a large fan base which provides you with a business opportunity by directing sales to your followers. And this is how…

1.      Make Sure All Your Profiles Are the Same

Whether its Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, it’s prudent to maintain the same handle on all of them. it may seem like something small but this is a significant branding strategy that over time produces big results.

Customers are able to find you through the different platforms and associate content with your individual brand. Once you have gained the trust of your followers, your business can reap massive rewards.

2.      Re-post Testimonials and Content About the Product

Trust is something that is not very easily established especially with the advent of social media due to a lack of physical presence. It is also one of the most important things that drive sales and helps to maintain a loyal customer base.

By re-posting what other people are saying about the product or service you are selling, you develop trust and are actually getting most of the work done by other customers.

Clients simply love reviews and will actually seek them out. You can even create an incentive for customers to leave reviews by providing giveaways.

3.      Target Your Customers

While maintaining a social presence on most of the main platforms such as Facebook is great, it is even better to have a strong presence on the ones where your clients are most active on. It’s all about focusing on the right platform by creating messages that will resonate well with your customers.

In other words, in order to drive sales, you need to speak to those who mainly buy your products and this means finding them first.

4.      It’s Time to Speak Their Language

One of the best and main ways to connect to your clients is to speak like them. This means using their language and vernacular.

It is especially important when asking someone to buy your products, tag friends or leave a comment.

Once you establish that connection, it makes your target audience more receptive to the marketing messages that you send.

5.      Always Leave a Link

Businesses should strive to make it simple for their following to make a purchase. Through social media, the best way to achieve this is by leaving a link that directs people to your products. If the process of making a purchase becomes difficult they will quickly move on to something else.

Put links in the content that seamlessly take your readers to your website with as few as one or two clicks. If it’s more than this, the conversion rate may be low. Features such as Instagram’s product tagging make it simple for businesses to perform well through social networks.

by Samuel Gitukui

Reviews are quickly gaining popularity as a strong determinant in making purchase decisions. You can find them from Google Star ratings to Amazon to pretty much everywhere you look. Even the testimonials on a website are a form of review.

But what fuels the need for reviews? To understand that concept, you will have to look at the numbers. Up to 92 percent of online business customers will go through reviews. Out of that number 72 percent will go ahead and make a buying decision after having read 6 or less reviews.

Without doubt reviews are important to customers which makes it incredibly crucial for business owners to manage them. But the real question is, why do customers value reviews so much in the first place.

Reviews Are Like Word of Mouth

More and more businesses are directing their marketing resources to digital methods of doing business. These include using tools like social media and SEO.

The main drawback with this method of doing business is that it has almost completely eliminated the human factor. Granted sending that add can catch someone’s attention but reading a personal statement about another customers experience with the product is the closest thing to word of mouth that you can find online.

Advertisements will mainly focus on a product’s strong points. Clients only see the good. But the reality of the situation is that all products have their own set of pros and cons. In a review, customers can learn about the downsides of the product and make a more informed buying decision.

Clients are aware that the person who left the review did not get any benefit from it, and that is what makes the opinions trustworthy. As the wall street journal puts it, the behavior of individuals is shaped by those around them and what they consider appropriate.

Word of mouth causes potential buyers to make a choice, one which they believe is the correct one based on the opinions of others.

What About Negative Reviews

It’s easy to think that bad reviews will drive away customers but this is usually not the case. In fact, customers are more likely to trust the review when it shows both the positive and negative features of a product as opposed to just the good points. This creates more transparency.

Not every customer will give a 5-star feedback and yes, too many negative reviews will indeed discourage customers. But a few negative points about the product will emphasize on the transparency of the business.

And for the business, responding promptly to any complaints will create an opportunity for even more satisfied customers which will help you form a loyal client base.

The Individuals Need to Belong

With Social platforms changing the way people communicate, individuals seem to want to have their own social ranking and thus lay out their views about a product.

Not only do customers crave reviews, they also want to voice out their opinions about a product.

by Summer Worsley

The world has expanded and globalised rapidly in the last few decades, to the point that the integration of certain social aspects has started to be the norm. What this means is that things such as culture and languages are exchanged continuously within the international community.
 
Languages particularly play a vital role in the exchange of information. In fact, multilingualism has never been as present in the international business community as it is now.
 
Here, we discuss some of the benefits multilingualism brings to business while highlighting some of its cognitive effects.
 
The English Myth of the Business World 

While English is considered by many to be the official language of business globally, this doesn’t mean that it is the sole competitor.
 
Many people believe that knowing English as their first language is a huge bonus, but in the business world, it can be damaging to think that way. All languages carry some useful clout in terms of business relations. This is in part due to the special economic value each country possesses.
 
Take into account the following situations, for example:
 
China’s economy has increased seven-fold between 2000 and 2015. The nation is considered an economic powerhouse and is home to over 1.05 billion Mandarin Chinese speakers.
 
Arabic is the world’s fifth most spoken language with around 300 million native speakers. This language can be used as a portal to conduct business in the Middle East, the Gulf nations, and in Northern Africa.
 
Japan is the world’s third largest economy with its main economic gains being main in technology and robotics. For anyone wanting a clear path into tech and electronics, learning Japanese is one of the best ways to get a foot in the door.
 
The Benefits of Multilingualism in the Workplace 

There’s been a lot of attention given to multilingualism and the benefits to businesses and workplaces recently. Here are just a few examples of how building a team with multiple languages can give your company the edge.
 
Engage an International Community 

Languages are a vital part of working on a global scale. Language skills facilitate not only ... your competitors but allow for the exchange of products, infrastructure, and assets. If you’re unable to observe or conduct meaningful business relations because of a language barrier, chances are that you could be missing out on a great deal of knowledge; knowledge capable of benefiting your business.
 
For example, from 2004 to 2011 the UK value of Chinese exports quadrupled to 12.5 billion Euro. The takeaway here is that Mandarin Chinese is a highly valuable skill to have when conducting business in the UK.
 
Satisfy Your Clients
 
It’s common knowledge that all of a given business’ clients won’t speak the language of that business. But by having a trained multilingual staff on hand, clients can be satisfied easier.
 
This perk eliminates the presence of language barriers while opening the pathway to long-lasting and mutually satisfying business contracts.
 
Sales Can Increase Exponentially 

The Common Sense Advisory board conducted research on the localisation of sales in global business. They surveyed a total of 10 countries, with each represented by 300 people. The countries being Brazil, China, Egypt, France, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, Russia, Spain, and Turkey (they were selected by economic value). To summarize the report, the following results were discovered:
 
Statistics show that 82 per cent of people are likelier to buy promotional material if the content is in their language.
 
Furthermore, 75 per cent of online shoppers are more inclined to buy from websites that have content and products displayed in their language.
 
While 74 per cent is more likely to re-purchase the same brand if they are provided with after-sales care in their native language.
 
Facts about Multilingualism 

• It is estimated that between 60 and 75 per cent of the world can speak at least two languages. Bilingualism (speaking two languages) is the norm while monolingualism (speaking one language only) is the oddity.

 

• Some people in the world can speak dozens of languages, they are known as hyperpolyglots.

 

• In the early 20th century there was a commonly held belief that bilingual children would be intellectually hindered by their language skills due to the increased linguistic activity. However, In 1962 the Peal and Lambert study proved that bilingual individuals actually have an improved sense of “mental flexibility”.

• If you’re looking to increase your salary, you’ll be glad to know that knowing a second language was estimated to be valued at $128,000 over 40 years.

 

​The Cognitive Benefits a Multilingual Team Holds 

Does it matter if your team members don’t speak more than one language? It might. Here’s why:
 
More Grey Matter 

Multilingual individuals have more grey matter in their brains than those who are monolingual.
Grey matter plays a role in muscle control, emotions, sensory perception, memory, and speech.
 
Having employees with these qualities enhanced may prove to be particularly useful in the business environment.
 
Better Problem Solving Skills 

Multilingual individuals can think in multiple languages. Having the ability to think in more than one language means also having the ability to process solutions in more than one way. This cognitive benefit can lead to improved problem-solving skills and enhanced rational thought processes.
 
Powerful People Skills 

Working as a part of a team in a large business corporation is something a lot of people do in today’s society. Having experience in a second language can grant you better people skills through the exposure of different cultures and societal mores.
 
Plus there’s evidence pointing to the fact that people who speak multiple languages are better at commanding executive control of situations through flexible reasoning skills.
 
