XTRF™ Translation Management Systems, which is a developer of complex management systems for translation agencies, has completed the implementation of XTRF™ Enterprise at the technical translation agency “NotaBene”.

NotaBene’s basic specialisation is the translation of technical, economic, and legal documentation. In addition, the company offers editing services (both technical and literary), translation, and the localization of websites. As a leader in the Volgograd and Volgograd region translation market and occupying a firm position in the translation market on a national scale in Russia, NotaBene processes a great quantity of orders, always taking into proper consideration every client’s individual needs.

In not having any special tools for managing projects with such a scope, the company spent a considerable amount of time (approx. 40%) for repeated actions, which hampered its further development. Therefore, by the end of 2009, the NotaBene management came to the conclusion that it was necessary to optimise the company’s business processes. After thorough analysis of the solutions available on the market, the decision was made to start the implementation of the web-oriented XTRF™ Enterprise.

XTRF™: Anna Vladimirovna, your company is continually singled out among all the translation companies on the Volgograd translation services market. What is your secret?

A. Bogdanova:  Our main secret is our aspiration for continual improvement and qualitative predominance. It is this aspiration that dominates all internal and external business processes in the company. The high quality of the translation is attained as a unified team by our talented managers, translators, and editors. Their professionalism results in our clients’ admiration, which makes them the most significant components of our success.    

I would also like to describe another important aspect. Our translation agency has always aspired to be different from the other agencies, not only by way of our professionalism, but also by way of the high level of service. Service is one of our company’s chief competitive advantages, because as far as this issue is concerned, we comply with the European standards and ISO requirements. It is an open secret that not even half of the companies in Russia, especially small ones, apply a client-oriented approach. We carry out our work in a way that makes every client clearly perceive our attentive, friendly attitude and to fully appreciate our individualised approach.   

XTRF™: What has changed starting in March 2010? Has the system implementation influenced your clients in any way?

A. Bogdanova: Many positive changes have occurred in the work structure. I can say that the system has been very helpful in streamlining all the data bases and the automation of the operations thereof.  

For example, processing requests from our permanent clients has accelerated twofold, due to the fact that each of them has an XTRF™ cell of their own, where they can independently fill out a translation request. If the managers fill out the order, they also do not have to waste any time for the repeated data search and input. The system itself identifies the client and offers the associated rates, terms and conditions, payment channels, etc. All of the actions are performed in remote mode, and it is not even required to call the clients in order to convey any information regarding the order.      

By the way, regarding Customer Relations Management. The CRM module in the system has been very helpful to us, which has provided for prompt and automatic advising for all of our permanent clients regarding news, special offers, etc. No one is ever unattended!  

Localisation of all system values is an additional plus. Our clients do not have to know Russian or even English; the new NotaBene portal can speak the client’s language!

Regarding quality. We used to apply our own evaluation scale to assess the quality of the contractors’ performance. With the XTRF™ system, we have obtained a more perfect and extensive tool, which is LISA QA. Without it, we certainly could not evaluate the level of performance of every performer so subtly. Now, we have such an ability, and the manager obtains a detailed quality report on each of our translators, based on which he or she can select the orders by type and complexity level corresponding to a given translator’s capabilities.   

XTRF™:  What advantages does the system application provide to you as a manager personally?

А. Bogdanova:   XTRF contains many useful functions. However, for me, the most useful is the project financial accountability, as well as other ISO module reports reflecting the general level of our operations and the clients’ level of satisfaction.   

The elimination of errors and the automation of routine actions free up, as a minimum, 40% of the managers’ time, and that greatly simplifies internal communication. Now it takes me only 10 minutes to enter the system and overview the current situation with the scope of orders, employees’ occupancy, payments and arrears, etc. Everything is convenient and transparent. The efficiency of short-term planning and general workload control increase, which in turn provides for an increase in our turnover. We hope to double our indices after a certain period of time.

XTRF™:  How do you evaluate the implementation process itself?

А. Bogdanova:  During the system implementation phase, we faced some things that were new for us every day. Naturally, there were questions and difficulties. In this respect, I would like to mention the outstanding job done by the XTRF™ support service. Its employees were always in touch with us; all issues were resolved very promptly and professionally. Moreover, their knowledge of Russian made communication significantly easier. We were also happy with their flexibility in meeting our wishes regarding the system’s individual setup, which made our work easier and more comfortable.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to cover everything within the bounds of this interview. Therefore, feel free to visit our site www.nota-bene.ru to familiarise yourself better with our company and to read about our experience in working with XTRF™ Enterprise!