How does a transcription assignment work at Acolad?

When people ask, "What's your job?" and we reply with "I work at Acolad, leader in localization services" it often leaves our listeners momentarily stumped. But, we're eager to clarify that our company's main line of work is more intricate than it may seem at first glance!

Many of our clients don't really know about the job of creating meeting minutes and summaries until they actually need them in their work. What's interesting is that the editor's work is just the tip of the iceberg, as it's all about providing our clients with a complete document ready to go after their meetings.

Here are the main stages of a writing assignment:

Understanding the client

The first contact is used to understand the challenges of the meeting: the type of meeting, the context, and the client's communication objectives. In addition to the practical information (date, time, place), this step is decisive for us to be able to offer the ideal level of reprocessing: the right choice among our writing solutions (transcription, report, summary) determines the final satisfaction of our customer.

One mission, one writer

The Planning Department then comes into action: determining who is the editor with the appropriate expertise for each mission is the daily life of our planners! They also need to carefully balance their presence at editorial meetings with their dedicated editorial work. Acting as guardians of their schedules, they meticulously craft a custom timetable week after week.

" My role is to manage a team of writers and to organize their schedules (on-site or remotely) and writing, according to different criteria: geographical location, mission schedules, teams of writers attached to each client, types of documents to be drafted, delivery deadlines, etc.". said one of our Planning department Managers.

“The intervention of the Planning department is a guarantee of quality and continuity of service. We are the bridge between project managers, editors, and other production roles.” 

In meetings, priority organization

D-day has arrived: the editor attends, face-to-face or remotely, the meeting: audio recording, identification of participants and above all… taking notes! Concentration is the red thread of the editor during these meetings. 

During the production of a synthesis, they begin their work of analyzing the remarks during the debates. If the document is not produced in Real Time, the editor resumes their final drafting work as soon as possible after the meeting, as long as the debates are still fresh in their mind.

Sharp eyes

The Planning Department Manager outlines the "Training and Proofreading" department's responsibilities: "Our team is responsible for recruiting new writers at Acolad and providing them with comprehensive training. Subsequently, we meticulously proofread their documents to guarantee they meet Acolad's desired quality standards."

While our editors are carefully chosen and produce high-quality work, our Proofreading team, with their background as editors, closely review their documents, leaving no room for errors or imprecise language.

A proper delivery

Beyond the content, the delivery team ensures that formatting rules are followed, whether it's an Acolad standard or a client-specific format. Their ultimate responsibility is to make the document available to the client.

Caring, until the end of the mission 

It sometimes happens that our customers wish to clarify a point or make a correction: the Quality department then takes over, getting in direct contact with the client if necessary. In all cases, customer specifications, like acronyms, for example, are recorded for the future assignments of these customers.

“Our role is to deal with customer questions related to our language writing services. From the analysis of customer feedback to the implementation of solutions, we check the adequacy of the service to the specifications, appraise the documents by listening to the recordings again, and rewrite them if necessary. In the context of complex assignments, we also advise the sales teams in analyzing the client's needs,” explains the Quality department's manager. 

Ever thought about all the work that goes into crafting a document? Even though there are many steps involved, they can be wrapped up in just a few hours or a couple of days, depending on the client's deadline. It's this process, shaped by decades of experience, that ensures Acolad's quality.