  
Languages are a critical part of human history, and they are necessarily an integral part of daily life; business is no exception.
 
If you’re questioning whether to pick up a second language to give you an edge in the industry you’re working in, then you’re on the right track. If you’re an employer, consider diversifying your team’s language base.
 
Multilingualism can boost cognitive functions, foster enhanced mental ability, and encourage a healthy flow of information in the international community.
 
Good business requires good communication – but at the end of it all, foreign language skills will determine the limits of your world.

by Samuel Gitukui

Very often when starting a business, limited resources forces owners to perform most of the tasks themselves such as sales, marketing as well as some day to day operations. They also do their own accounting and take part in customer service.

While we can all agree that this is not the most efficient way to run a business, it’s not a wonder to pick on skills from one department and transfer them to another and improve on the general performance of the enterprise.

Take customer relations and sales for example. These two departments might seem different but skills acquired from handling customer complaints can really improve on the performance of the sales team to help build good customer relations. Let’s find out.

Modern Times Demand Modern Methods

Initially, but not in the so distant past, sales people relied on a simple strategy of cold calling and interacting with as many people as possible to drive sales in the hopes that some of them will make a purchase.

While this method did work, modern times are seeing well-informed customers who value the quality of service as much as making the purchase.

The difference between cold calling and offering good service, is that with the second method, the business is able to retain those customers ensuring they make repeated purchases.

In comes the sales team. These people are the initial point of contact with any new and potential customers. If they create the wrong first impression, it is likely that the customer will want to avoid the business. However, if they are engaging and display professionalism, the customers will be easily drawn in.

This is exactly why sales people need to view customers as human beings and not just another deal to close. And what better way of making this possible than by taking part in customer service?

Through understanding the needs of their clients, sales people are able to view them from a customer relations point of view. Customers are more than willing to share their opinions and complaints but may lack a listening ear.

By listening to the customers, the sales people express empathy and tailor their pitch to show how their product can help solve the customers’ problems as opposed to aggressively trying to get them to buy.

Empathy is one of the most important skills that a customer service rep can have in his arsenal and is the motivation to ensuring that the customer’s issues are met and that they leave satisfied.

Better Customer Relations Equals Loyal Customers

Think about it for a second, what would you rather have, a one-time purchase from a customer or a client that keeps coming back for more? It’s pretty obvious that the second type of customer is best isn’t it?

It is one thing to get someone to buy your product, but it is a completely different thing to have a buyer become an advocate for your business. With a few customers, word will get out of the amazing benefits of buying your products increasing sales and revenue.

This can be made possible by providing the sales team with customer relations skills.

Remember, you don’t find customers for your products, you find products for your customers.

by Samuel Gitukui

Technology—we embrace it for all the benefits that it offers, making our work easier, helping us connect and offering entertainment. However, great as it may be, technology has a downside, it is harder to make personal connections.

All of us can think of a way in which technology helps boost business and sales. Take communication for example. It is possible to automate things and send emails in bulk. But the main question is, is this what customers really want?
The simple truth is, personal connections are important as they build trust. Having a large client base that trusts in the service and products that you offer means that they will get the word out allowing your business to enjoy free marketing.

When it’s all said and done, it is not the latest up-to-date technology that will keep your business running, it is the relationships that you build with your clients.

And there are 3 main people that every business should focus on building strong and healthy relationships with—the customers, the competitors and the influencers.

The Customers

While it may sound obvious that a business should have good relations with the customers, making this possible is actually harder than it sounds. Customers are clever. They know inauthentic when they see it after many bad experiences with companies that trying to close a quick deal.

These experiences also make them skeptical and what they are really looking for in a business is a long-standing relationship.

But how can business owners ensure good relationships with clients? There are two main points to note and practice. First, listen to what the customers are saying and second, provide them with what they want.

A good way to show appreciation to customers is sending them an email after they’ve made a purchase or through gift cards.

The Influencers
There will always be influencers in every industry. These are the guys that know how to drive sales and make trends. Aligning your enterprise with influencers can bring with it massive rewards.

These organizations or people have a large following who trust in their lead. To build a relationship with them will also mean that customers will trust in your products as well.

But to create a long-standing relationship with influencers, you have to show them that you can do something for them as well. The relationship should be mutually beneficial. One of the ways to do this is to share content, ideas and information.

There is a massive sales potential once an influencer starts to recommend your products.

The Competitors
 
Business owners view competition as something that needs to be avoided or somehow gotten rid of. However, the competition can turn into an invaluable resource. By connecting with your competitors and making friends, you can learn something new which you can use to your advantage.

On the other hand, bad-mouthing competition proves to your customers that your business lacks integrity, which will take the customers focus off the benefits that your products can offer.

by Samuel Gitukui

Technology is a significant driving force in today’s world. It has found its way in virtually every sector of human lives. Today we want to find out about the technology that drives sales and marketing and one that ultimately helps increase business revenue.

These tools, also known as sales enablement tools can help make the work of the sales and marketing team more efficient which translates to more and faster streaming revenue.

But first…

What Is the Meaning of Sales Enablement?

The main function that centers around the design of sales enablement tools is to help the sales people with the right guidance and training to pass on the relevant information to potential clients and effectively close the deal.

These tools touch on different areas which include communications and customer engagement, training, content development and performance analytics.

One way to be efficient in business is to find what works and to repeat and improve on the process time and time again. The same can be said for sales enablement tools. They provide users with a repeatable process which they can follow to raise revenue and to maintain that revenue.

By using such tools, clients are able to find the most relevant information at the most convenient time. They will help to further integrate the actions of the different departments in the enterprise such as production and branding.

Customers are also provided with the perfect avenue to leave feedback which the business can use to improve service.

When and Where Sales Enablement Tools are Used

Note that sales enablement tools can only be used in 3 main scenarios…

1. Content organization and optimization—all the information pertaining to the business sales department such as competitor analysis, decks, email templates and case studies are organized in a neat, easily accessible format. The sales people can get the relevant information that they require fast and easy.
2. Automation—this makes sending messages and emails to prospective customers efficient without the delay of having to wait for a member of the sales and marketing team to reply to emails and messages.
3. Analysis and Reporting—these tools will provide data on which emails got the most responses and provides information on not just how the sales team is performing, but the results of their engagement with clients. The information can then be analyzed and the right adjustments in the operations can be made.

Are Sales Enablement Tools Actually Helpful?

You know what they say, numbers don’t lie. Research has shown that businesses that use sales enablement tools were over 2X more efficient at creating a link between their sales actions to the revenue realized.

These businesses were also 83% more productive, 58% more efficient at retaining their sales people, had 23% better conversion rate and a 32% higher sales team quota.

Sales enablement tools allow managers and business owners to have insight to the actions of the sales team. They can find out what works and what doesn’t and make the necessary adjustments to optimize what works around the entire sales team.

If you are considering investing in sales enablement tools, great choice. The best tools come from companies such as Guru, CloudMap and Clearside. 

by Samuel Gitukui

Anyone, whether successful or not makes excuses. Sometimes a challenge will face us and once self-doubt kicks in we make an excuse as to why we don’t want to face that challenge.

Think about what happened when you last made an excuse. High chance there was a missed opportunity which ultimately meant failure. No matter which target you want to hit, whether it’s getting fitter, finishing a course or starting a new business, excuses go hand-in-hand with failure.

And there are some excuses that are common and are the result of most people failing to achieve their goals. Let’s look at them now.

       1.      There’s no time
We all have the same 24 hours in a day. Within that time, we meet people we want to meet, do the things we want to do and see the things we want to see.

The same goes for when you want to start a business. If you are about to make the excuse that you don’t have enough time since you work a nine-to-five, then note that you can always wake up earlier or stay up late. If you really want it to happen, then you will definitely make time.

       2.      I won’t get enough opportunities

Being an entrepreneur is never easy. There is no well laid out path from A to B. you have to make things work. If there’s a barrier, either find a way around it or go straight through it. That’s how you move forward. Successful business people are tenacious and are not about to let a barrier stand between them and their goals.

Telling yourself that there are not enough opportunities is an excuse that will see you give up even before you start.

       3.      What will my family and friends think?

Don’t be surprised to find that your closest friends and family do not support your decisions to become an entrepreneur. If you find you are in such a situation, then you can remove yourself from their negative energy. Do what you believe is best for you.

If on the other hand you listen and go with whatever they think is best for you, then you will not get close to even starting that business.

