Managing Director
of Way With Words Group, Adam Kossowski, speaks to us about a unique business
service in South Africa in an industry unknown by many that grows year-on-year
globally.
What makes a South African start-up company,
Way With Words Transcription, the global leader in English language
transcription?
Our starting point
is our brand that reflects our key principles: quality, efficiency
and professionalism. These
principles are founded on our investment in people and key-point company
structures that drive our growth.
Management and who
we recruit to transcribe for us are critical to our business success. We have a
number of processes in place and take a lot of time to select who can work for
us from around the world. On average we accept between 2 to 5 applicants out of
every thousand monthly applications.
On the other hand
Way With Words have also created industry-leading proprietary software for
transcription workflow that allows us to seamlessly integrate the transcription
process from the moment of a client-booking to the return of a client’s transcript
all online.
How can Way With Words afford to focus on
only one service and one language seeing that the broad majority
of transcription services tend to cover other languages and activities such as
copy typing?
Exactly for that
reason. Way With Words achieves this
singular focus with our proven business model, by our excellent client
reputation in many parts of the world, and by establishing precedence as to
what is actually required of a reliable transcription service for meeting the
client’s ultimate need: the provision of a transcript that represents, in both
accurate text and precision of meaning, dictations or discussions recorded.
You can imagine how
vital the quality of the transcript is in countless situations: from law courts
where meaning can make the difference to case outcomes; to an interview with a
politician where the misrepresentation of what was meant could sway voters or cause
a major media frenzy; even to a business decision where an inaccurate
transcript could play a key influence in a decision based on what was spoken
during a confidential boardroom meeting.
You mention “English”. Does Way With Words not
provide transcription in other languages?
Over time, the
company may consider the provision of
transcription services in other languages. However, it is critically important
to point out that the enormous success of the Way With Words Transcription
worldwide is our ability to secure an extremely
high quality transcript, precisely because of our focus on a singular core
service. We invest in professionalism
throughout the employment, management and workflow cycles of English language
transcription. This requires our complete confidence in the calibre of trained
employees based on our ability to recognise them, not as mere typist, but as
highly trained English-language professionals. This same key principle of elite
professional exclusivity will need to be carefully applied if and when Way With
Words considers entry into other languages as a transcription service provider
of choice.
Is translation, then, not the same as
transcription really?
Not at all.
Translation is the interpretation of meaning from one language into another, in
written text, spoken words, or audio recordings. Transcription, on the other
hand, is the typed record of audio discussions. Our Way With Words’ approach,
though, takes this a step further than the mere typing of audio by recognising
and putting into place a number of key measures to skilfully manage the large
variances in expression, accent, business or industry terminology and more, in
just one core language: English.
What about typing, copy typing, data capturing?
Are these not what transcribers do?
The confusion as to
what transcription is or should be really comes from a combination of things:
by a lack of public awareness of the basic differences between transcription
and other typing activities; by the fact that the majority of home-based or
small transcription operators often have to revert to various other
income-generating activities in order to supplement their transcription income;
and, perhaps most challenging to overcome, by a general lack of recognition of
transcription as a professional industry,
other than perhaps with medical and legal transcription. Way With Words’
transcribers are trained and contracted
only to transcribe, and hence again, our singular focus resulting in top
quality.
You say you have clients worldwide. Can you
give some examples?
Presently, almost
95% of our clients are global. We
service a vast range of client types – from individuals to major corporations
-- in a variety of countries including the United Kingdom, continental Europe, the
United States, Canada, and increasingly, Australia, the Middle East and Far
East. Our clients come from a complete cross-section of industry and service
such as academia, law, media, research, business, manufacturing, and
development.
Way With Words
provides transcriptions for some well-known international companies including
the Financial Times, The Mail & Guardian, News International, Saatchi and
Saatchi, Sky News and Sky Sports, World Health Organisation, International
Criminal Court Tribunals, Shell, UK Government, Welsh Assembly, NHS (UK),
Credit Suisse, HSBC, and many more.
Here in South
Africa we provide transcription to most of the major universities, some
government departments, and corporate businesses such as Sasol, Checkers,
Investec, Werksmans, Standard Chartered Bank, the CCMA and many others.
Undeniably, our
clients are varied, but all require, and receive, the same exact thing: a
quality assured transcript.
2 comments:
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