Creating a Vendor Management Office — or “Talent Management Office” (TMO) per the growing trend — for language services is much the same as establishing any new department within a company. You need to decide who the main operators of it will be, their responsibilities, and how they are organized. As a TMO, you will also need to determine the onboarding process for the vendors — talent — that you’ll be taking on. This includes screening and contacting potential talent, doing a background review, testing their linguistic skill, and then performing the actual onboarding process.

All of this requires some specific documentation — some familiar, some that might be new. An initial questionnaire to get a good snapshot of the candidates is a good idea, as well as keeping a database of all the talent you run into. This database can include background information and a scorecard referring to the linguistic test. And of course, an Independent Contractor Agreement (ICA) is a must-have.

• Best practices
  • Team Organizational Chart & Job Description
  • Roles/Authority
  • Talent Onboarding Process
  • Contract Management
• Onboarding Processes
  • Screening & Initial Contact
  • Request for Information
  • Due Diligence Review
  • Linguistic Testing
  • Onboarding
• Templates & Documentation
  • New Talent Questionnaire
  • Talent Database
  • Independent Contractor Agreement
  • Test/Scorecard

In this post I will outline a (fictional) example of a TMO established within a medical translation and interpretation language services provider (LSP). This example is the result of weeks of work by myself and my team members in a Talent Management course at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, led by Alaina Brandt.

Our fictional LSP is called MediTrans Inc., which specializes in medical translation and interpretation. The sensitive nature of medical information informed many of our decisions going forward.

In this scenario, MediTrans is a smallish LSP, and the TMO only has six people. The following titles and descriptions are based on research we did on similar job postings around the web, customized for our purposes.

Head of Talent Office

Develops and drives our recruiting strategy and execution to support our rapid growth. Optimizes the talent acquisition function and processes.

Financial Manager

Reviews financial reports, monitors accounts, and prepares activity reports and financial forecasts.

Talent Manager

Provides analyses to the organization on vendors, costs, and ensures the terms of contracts are followed by all parties.

Recruiters (2)

Work with outside agencies to discover new talent. They also review resumes, explore job search websites for potential talent and contact those individuals personally.

Interview potential candidates, searching for talents that match the specific needs of Meditrans’ work. Introduce new hires to the company and walk them onboarding process. Facilitate all new-hire paperwork of candidates who meet the expectations of the job.

HR Coordinator to TMO

Works with MediTrans’s HR department to develop policy and direct and coordinates human resources activities, such as employment, compensation, labor relations, benefits, training, and employee services.

We used the software Process Street to help with organizing the onboarding process. Process Street is sort of a checklist software with a bunch of other bells and whistles, like the ability to make automated lists that will send out emails that auto-fill with client info. The following is a snapshot of out Process Street… process.

One thing in particular that we focused on as a medical translation/interpretation LSP was strict requirements for contractors. Our drafting process included a profile screening for staff performing the onboarding, with harsh penalties for any issues with references, reviews, and online professional presence, in addition to the obvious penalties for plagiarism and illegitimate payment methods.

We also required at least a year of experience in medial translation, as well as the ability to keep sensitive information confidential. When evaluating the test translation, we pay special attention to meaning errors, additions, or omissions, and less attention to formatting and tone. This is to ensure maximum understanding in a field where any errors or ambiguity can mean the difference between life and death.

If the candidate gets a good score and passes the background test, they’re placed in our database ready to be worked with in the future; failing candidates are also placed in the database so that we can keep track of individuals that we’ve already tested, and to make sure we don’t accidentally perform redundant work in the future.

The onboarding process for many companies can look very similar, but care should be taken to customize the process for every industry and, frequently, every project. The above can give you some ideas for your own process, but remember that there is no one-size-fits-all solution.

One piece of advice, however: don’t cut corners that sacrifice your talent’s (vendor’s; contractor’s; etc) happiness. There are only so many professionals out there, and often their online community is vocal; if you treat them right, your returns will be greater than any shady cost-cutting ever could be.