It is simple to go along with what friends and family are saying as it is an excuse why you shouldn’t even start but it should be enough motivation to start your business and prove them wrong.

       4.      I am happy with where I am and what I have

What you are actually telling yourself is you don’t want to work any harder, but then sugar coating it to make it sound more appropriate.

Granted, more material things is not a guarantee of happiness but more often than not, it provides you with comfort and with the right mindset gives you a better life. Never settle, and always strive for more.

       5.      I’m worried about taking the risk

Taking risks is a part of doing business. There is no way around it. If your current venture scares you and you are worried that you may not be able to pull it off, keep in mind that even if you decide to go for the next idea, this second idea will still come with its own set of risks.

To be an entrepreneur also means rising above your fears and worries.

by Summer Worsley
​
Love it or hate it, English has become the world’s lingua franca* and its current position as a communication powerhouse is unlikely to change anytime soon.

For this reason, most businesses online these days choose to have an English language version of their website available, even if the business is not from an English-speaking country.

But with so many varieties of English to choose from, which one should you pick for your company or business?
 
The many varieties of English 

A given language, such as English, often has multiple varieties. In many ways, it’s technically more correct to speak about Englishes instead of English.

From the colloquially informed Australian variety, to the formality of written Indian English, in English we have a language chameleon. One that has been shaped, crafted and changed by the nations who use it.

Did you know that there are around 65 sovereign nations who list English as one of their official languages? Add to this the 30 odd non-sovereign nations who use English in the same capacity, mix in the world’s English creoles and pidgins, season with emerging Englishes, and the result is a linguistic stew like no other.

For the most part, Englishes are mutually intelligible.  Meaning that a speaker from one place can easily understand a speaker from another. That said, it’s also possible that being offered a “switcha” (lemonade) in Nassau, Bahamas would confuse many other native speakers. And being “aksed” (asked) a question in New Zealand would cause many an English speaker to do a double take.

Each variety of English is enriched by local slang, phrases, and pronunciation. But this is all speech, isn’t it different when it comes to text?

In terms of writing, vocabularies are merging thanks to the rise of globalisation, but many idioms remain unknown. Moreover, grammatical constructions used in one variety may be completely unused in others.

And while a heavy use of contractions (it’ll, she’ll, don’t and the like) might be completely acceptable in one variety, even in a formal text, they would be frowned upon in other varieties. For example, Australian English favours contractions and a conversational style, including in government texts. British English, on the other hand, shows less use of contractions.
 
Know your bottle-os from your offies 

Language does not exist in a vacuum. And any language, or variety of that language, is always inextricably linked to culture.

For this reason, it’s important that you gear your English-language texts toward the clientele you’re aiming to convert. It’s no good peppering your texts with regionally specific idioms and vocabulary that are going to be misunderstood by your readers. At best you’ll lose your customer base, at worst you’ll come across as inept and untrustworthy.

This is not to say that you should steer clear of all colloquial language, just that you need to make sure that it fits the audience you’re targeting. It’s no good referring to, for example, a “bottle-o” * or an “offie” * when your readers will only understand “liquor store”.

Colloquial language is a powerful tool for business when used correctly. In fact, studies have shown that the correct use of localised forms of language in text can result in a more positive reception that plain, formal writing would.

Essentially, you can seem more likeable and approachable by making sure that your texts encompass and embrace the culture you’re writing for. Language has a large part to play in terms of social cohesion and your marketing can tap into this and turn it to your advantage.
 
Forget about minding my Ps and Qs, should I Z or S? 

Here in the digital realm we are witnessing an epic battle of sorts. It seems that half of the pages you read these days are written in American English, and the other half, this page included, are written in British English.

Should you capitalize or capitalise on the changing tides of English or not? There’s no correct answer to that question, but once again, it pays to pay close attention to who your market is. Across Europe the preferred form of English is British English. In fact, the European Union uses this variety for all its English-language publications and translations.

But when it comes to international business, northern American English is far more common. Because globalisation is driven in large part by business, it is entirely possible that in the future we will be swapping ‘s’ for ‘z’ and dropping ‘u’ from many of our words. Good news for those who already write this way, bad news for those of us who are somewhat attached to our colourful variety.

In any case, both are easily understood by all readers so long as you pay attention to those pesky bits of vocabulary which don’t cross the Atlantic as easily as the grammar seems to have done.

Oh, and make sure that stylistically your texts don’t alienate either audience. American English does no favour passive sentence construction or long sentences with multiple clauses. And the very notion of “gotten” being a word will send many a Brit running for the OED.
 
Sounds like a lot to take in? If so, keep your focus on the business side of things and let us worry about the words. We like to keep them front and centre (center?) around here.

For further information on how to supercharge your marketing materials and really tap into the national psyche of your target audience, get in touch with us to find out how we can help.
 
 
 
*We’re sure the irony of this usage is not lost on the French
*Bottle-o – An Australian term for a shop which sells alcohol.
*Offie – Backformation from ‘off-licence’ a shop which sells alcohol.

by Samuel Gitukui

The best kind of management will focus on providing employees with a chance to grow and develop. The people you hire should feel cared for and needed as opposed to managing them with fear of punishment and job loss when they don’t hit targets.

And when such employees fail to perform to full potential, they need to be provided with an opportunity to redeem themselves. They are human after all, and mistakes abound. But what happens when they fail to prove themselves when they are given a chance to?

For anyone who has been in management long enough, there are always those employees that keep repeating the same mistakes, and once called in to explain themselves, there’s always the “I’m sorry” response.

A good manager will still not rush to reprimand the employee, but some tough love is crucial to remind them that there are consequences to their actions.

Whether it’s that person who is always late for a meeting or that guy who always has such good ideas that he thinks he can get away with disrespecting his co-workers and when asked about it always pulls the sorry card, it’s pretty obvious the behavior cannot be encouraged.

Simply saying “sorry” doesn’t make things right. People need to own up to their actions and find a plan to make sure it doesn’t persist. What matters is that the employee shows a change in behavior. A good manager puts in place a good support system and puts their employees on the right path before serious consequences happen.

So, how should the employer approach such matters?

1.      Make them aware of their behavior

It is never a good idea to shame employees in public or in front of their co-workers. Instead call them in for a meeting and point out that you have a noticed a pattern of behavior that is less than appropriate. Also make them aware of their sorry pattern and ask them how they are willing to solve the issue.

There could be a health issue or a family situation going on. This is why it is always in order to approach such matters from an empathetic point. Show compassion in such a case and involve HR to provide the employee with all the resources they need to overcome their challenges.

If the problem is coming form the employee’s own negligence, it is still not a reason to be harsh. Start from a position of empathy and work your way up to tough love.

Let them know that the behavior is not fair to the business, or the other employees, and will not be tolerated and that it needs to stop. Otherwise the employee will be left with no choice but to face the consequences.

2.      Support the employee to find a solution

Some problems may be just habitual such as coming to work late and missing meetings. Solving them shouldn’t be too complicated. Sit down with the employee and go back on the scenario to find the cause of the issue. More often than not, the answer lies in changing and improving on the timing by getting rid of unnecessary morning tasks or waking up earlier to avoid traffic.

Take for example someone who is regularly getting to the office late. You can begin by finding out their morning activities such as getting kids ready for work, dealing with traffic or the time they wake up. Most of these can be solved by just waking up earlier than usual.

On the other hand, if someone keeps missing their deadlines, there is a chance that they are simply over-promising on the results or are not good on time management. You can get them to try and set more achievable goals and how to better manage their work and time.

As a manager, when you show workers that you are willing to help them deal with their problems, this is usually enough motivation to improve.

3.      Analyze and understand the project management process

Sometimes the problem is not very much with the workers but with the set-up of the organization. Is there enough free flowing communication? Is the employee’s behavior a reflection of what is actually happening in the department? All this needs to be carefully looked into.

A good manager is aware of the possibility of issues within his own organization and that worker performance could be indicative of this. By solving the underlying problem, you can solve it from the roots for a better-performing workforce.

Sometimes the solution could be as simple as getting a coffee machine to prevent workers from rushing to the nearest coffee shop every so often.

4.      Look at your own behavior

Do you yourself as the leader play the sorry card? Perhaps this is where your employees learnt it from. Before you commit to solve certain behaviors from the workforce, ensure that you are not under the same pattern.

For example, you cannot try to convince your employees to get to work early if you are getting late. It makes no sense. Neither can you reprimand them on a behavior that you do yourself. What we are saying here is, be a leader who leads by example.

