End Client: Societe Generale

Project Description: Web based Content Management System for Benefits Information for Employees in various countries
Scope: Technology Advising and Evaluation with client of WCMS System, Scoping of project, Translation, Website Localization

Our client, a global HR consulting group, needed a content management system for their client, Société Générale,  to communicate online total reward statements for a limited group of employees in 20 different countries and languages. They needed a partner that specialized in human resources translations and in solution advising.

All content was to be developed in English in the CMS yet differentiated per country.  All content was then identified and provided in the target language of that employee group.

Challenges: English source content had to be duplicated in multiple pages so that it could be edited and localized for a specific group. For example, benefit information for Poland was different than benefit information for France yet English was the source language of the content messaging.  From there, content had to be pushed for translation and routed out. When translation was complete, content had to be pushed back in to the corresponding pages and published.

Solution:  We advise clients on technology that is developed in our industry that may be a fit for them. We introduced our client to a 3rd party developer of a multilingual CMS system.  We sat in on meetings and conference calls with our client’s  IT support and the 3rd party developer to help them evaluate the solution.  When the client found another 3rd party developer after an RFP was circulated, we also sat in on those meetings to help evaluate (we even helped write the RFP for other developers).

We finally decided on a solution based on the aspect of project management that one of the solutions offered.  There were a few options at the time but because the client had so much content and variable content (English for Polish, English for German, English for France, etc), we advised them that they needed a high level of organization of the content once it was routed out. The platform also had to be able to have content downloaded so that translators could use multiple CAT tools when working on it.

The chosen platform also attached meta info to each page and all content was packaged and identified for the country and zipped in one file so that we were able to pick it up (automatic notifications) and have it organized and ready to process.  The meta data identified where it was to go on final import.

All content was translated and went through internal review cycles which we managed as well as the final upload of all content into the CMS system and final approval steps (the final QA step before publishing).

What do you expect from your language service provider as a partner in your success?  Read more here about what you should expect….

Understanding different software platforms is something we routinely investigate for clients.  Online survey tools are a popular platform that many clients choose when doing a survey.  Read here to see our review of a few of them and how they work with translation.