Who are we? Lidia Starck, founder of CH Traductions

lidia starck

My background:

I became a freelance interpreter in 1993.

In 2007, I founded my own company, CH Traductions, to offer my clients interpreting and translation in my own language combination (Russian-French-English) as well interpreting between other languages and a turnkey conference interpreting service covering interpreter team recruitment, interpreting equipment and the translation of conference documents.

With frequent recommendations from satisfied clients, CH Traductions became more and more in demand.

In 2012, I stopped interpreting myself to focus all my efforts on managing services, in constant contact with clients.

I'm always available by phone or email, even on weekends, where necessary.

Our availability ensures a fast response – we deal with requests immediately and we’re very flexible.

Learning new foreign languages is my passion, as is the internet, and I like to keep improving our working methods.

How it works:

With 20+ years' experience in the field, I know exactly how to organise interpretation to ensure a seamless delivery, complete comfort for the client and maximum efficiency.

From my point of view, it is absolutely essential that the interpreters ('my interpreters') work in conditions conducive to top-quality interpretation. With this in mind, I organise the assignments (logistics, preparatory documents, etc.) from start to finish, allowing them to fully concentrate on their job: the interpreting.

I know the interpreters I send to clients personally. I've listened to their work on numerous occasions and I have absolute faith in the quality of their services, on a professional and personal level. I also know which colleague would be best suited to a particular event based on their personality and specialist subjects.

I know that all translators, no matter how experienced or meticulous, may make a spelling mistake in a text they have been working on for hours or even days. So before sending translations to clients, I have them proofread by another translator in the same language combination. For especially important translations between languages I speak well (Spanish and German as well as Russian, French and English), I may sometimes carry out an additional proofread myself.

2019:

In the last year of the old normal, CH Traductions interpreted at more than 220 events, including several dozen conferences with more than two interpretation languages and interpreting equipment setup. We also produced a huge number of translations for around 50 international projects.

2020:

We’re not going to forget this vintage year!

There’s no doubt that the health situation shook up our lives and working methods but it also paved the way for new approaches – or even a reinvention of the interpretation process. From the first lockdown, we worked flat out and hand in hand with our technical partners to find technical solutions and adapt existing tools to interpreting needs, especially those of our clients. Uncompromising on quality, lowering the bar was out of the question for us. We all had to learn on the job and we continue to keep our ear to the ground for any technical developments likely to expand our offer.

Remote work demands greater discipline and precision from all of us – clients, interpreters and technicians – but we now offer remote interpreting services of the same quality as booths in a meeting room.

We were fairly busy during this strange year: we learnt a lot, interpreted at a hundred meetings and translated many documents.

In 2021,

we experienced uncertainty around the future of our industry in the midst of a gradual recovery.

We fine-tuned our technical know-how and expanded our range of tools, allowing us to work under any circumstances – as we pondered the prospect of yet another lockdown. We resumed in-person interpretation on a small scale – our clients were keen to meet again – and we also attended the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the seventh year running. Many meetings were interpreted from our interpretation studio (the ‘hub’) while our interpreters often worked from home too, kitting out their offices with professional equipment, such as microphones, headsets and mixers.

In 2022,

business took off again! Conferences, symposia and other events postponed or delayed since 2020 were finally able to take place and travel resumed; we also moved away from individual booths with interpreters able to enjoy teamwork once more as well as the option to operate in twos or even threes for long meetings, to help each other out.

We saw a 20% increase in annual revenue while interpreting at a hundred bilingual meetings, providing the simultaneous interpretation between more than six languages at 15 conferences and recruiting team members from other EU countries, particularly for rare languages.

Zoom is now the go-to solution for short meetings and/or small groups, allowing our clients (and our interpreters) to save time and money on travel. Quality remains our priority and our moderation and technical support team’s assistance during meetings allowed us to continue working to the same high standards.

And it's not over yet. CH Traductions is going from strength to strength.

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