As a leader, if you work hard and show empathy when your employees make mistakes, you will encourage this behavior in them as well. Bullies beget bullies.

There’s another big problem that can easily affect the employees’ performance—financial strain.

Money, or the lack of it can be a cause for a lot of stress in all of us. It can be the reason for anxiety which can then be brought to the work place. Employees experiencing financial challenges will show a drop in their performance.

And to prove just how much money is a significant factor in our daily lives, research has shown that up to 72% of people think about their financial situation and get stressed during some time in their day. 22% of people admit to being at some point highly stressed about the money issue.

When the workforce is not satisfied with their pay, there is high absenteeism, low morale, low levels of production and high employee turnover, not good for business.

To deal with such a situation, a good manager needs to ensure that there are measures in place to help keep the employees free of anxiety and stress caused by money.

The financial situation of the employees is yours to deal with

Compared to earlier times, research continues to show that employees are continually facing more money issues, are in more debt and they are unable to save enough. Many employees continue to be worried about whether they will be able to afford their lives after retirement.

And stress affects the well-being of both employees and the business in more ways than one. Not only will they show less productivity, less performance and more absenteeism, they are also more likely to suffer from diseases due to lower immunity. This means more days off work.

Lets recap. This is what you can expect as a manager from a workforce that is experiencing high financial stress:

1. Absenteeism - there will be more sick leaves and just more days off work.
   
2. Presenteeism - this situation is quite interesting. While an employee may be physically present at work, their mind is focused on their problems, which means that they will not be able to function properly.
   
3. Conflicts at work - workers will often be easily agitated which can cause more conflict issues between them and the other employees.
   
4. Health issues - stress reduces the body’s immune system which further causes more strain on the employee through higher hospital bills.

How to provide the employees with financial wellness

Businesses should provide their workers with programs that provide information on how to be financially stable. Tools that help the workers to become more stable by showing them how to save and invest their money will help take off the stress that is brought about by financial uncertainty.

This will have long lasting effects to the business. The employees will feel part of a family and their motivation and loyalty will rise.

Let’s consider some of these financial benefits that the business can offer.

1. Life Insurance - your employees will feel better knowing that there will be a lump sum offered to their beneficiaries in case of their death. It provides them with peace of mind and can help attract talented job seekers to the organization.
   
2. End of service benefits - these are given to the employees in the event they leave the organization, whether during contract termination or if the employee so choses to leave.
   
3. Disability benefits - accidents are unforeseeable and can really put financial strain on someone. When the company offers disability benefits, the employee can rest easy knowing that they are covered in case of any injury or accident that could put them off work for some time.
   
4. Retirement benefits - these are different from end of service benefits. They mostly involve savings and are a great way to ensure employee loyalty.
   
5. Financial education programs -these teach employees how to invest their earnings and how to better save for the future.

Good management is a key role in ensuring the business performs at its optimum. Workers are the most valuable resource and a good manager will see them motivated enough to take the organization to new levels.

by Samuel Gitukui
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Maintaining good customer relations should be a no-brainer for anyone in business, especially with the intensive business courses and information out there at the convenience of anyone who wants to learn.

Good customer relations create loyalty which means that you can expect clients to keep coming back. The opposite is true as well. A dissatisfied customer will likely seek out a competitor. But to put things into perspective, let’s consider some figures, shall we?

Did you know that up to 89% of customers will quit on a company simply because the service was less than ideal? Customers have also been shown to be 4 times more likely to move to a competitor due to a lack of proper service.

Once you look at things from this angle, then you can’t help but see just how important it is to maintain good customer relations. Let’s consider some helpful tips on how to create and maintain an ideal relationship between business and customer.

1.      Communication and Support

Studies have shown that customers are willing to pay more for better service. As much as getting the product is the main goal, the whole experience matters.  

Ensure that the customer service team is able to anticipate and engage the clients at the moment they walk in looking to make a purchase.

Some people just want to see what is on display so that they can make a purchase later on. Once you provide the best experience and support, there is a high chance that they will come back.

Word of mouth gets around fast and soon the cumulative good service offered will attract more and more clients.

2.      Don’t Stop There, Make Improvements

It is simple to see any interactions with a customer as a one-off experience, but the loyalty strings attach and go far beyond the doors of the business.

This is why it’s important to keep finding new ways to make the experience for the customer more engaging, interactive and satisfying.

It will all add up eventually as your client base starts to increase.

3.      Provide Ways to Get Feedback

Getting feedback is one of the best ways to find out how customers are interacting with the business and the products. You can then take this information and make the necessary changes to optimize on the customer experience.

This should be a continuous process with regular feedback analysis and adjustments. It will help to maintain a happy client base throughout the running of the business.

4.      Prioritize on the Customer Feedback

Research also shows that customers who complain especially on social media want a quick response in under 60 minutes. This information can help put in place measures to record the time when the feedback was sent and deliver a response within the shortest time possible. Priority should be given to the earliest feedback.

5.      Provide All Customers with the Same Level of Service

Traditionally businesses would give priority to their largest customers. However, considering that 70% of all purchases are made based on how clients are treated and the quality of service received, it makes sense to treat customers the same way across the board.

Whether it’s individual buyers or large corporations, providing them all with a good high-quality service will ensure they stick around.

by Samuel Gitukui

As marketers we have an underlying urge to maximize our potential and this means trying to appease as many customers as possible. While it sounds logical, things couldn’t be furthest from the truth.

You simply cannot be everything to everyone and as a marketer, you cannot be in a position to make every one of your customers happy. Saying no may be difficult, but sometimes it is the right way to go.

With the ‘yes’ mindset where marketers are trying to provide the best service and products to everyone, we naturally go for a broad range of products with less specific features. Why? Because we feel more secure that way, like we are not putting the business in any risk by saying no.

But There’s Actually a Risk

By offering a broad range of products, customers cannot identify with the brand and are unsure of what the business actually stands for. This means there will be less customer loyalty as they are more likely to turn to more specific brands that they can identify with.

After a long time spent on trying to appease clients, the business becomes less efficient as it is now using all its resources but isn’t really performing at full potential.

So, what is a savvy entrepreneur to do?

Get Specific

This is the first step towards improving on your businesses efficiency. Hone in on one or two skills that you are really good at and focus most of your resources to these. It will give you an edge over your competitors and help clients identify with your specific brand.

Define Your Target Market

You should next know who will appreciate your skills the most. Yes, the market just got smaller, but you now have a chance to build on customer loyalty. You will not be average at a large number of skills, but professional at a few specific ones.

Once you know who your target customers are, you will be able to tailor your services and products to best meet their needs and expectations.

Strive for Customer Loyalty

You are now focused on who you want to serve. It’s now time to put strategies and measures in place to ensure that your customers remain loyal.

A good following will keep buying from your business over and over again. They will also pass the word out of the amazing benefits that your business offers.

And remember, it is far much easier to get business from loyal customers than to get a new one.

Remain Innovative

Never settle. You want to have an ‘ideas’ pipeline to keep your business innovative and evolving. Customers will remain interested and the business will be at par or even ahead of the competition and will not be left behind.

The longer your customers remain interested, the more they will keep buying from your business.

Show Support for Your Customers

This is an excellent strategy to build even more trust and foster more loyalty from your client base. Your business should show that it is living amongst its employees and should support their social, economic and sometimes political views.

While this may be difficult as it may alienate some, you also stand a chance to pull in more customers since people will view the business as a healthy and important member of the community.

#10 Nominalizations – releasing the power of smothered verbs

…It is a simple truth that in most sentences you should express action through verbs, just as you do when you speak. Yet in so many sentences the verbs are smothered, all their vitality trapped beneath heavy noun phrases based on the verbs themselves. There is nothing wrong with nominalization as such – it is a useful part of the language. But overusing it tends to freeze-frame the action…. (Cutts, 1996)

This is the final post in my summer series on machine translation (in September my guest writers will be returning with lots of interesting topics), and I’d like to briefly look at nominalizations. Basically, a nominalization is a verb converted into a noun. The fun usually starts when it needs support from another verb, such as in the phrase “to give consideration to” (where “give” helps out) meaning the same as “to consider something”.

       He is interested in obtaining a quotation for…
       He expressed his interest in obtaining a quotation for…

Business and science tend to have a penchant for indirectness, verblessness and personification:  

       Die Schnelligkeit der Rückantwort und die Bereitstellung der Antworten
       [The speed of reply and the provision of answers]
      Cleaning and user maintenance should not be made [carried out] by children unless they are older than 8 years           and supervised.

