Translating HR material brings major benefits
Why use a professional translator to translate your company’s HR documents and internal communication?
In the globalised work landscape of today, it has become increasingly common for companies to recruit internationally in order to find the right person for the right job.
Supplying your employees with important corporate documents in their native language will give you a number of major benefits:
- You will enjoy a more efficient onboarding process and smoother information exchange.
- Your employees will feel a greater sense of belonging which will build more loyalty.
- You will help to prevent undesirably high levels of staff turnover.
Our specially selected professionals have a wealth of experience in HR and can translate your HR material into more than 40 different languages so that your employees can access all the important information they need in their native language. We can also proofread your material in these languages.
What one of our HR clients says about us
”We have been using Novoterm’s translation services since the beginning of 2022. We have been pleasantly surprised by every translation they have delivered, which has also always been completed according to schedule. Industry-specific terms have been competently managed and if any ambiguities have arisen, we have been provided with recommended translations in a well-documented manner. Novoterm offers a professional, well-organised service that we can warmly recommend.”
Turn the challenges of a multilingual workforce to your advantage
Finding the right candidate for a vacant position often means a company needs to appeal to an international target group. The many advantages of a global candidate pool are just one side of the coin. A multilingual workforce also presents HR managers with particular challenges when it comes to hard values – such as the efficiency of onboarding and training – and soft values, such as creating a feeling of belonging and loyalty towards employers.
By translating your HR material – everything from job adverts and role descriptions to codes of conduct, policy documents, employee surveys and assessment documentation – into the native language of your employees, you are transforming these challenges into advantages.
Translating HR documents results in more efficient onboarding
Starting a new job can be an intensive experience. New employees need to take in a large amount of information about your company’s policies, procedures and expectations as well as familiarising themselves with the duties involved in their work role. New employees also need to learn and adapt to the corporate culture and get to know their colleagues. Any employees who have been recruited from another country also have to get used to living in a new country. It can be overwhelming, both cognitively and emotionally.
By providing all key documents in an employee’s native language, you will make the process a whole lot easier. You will reduce the risk of misunderstandings and make it easier for employees to become familiar with the information they need, as they won’t need to use any cognitive resources to process that information. Instead they will be free to focus on learning about the company and its operations and thereby adapt to their new role much more quickly.
Stronger sense of belonging and common identity
By providing employees with documents in their native language, you are not only making the onboarding process easier, you are also boosting your image of having a coherent and welcoming corporate culture.
When you communicate your company values and visions in an employee’s native language, you are making it easier for them to take these on board and identify with the company. Once employees fully understand your corporate culture, they can internalise it, which in turn builds their sense of belonging.
More effective information exchange and training
The mechanisms behind this challenge are very similar to those taking place during the onboarding process. When employees are required to absorb information in a language that is not native to them, processing the language used takes up a lot of the cognitive resources that could instead have been used to learn from the training on a deeper level or take in the information more effectively.
Getting information and training material translated is key to effective information exchange and training your international employees in a way that rewards your investment in skills development with maximum benefit as well as avoiding costly language-based misunderstandings.
Increased loyalty through showing appreciation
When you get your HR documents translated into the native language of your employees, you are sending out a clear signal that you appreciate all your employees and that you are willing to invest in them. It shows that you care about them, that you are making an effort to anticipate any challenges they might face and that you are flexible enough to adapt – all qualities that are very attractive in an employer. This will help your employees to feel more loyal towards you and thereby help to prevent undesirably high levels of staff turnover.
A common shortcut is to translate your HR documents into English – which works if English is the native language of all your international employees. But if this isn’t the case, then any benefits are lost.
Novoterm offers translation and proofreading of HR documents in more than 40 different languages so that you can transform language barriers into gains.
Novoterm is a highly regarded translation agency that was established in 1996. We offer language services in more than 40 languages provided by translators and proofreaders who understand your industry – we listen, we understand, we translate.