Psycholinguistic studies have found that nominalizations seem to pose greater processing demands than individual sentences containing verbs, mainly because the results of nominalizations tend to be complex multi-clause sentences.

       My going to the store afterwards led to Sam’s objecting most vigorously.
       The sheriff pursued the cattle-rustling cowboys.

So, let’s release the vitality of verbs trapped beneath heavy noun phrases and see what the free online translation programs think. “No small part of language’s value lies in its flexibility” (Quirk & Greenbaum) after all, so there should be scope for remediation.

       Zur Erfüllung eines Bauvertrags sind in zahlreichen Fällen Mitwirkungshandlungen des Bestellers erforderlich.

A literal translation could be:

       The fulfilling of a construction contract in many cases necessitates participatory action by the customer.

Not very nice, is it? Or (with a different focus):  

       In many cases, the customer’s participation is necessary for the fulfilling of a construction contract.

Or even less literal, less formal translations, depending on the context. We don’t really need to be so literal unless it’s a legal text. But I think the machine also felt that the nominalizations sounded a bit odd in English:












It gives us “in order to fulfil” and “the customer is required to participate”. Interesting. Not a nominalization in sight! And if we hand the translated sentence back and ask it to translate it into German, we get:

Um einen Bauvertrag zu erfüllen, ist der Kunde verpflichtet, sich in zahlreichen Fällen zu beteiligen.

The meaning has changed slightly, but still there are no nominalizations. Thank goodness.

Writing well and writing for an international audience are two sides of the same coin. Get the one right and chances are you (and your machine translation tool) will succeed in getting your message across no matter what language you are writing in. Make sure you avoid the pitfalls I talked about in this series on machine translation, such as when using punctuation, the active and the passive voice, literal translations and special vocabularies, homonymy and misspellings, and you’ll capture your audience (and save time and money to boot).

Good luck! And have a great summer!

​#9 Semantics, spelling and vocabulary: creating a new kind of ambiguity?

The study of language in use is a truly rewarding experience. Human discourse is a treasure trove of variation and creativity, and languages like English and German come in a number social and regional varieties used for a multitude of interaction purposes. Often, their most distinguishing characteristic is their lexicon, their vocabularies. Let’s look at what free online translation tools know about special purpose vocabularies. Here’s an example from the language of science and engineering:  

For the purposes of this part of ISO 9117, a single coating or multi-coat system of paint or varnish or related material is considered to be through-dry when a specified gauze under specifies pressure, torsion and time does not damage the film.

Für die Zwecke dieses Teils von ISO 9117 wird eine einzelne Beschichtung oder ein Mehrschichtsystem aus Farbe oder Lack oder einem verwandten Material als durchtränkt angesehen, wenn eine spezifische Gaze unter spezifischem Druck, Torsion und Zeit den Film nicht beschädigt.

Even if you don’t know what “through-dry” means, I think you would be able to hazard a guess, wouldn’t you? It’s something to do with being dry. The German translation provided by the machine, however, means “saturated, impregnated” (i.e. quite the opposite of being dry)! The correct term is “durchgetrocknet” (or “durchgehärtet”), a documented and standardised special purpose term (in chemistry and related fields). So, what went wrong here?

Machines need databases of word lists to tap into when converting sentences from one language to another. Glossaries of special purpose vocabularies and annotated lists of technical and scientific terms, for example, are fed into these databases to provide the raw material for the computer to access at high speed during the conversion process.

Let’s look at an example of social variation. We had one in an earlier post – the “dings” used by DIY enthusiasts. Here’s another example from a different field, illustrating the power of creativity:
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       One beef with the BMI is that burgers cannot easily be traded across borders.

BMI in this sentence stands for the “Big Mac Index” produced by The Economist, and the author uses the phrase “to have a beef with someone” (have a complaint) partly for comic effect, as “beef” belongs to the same lexical field as “burger”. Unfortunately, the machine doesn’t understand the context (or the joke) and gives us the meat (“Rindfleisch”) instead:
​
       Ein Rindfleisch mit dem BMI ist, dass Burger nicht einfach über Grenzen hinweg gehandelt werden können.

Well, at least we still have something to laugh about.

Similarly, the slang term “binge”, here used in the sentence starting with “You can binge on…” presents a problem:

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​​Unfortunately, the machine is way off track with “auf die Beine stellen”, which means “to organise/mount something” (e.g. an exhibition). If you have a clue as to why this is, please write to me. Maybe the machine is short-sighted and needs glasses, which is the only explanation I could find for the following example:

[Er] nutzt die Daten unserer Newsletterempfänger jedoch nicht, um diese selbst anzuschreiben oder an Dritte weiterzugeben.

However, [he] does not use the data of our newsletter recipients to write them down or pass them on to third      parties.

The verb “anschreiben” has various meanings (both in standard and colloquial usage, as well as in combination with the verb “lassen”), but is here clearly used to mean “to write to somebody”. The context makes this clear. But do you see how the pronoun “diese” – “them” is misinterpreted, missing the coreference with the newsletter recipients? That is the reason for this semantic error.  

One last example:

       They stand by him when an attempt is made on his life by a gang of rockers who were paid to kill him.

       Sie stehen ihm bei, als eine Rockerbande, die dafür bezahlt wurden, ihn zu töten, versucht, sein Leben zu retten.

The phrase “attempt is made on his life” has a relatively low frequency in the English language (less than 0.01 occurrences per 1 million words, cf. Sketch Engine), but it is not ambiguous in any way. It means to try and kill somebody, not to save somebody’s life, as the machine would have us believe. It seems that machines still have a lot of learning to do; they are “inexperienced”.

Would you like to share some examples or discuss the topic? Write to me below or on Facebook. I look forward to hearing from you!

​#8 Semantics, spelling and vocabulary: creating a new kind of ambiguity?

Hi again, and welcome to part 8 of the series on machine translation and plain English. Let’s look at some “lazy solutions” for simple problems.

Do you know what the English word “snap” means? It can be a verb or a noun and it can have several meanings. It’s what linguists call a homonym, a word that has the same form (and sound) as another word with a different meaning. In the following sentence the word “snap” refers to the audible cracking sound the component part makes when it is slid into place:

       You will hear a firm snap when the earcup cushion is properly in place.

In German the word would be “Klicken”. In the given context (in connection with the verb “hear”) the word “Einrasten” (also “Einschnappen”) is acceptable, as one free online translation program suggests:

       Sie hören ein festes Einrasten, wenn das Hörmuschelpolster richtig sitzt.

(Note: „Polster“ is the Austrian German word for German „Kissen“.) Another program, however, suggested this:

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​“Schnappschuss” is the sense of the word snap used when talking about photography: taking a snapshot. So, this is a case of the computer offering the wrong sense for homonyms in context. Not what I call helpful. 

We looked at a similar situation in an earlier post. Remember the “match head” flickering? The computer thought that “match” referred to a game and translated it to the German word “Spiel”:
​
       The flame on the match head danced and jumped in her fingers…
       Die Flamme auf dem Spiel Kopf tanzte und sprang in den Fingern…

This is a very obvious example, and there many are other cases where it’s not immediately apparent that the semantics have changed:

On your initial visit to the chiropractor, he or she will take a thorough case history and give you a full physical examination. Your blood pressure may be tested and blood or urine specimens sent for analysis. The practitioner will frequently feel the spinal column to reveal where movement is restricted or excessive, as well as possibly testing mobility in other joints. X-rays are taken, if necessary.

In this example the reader is being told what to expect from the visit and the examination. The machine translated the underlined sentence as:

…Der Behandler wird häufig spüren, dass die Wirbelsäule anzeigt, wo die Bewegung eingeschränkt oder übermäßig ist, sowie möglicherweise die Beweglichkeit in anderen Gelenken testen. Röntgenstrahlen werden, wenn nötig, genommen.

This conveys the “perceive by touch” meaning of „feel“, rather than the “examine or search by touch” meaning intended and indicated by the immediate sentence context, the co-text. If the machine had read the context correctly, it would not have made this error. Nor would it have produced the rather confusing (and co-referentially faulty) version of the following sentence, where “should look at it” is rendered as “darauf achten” (take care that…, make sure that…) and the translation of “it” in “If it does fail” does not refer to the mower but to the manufacturing and testing:

The mower has been carefully manufactured and tested. If it does fail, an authorised customer service agent for our products should look at it.

Der Rasenmäher wurde sorgfältig hergestellt und getestet. Sollte dies fehlschlagen, sollte ein autorisierter Kundendienstmitarbeiter für unsere Produkte darauf achten.

Readers (and human translators) rely on the context to help them understand the meaning of a text. Machines do, too, but sometimes they get side-tracked by unfamiliar constructions or constellations and come up with sentences like this one:

Bent under hoods of raincoats or with plastic bags on his head, some with blankets over his shoulders or over his heads, some carried bags, others pulled suitcases, the windscreen wipers beat rhythmically back and forth, like hands who wanted to blur the picture, wiping away, he heard the navigation device: “Please turn around if possible!”.

Confused? (And no, it’s not science fiction. The text is not about people with more than one head! It describes a group of refugees as seen by the driver in the car and should read “…on their heads” etc.) Luckily, if you know German, you would notice this kind of error quite quickly. The situation is slightly different for the following example:

Sind die Daten für die Erfüllung vertraglicher oder gesetzlicher Pflichten nicht mehr erforderlich, werden diese regelmäßig gelöscht.

If the data are no longer required for the fulfilment of contractual or statutory obligations, they are regularly updated.

If your data are being “gelöscht”, they are being deleted. Updating may include deleting, but I do think that there is a difference between these two actions, and seen from a legal perspective, this could certainly be an issue.   

Let’s briefly look at misspellings. Typos. Letters switching position. A wrong spelling or the autofill on overdrive. They happen, don’t they? And they’re not really an issue if your translator is a human being. But what would happen if you were to enter sentences like the following into a free online translation program?

Despite his looks, the man had an aurora of calmness and competence about him.
He couldn’t help his eyes wondering up her shapely legs.

Can you guess? What do you think?
See you next time!

#7 Semantics, spelling and vocabulary: creating a new kind of ambiguity?

As a rule, if you want to make life easy for your readers (and the machine), follow the recommendation of the plain English movement which states that you should use words that are appropriate for the reader. This means that word choice depends on the given textual and situational context. If you’re writing for DIY enthusiasts, for example, then you will probably use the terms, the vocabulary, familiar to members of this group of people:

Fill all dings and deep gouges with quality wood putty, is possible. Use a flexible putty knife and fill in all the areas needing attention.

This was translated by the computer as:

Füllen Sie nach Möglichkeit alle Dings und tiefen Hohlmeißel mit hochwertigem Holzkitt. Verwenden Sie ein flexibles Spachtel und füllen Sie alle Bereiche aus, die Aufmerksamkeit erfordern.

There are a number of issues with this translation, the most obvious one perhaps being what in my last post I called the “make-do” and “inexperience” strategies. The American English word “ding” is left untranslated (“Dings”), probably because it is usually categorised as a slang term (meaning “a small dent”) and isn’t in the computer database. Then there is the translation of “deep gouges”: this refers to a groove in the wood, but what the computer selected (“Hohlmeißel”, chisel) is actually the tool (!), which is, of course, totally wrong in the sentence context. So, it’s 0 out of 10 for this sentence. I think it’s safe to say that a human translator would NEVER have made this mistake, simply because the text is about filling in dents in wood, not the tools making the dents. (Even I gathered that much.) A human translator not familiar with a subject area will research the field to find the correct terms plus suitable alternatives depending on the readership.

Next, we have the phrase “a flexible putty knife”, translated as “ein flexibles Spachtel”. This means that the basic form of “Spachtel” would be “das Spachtel”, a neuter gender noun. Except it’s not. “Spachtel” is masculine in most parts of Germany (“der Spachtel”) and feminine in Austria (“die Spachtel”). Who put the wrong form in the computer database?

Let’s look at another case of “I-don’t-know-so-I’ll-just-use-the-English-term”:

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In this example the word “scrim” is left untranslated (“Scrim”) in the first, but translated as “Schreiber” in the second sentence. Both are wrong. However, what saves the day a little (but really only a tiny bit) is the fact that in the first sentence of the text it actually tells you what the scrim is (“…the black cloth inside the earcup”) and the translation reproduces this. But then the second sentence suddenly talks about a “Schreiber”. What? Why, for goodness sake? Are you feeling confused? I don’t blame you. My suggestion to the computer program in this instance would have been to leave both instances of “scrim” untranslated (and wait for scrim to become a loan word, maybe, who knows).

When the computer leaves words untranslated this can have either of two consequences:

1.      The reader will not be able to understand the text. Unfamiliar words can be looked up, but if this is not an option,          comprehension will suffer.
2.      The unfamiliar word will be accepted by the reader and interpreted in a way which may or may not conform to              the original, thus adding or removing parts of the original meaning.

To illustrate the second point, let’s look at the following sentence:

He turned and moved away swiftly, his slight limp masked almost completely by the use of his hawk-headed stick.

Er drehte sich schnell um und bewegte sich weg, sein leichtes Hinken verdeckt fast vollständig durch den Gebrauch seines Falkenkopfes.

I don’t want to go into detail here and discuss what’s wrong with the whole sentence but concentrate instead on the word “hawk-headed stick”. Did you form an image in your mind when you read the description of this ornamented walking stick? I bet you did. Reading the German sentence, however, entails having to make a mental leap to realise that it is in fact a walking stick that is being talked about. Although there are some cases of figurative language use (metonymy, pars pro toto) in German where an attribute replaces the whole (which would mean that a “hawk head” would stand for “a walking stick with the handle shaped like a hawk head”), this is not the case for “Falkenkopf” (yet).

It’s perhaps laudable that computers are trying to fill the lexical gaps in our languages with coinages of their own to create so-called neologisms, but this is not something you want to happen when you’re trying to reproduce your original text and meaning. The danger is that meaning(s) will be lost or, worse still, incompatible meaning(s) added. I still remember the shock I felt when I received a translation of a story in which someone is cleaning out their room using black plastic bags (bin liners) and these were rendered as black body bags! Not a very nice connotation to be confronted with! (It was around Halloween; maybe someone had gotten distracted.)

So, this post has been about the kind of “make-do” translation free machine translators provide us with. Next time I’ll talk a little bit about more about homonyms and also about misspellings and the “lazy solutions” on offer for those. If you have any examples of your own that you would like to present to us, go ahead and use the comment function below. I’d love to hear from you!

Before you go, here is another example (in German this time) for why some things are better left untranslated:

Zunächst hatte die Eurostat brav geliefert. Die Antwort war ausführlich, gespickt mit Zahlen, aber nicht hilfreich.
Statisten! Hatte Bohumil achselzuckend auf Deutsch zu Martin gesagt.
Du meinst: Statistiker!
Ja.

Jokes and word-play are notoriously difficult to render in another language. In the example above, Bohumil uses the word “Statist” (by mistake?) when he means “Statistiker”, presumably because it sounds similar. Like a malapropism it comes across as funny. If you had to translate this correctly to English, the lexemes would be “extra” and “statistician”. You would lose the similar sounds and the humorous effect. An alternative could be, perhaps, to leave those two words untranslated and indicate this using quotation marks. What do you think?

#6 Semantics, spelling and vocabulary: creating a new kind of ambiguity?

Continuing the series on machine translation and plain English, I’d now like to take you on a tour around the wonderful world of word meanings. I’ll talk a little bit about what you need to watch out for when you hand your text to a machine to get a free translation meaning the same thing as the text you put in.

Actually, I had quite a bit of fun with this instalment. Not only because the errors really are legion and easy to come by, but also because some are quite funny. In fact, some are droll, some are infuriating, and the majority seems to be so well hidden in plain sight that it’s really no surprise one tends to overlook them. I had to come up with a selection for this post, so below I’ve tried to reproduce the best examples for you. Here we go…

Broadly speaking, there are four categories of machine output you will come across time and again, which I’ve decided to call

a)     “literal” – a word-for-word translation gone wrong,
b)     “make-dos” – words are left untranslated,
c)      “lazy solutions” – offering the wrong sense for homonyms and misspellings in context, and
d)     “inexperienced” – when words in restricted use are simply not available, e.g. slang words.

Let’s start with the first one and some examples. (In each case the sentence represents a genuine source language sentence and the word with the asterisk is what one (or all) of the more popular free online translation programs had to offer for the underlined word.)

Mobile phone case with precise camera cutouts and button covers… -->*Kameraausschnitte

The scrim is the black cloth inside the earcup and protects the earcup components. --> *Ohrbecher, ohrbecher

Eine Begrenzung aus Maschendraht sieht ja oft ein wenig schlaff und ausgebeult aus, ein Jägerzaun wirkt rasch verblasst nostalgisch und ist deshalb so gut wie ausgestorben. Dafür umziehen nun vielerorts sogenannte Stabmatten die Gärten, die mit ihren strengen Stahlgittern ebenso gut im Gewerbegebiet eingesetzt werden können und zur Einfassung von Sportanlagen bestens geeignet sind.  ​--> *hunting fence… bar mats move around the garden…

Finally, your authority will be weakened. Your old buddies – the ones with weird hair but brilliant ideas and total loyalty – will have to be hidden in the basement. --> *…müssen im Keller versteckt sein.

The “camera cutouts” in the first sentence are undisputedly those little holes in the phone cases that are left for the camera to see through, right? Yes, well, in German these are called “Aussparungen” or similar, not “Kameraausschnitte” or “Kamera-Ausschnitte”, which is a literal, word-for-word translation but actually refers to the detail or frame selected for a picture (for example by zooming in). You will find this translation on some websites, but it simply isn’t German (yet).

Similarly, an “earcup” or “ear cup” on a headphone refers to the part (on so-called earcup or over-the-head earphones) that looks like a cup and goes around or lies on your ears. This is called a “Hörmuschel” (or, more precisely, a Kopfhörermuschel) in German, lit. a “hearing shell”. “Ohrbecher” is a word-for-word translation but wrong.

The next sentence, the one in German, mentions a type of wire mesh fence right at the beginning and then the “Jägerzaun”, which is a very popular type of rustic wooden (!) lattice concertina fence (see the picture below this post). The free translation program probably got sidetracked by the mention of the wire fence developing a slack and looking baggy in the first clause and so decided that a “hunting fence” (i.e. an almost literal translation of “Jägerzaun”, actually a “hunters’/hunter’s fence”) must be the right word to use in this context. (Note: the sentence structure makes it clear that two types of fence are being talked about. A human translator would not have been sidetracked in this way, since he or she would have noticed the additional hint of the “verblasst nostalgisch” (nostalgically faded), which indicates a wooden fence.) "Jägerzäune" were traditionally used to keep hunting quarry out of plots and gardens, but they were never used to hunt with. The word “umziehen” (surround, enclose) in this example, wrongly translated as “move around”, is a bit unusual, I admit. A more common term would be “umgeben”. But what the program did is a trifle too clever: it thought that maybe “umziehen” (which actually has another sense, namely "relocating, moving house", etc.) is related to "herumziehen" (wander about, move around/about). Yes, well…

Of course, for some of these examples most programs offer alternative lexical items if you hover or mouse over the word that you consider inadequate, so the information is there for you to find. But how do you know that you are supposed to change the word if you don’t speak the language?

Finally, the sentence starting with “Finally,…”: probably a case of misunderstanding. What the English phrase means is that they will have to be hidden in the basement in the future. The German translation says that you can assume that they are hidden in the cellar now. Not wrong, but wrong in the given context.

Fun, isn’t it? Next, I’ll look at words being left untranslated (and why this is actually a good idea sometimes). In the meantime, let’s hear from you!

#5 Punctuation

Did you know that a typo can land you in jail? Oh yes, you could end up like this poor fellow:

       Walker sorgt sich um die Sicherheit seiner Freunde und wird des Mordes beschuldigt.
       [Walker is concerned about his friends’ safety and is charged with murder.]

And just because someone left out a pair of commas:

       Walker concerned about his friends’ safety gives himself up and is charged with murder.

In the original (source text) sentence, Walker gives himself up to the police. There is no mention of that in the translation. In fact, the translated sentence taken out of context suggests that his being concerned for his friends is the reason or cause for his being charged. (I once saw a similar sentence in which a rocket was being built, which ended up being fired (!) in the translation. More than wishful thinking.) What ever happened? 

Put the commas where they should be and the reason becomes clear (and you also get a perfectly acceptable translation): 






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Losing bits of information is one of the most common ‘errors’ in automated translation, and one of the most annoying. And the reason is not always an erroneous input. Let’s look at another example, taken from the Wikipedia page on the serial comma:

       My usual breakfast is coffee, bacon and eggs and toast.

Google translates this correctly as: 
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      Mein übliches Frühstück ist Kaffee, Speck und Eier und Toast.

What happens if we decide do add the serial comma that groups the bacon with the eggs?
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       My usual breakfast is coffee, bacon and eggs, and toast.

Well,…nothing. It’s still:

       Mein übliches Frühstück ist Kaffee, Speck und Eier und Toast. 

The machine doesn’t understand cultural references of any kind. It doesn’t know how ‘bacon and eggs’ are eaten or that in German you could use the phrases ‘Eier mit Speck’ or ‘Speck mit Ei’ to indicate the proximity of the foodstuffs on the plate. All it does is look up the words, the frequency of appearance in a corpus and the most likely combination. Which is why the serial comma is simply ignored: it isn’t mandatory and so isn’t used by all speakers of English.

You can leave out commas to your heart’s content where there is no danger of a misunderstanding:

       Your new financial friends will be abstract, obsessed with numbers [,] and keen on comparing you with your                  competitors.

But (!) be aware, that the machine has a creative mind of its own and will add a little variety:

Ihre neuen finanziellen Freunde werden abstrakt sein, von Zahlen besessen und darauf bedacht sein, Sie mit Ihren Konkurrenten zu vergleichen. 

Deine neuen finanziellen Freunde werden abstrakt sein, von Zahlen besessen und darauf bedacht sein, dich mit deinen Konkurrenten zu vergleichen.

Apart from the fact that ‘financial friends’ is not normally translated as ‘finanzielle Freunde’, I don’t see why the comma should lead to the informal ‘du’ being used all of a sudden. Do you?

Commas also serve to indicate relative clauses. In the following sentence the noun ‘fingers’ is modified by a relative clause:

The flame on the match head danced and jumped in her fingers, which had yet to stop shaking.

The translation I received from one of the free programs available on the net was:

Die Flamme auf dem Spiel Kopf tanzte und sprang in den Fingern, die noch zu schütteln aufhören musste.

You had better be able to read German if you wanted to use this. Not only is ‘Spiel Kopf’ (not even a word) not even close to ‘match head’, but there is no subject-verb agreement, i.e. the number of the finite verb ‘musste’ is singular rather than plural (‘fingers’)! Well, you could always count this as a typo, I guess. ;-)

Perhaps the comma in the previous example caused some confusion. Let’s now look at the parentheses (or round brackets) and dashes indicating an interruption in the following sentence:

They don’t have to reveal their agenda (are they long or short your shares?) and try to tease out gossip with which to speculate.

translated as:
Sie müssen ihre Agenda nicht offen legen (sind sie long oder short ihre Aktien?) Und versuchen, Klatsch zu entlocken, mit dem zu spekulieren.

And with a dash (single or double):

They don’t have to reveal their agenda - are they long or short your shares? - and try to tease out gossip with which to speculate.

translated as:
Sie müssen ihre Agenda nicht offen legen - sind sie long oder short ihre Aktien? - und versuchen, Klatsch herauszupicken, mit dem man spekulieren kann.

In the second version (the one with the dashes) the ‘und’ is correctly reproduced in lower case and the clause ‘mit dem man spekulieren kann’ has the correct finite verb form ‘kann’. There is no obvious reason for the lexical variation. Perhaps you have an idea. I’d love to hear from you, so just write your comments in the field provided below. 

#4 The active and the passive voice

The best advice for budding writers and translator I’ve come across is that you should go over your text with fresh eyes and ruthlessly cut out anything you feel is redundant or superfluous. For me, it’s often cut, cut, cut, with my grey cells screaming, ‘You want to get rid of WHAT?! You CANNOT be SERIOUS!’ So, when I write in this blog I tend to just let loose and give in to the inspiration of the moment without regard to good writing practice. I hope you will forgive me. And I hope you’ll find something interesting to read. Continuing in the series on machine translation this week, I would like to talk to you about two interesting things I’ve noticed coming up time and again. First, let’s look at the passive voice.   

You can make writing clearer by using verbs in the active voice and avoiding the passive. For instance, if you want to make it clear who is doing (or supposed to be doing) an action:

       Make sure you update your virus protection programs regularly.
       Do not continue to press the On/Off switch after the machine has been automatically switched off.
       Before you can claim your tax refund, you will need to verify your identity.

This is a sensible precaution when conveying vital information. Passive voice verbs can keep readers guessing as to who is doing what if no ‘agent’ (or ‘doer’) is mentioned. Consider the following sentences:

       It must be insured that the virus protection programs are updated as quickly as possible on all computers when a        new virus is detected. 
       Appropriate measures must be prepared and tested.

Do you know who is doing the action? Do you know who is supposed to be doing it? (Could be you.) What about the following example?

       If the cable is damaged or cut during work, do not touch the cable.

It seems we don’t have to know. This is because sometimes the context makes it irrelevant as to who is doing the action conveyed by the verb. For example:

       Do not continue to press the On/Off switch after the machine has been automatically switched off.

You don’t need do know who did the switching off, the machine itself or maybe some external electronic system. 

​Let’s now look at a different example and ask the computer to do some translating for us.

       The tax may be refunded if the traveller has exported the purchased goods outside the European Union not later          than on the last day of the third month following the month in which the purchase was made.



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​The English sentence contains two passive voice verbs (‘refunded’ and ‘made’) and a verb in the active voice (‘exported’) plus an agent given as ‘the traveller’.

       The tax may be refunded if the traveller has exported the purchased goods outside the European Union not later          than….

The traveller is clearly doing the exporting. What about the ‘refunding’? Do we need to know who is doing it? No, but we are told something about the restrictions that apply:

       …if the traveller has exported the purchased goods…not later than on the last day of the third month in which the        purchase was made.

Again, the passive ‘was made’ does not tell us anything about the agent of the action – it could be ‘the traveller’ or somebody else –, but we do know that it was a ‘purchase’ that was made.

And now let’s put the machine to the test with a sentence that isn’t formed quite so well. The following English sentence came up in a text recently:

       A tax refund can be made if the traveler purchased goods exported outside the EU no later than the last day of the third month following the month in which the purchase was made.

As you can clearly see, there has been a mix-up and the sentence no longer makes sense. A human being will recognise this error and rephrase the sentence accordingly because he or she understands the meaning. The machine, by contrast, takes the clauses provided and translates them literally to read:

       Eine Steuerrückerstattung kann erfolgen, wenn der Reisende Waren, die außerhalb der EU ausgeführt werden,          spätestens am letzten Tag des dritten Monats nach dem Monat, in dem der Kauf getätigt wurde, gekauft hat.

As in the source text, the goods are being purchased after having been purchased. Makes your head spin, doesn’t it? Could these issues have been avoided by putting everything in the active voice, for example, ‘You can claim a tax refund if…’? Maybe.

In any case, before you hand your text to the machine it makes sense to:

• determine whether, if at all, you need passive verb phrases;
• turn them into active phrases to ensure that the person doing the action is clear;
• avoid errors which will be translated literally.

Easier said than done? Well, it’s usually not too difficult. And it’s worth it. Next time, I’ll tell you about how leaving out seemingly insignificant commas will make the machine change the meaning of your text completely. Lots of fun to come!

3: Chopping up snakes 

One of the tenets that most proponents of an easily comprehensible style of writing seem to agree on is that

     sentences should not be too long.

The Plain English Campaign, for example, recommends that clear writing should have an average sentence length of 15 to 20 words. Complex sentences can cause havoc because the structure and meaning may not be clear.

​Let’s put a machine to the test. The following German example (in box on right) contains four short sentences.

As you can see, Google Translate is quite capable of delivering a correct English version that makes perfect sense.

​What happens if we turn three of those sentences into one long ‘snake’ of a sentence? Let’s add some conjunctions:

       …eine einfache Deinstallation, denn die Macher…, sondern bauen eher darauf…

Again, the result is satisfying:

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​Note how the program even offers a bit of stylistic variation by differentiating between “are likely to believe” and “rely on”.

This result doesn’t really surprise, given that machine translation tools are being developed with ever greater computing power “brains” and learning mechanisms modelled on human neural networks. Services such as Amazon Translate are cheap to use and capable of handling large batches at high speed. Cryptic product descriptions such as the following will soon be a thing of the past:​

This isn’t such a long sentence – and you could find longer ones, containing several subordinate clauses, in some kinds of fiction or philosophical texts, for example –, but let’s not dwell on that. What we can see is that syntactic complexity is handled quite well.

So why do blunders and howlers still occur? Any idea? And why is the following sentence (from the AWS website) not perfect? (Clue: it has to do with the translation of ‘simply’.)
      
Wenn Ihr kostenloser Nutzungszeitraum abgelaufen ist oder Ihre Nutzung das Kontingent übersteigt, zahlen Sie einfach die üblichen     nutzungsbasierten Preise.

Send me your answers and let’s start the discussion. Alternatively, come back in a few weeks’ time when we’ll take the topic further to talk about nominalizations, semantics (vocabulary) and the role of punctuation in machine translation. And on how to avoid losing vital bits of information. See you then!

References:
Duden-Ratgeber Technische Dokumentation. Beschreibende und anleitende Texte erstellen. 2012. (von Andreas Schlenkhoff in Zusammenarbeit mit der Duden-Redaktion) ISNB: 978-3-411-74721-4
Martin Cutts. 1996. The Plain English Guide. How to write clearly and communicate better. ISNB: 0-19-860049-6

by Samuel Gitukui

There are many situations in the workplace that can affect the performance of employees. Conflicts are one of them. For some managers rushing in and firing an employee seems to be the first and only way to solve the issue.

However, the best business leaders seek to understand the underlying issue and find solutions. In this way they can increase the motivation of the employee and boost their performance. Let’s find out a few ways on how to improve the motivation for an underperforming employee.

       1.      Ask for a Private Meeting

The best way to handle an employee is by asking them in for a one-on-one meeting. You want to avoid addressing the issue in front of peers and colleagues, as that can create resentment and cause them to get into a defensive state.

Instead ask them to the office and talk about what is causing their lack of motivation. The employee is more likely to open up. Once you have leant the issue, take time to find the best way to handle it. This makes the employee feel part of the family and is itself the first step towards making progress.

       2.      Analyzing the Problem

Some issues are easy to solve. If the employee is regularly arriving late, then reversing this situation is only a matter of managing time. Helping the employee understand what he is doing wrong should not be a lengthy process.

For some problems however, it’s a bit more complicated. Assume a situation where one of the employees doesn’t get along well with the rest of the colleagues.

This will require you to take time to decide how best to approach the matter before calling the employee back in for a second meeting.

       3.      Some Issues Can be Ignored

The best leaders will tell their employees what to do as well as how to do it. However, it is not a bad idea to let employees find their own solutions. Some employees will have a messy desk and look disorganized but could end up being quite productive. 

Sometimes by letting such employees find their own solutions, you are able to determine whether they are affecting the productivity of the company. If not, then perhaps the issue is not worth calling them in for a meeting.

       4.      Don’t Waste Time

When a problem needs to be addressed, you need to do so with utmost speed. This will prevent the problem from persisting and spreading onto other employees.

When you solve the issue and the employee does in fact show progress, you also communicate to the rest of the workers that your instructions are to be adhered to and taken seriously and that you are not willing to accept complacency. 

       5.      Don’t Make it Personal
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Problems need to be handled the right way and this means avoiding making the employee feel like you are attacking them. Pass on your views and suggestions in a mature and calm way that does not create resentment in the employee.

#2: Simplified English, Plain English & Co.

The basic idea behind writing in a simple style is not new and has been taken up by educators and technical editors worldwide. Simplified (technical) English has been around for a long time, helping staff in technical domains pass on their knowledge (in instruction manuals, product descriptions, safety guides etc.) to non-native users of English. Basic English once found a place in education as a simple style suitable for students learning English as a second language but has been widely criticised as being too restricted. It was consequently superseded by plain English in modern times, a much ‘broader’, much more flexible and versatile concept. Plain English was devised with the aim of making documents, especially legal and government documents and forms clearer and easier to understand. In Germany, the concept of Leichte Sprache (engl. easy language) is based on a similar premise, with accessibility and the inclusion of readers with disabilities very much in the foreground.

What these approaches have in common is that they provide guidelines for creating written texts in such a way that they will be more easily readable for a wide range of readers and thus more easily comprehensible to them. By restricting the use of certain constructions and terms, and by being consistent in the use of a preferred vocabulary and syntax, plain language is thought to become more easily recognisable. In other words, a certain level of standardisation can help make life easier for readers and translators alike. But what about machines? 
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