Last week, The Danish Chamber of Commerce (Dansk Erhverv) held its 2008 annual conference. These conferences can be deathly boring and it’s always a question of what value they have to my daily work. But I’m happy to say that this was well worth attending. The theme was Corporate Social Responsibility, or “Doing well by doing good”, as they called it.

It was good to see that the overall standard of communication was high. Also interesting that two of the guest speakers were writers – Zac Goldsmith and Tor Nørretranders. Who else but a writer would tell a story about “One man’s crap is another man’s food” as Nørretranders did? That aside, they kept excellent company alongside the Danish Prime Minister and an Olympic gold medal coach.

The highlight for me was Ulrik Wilbek’s talk. He is an exceptional sports coach whose handball teams have won Olympic gold medals, World Championships and European Championships. He spoke for half an hour on “Management and Winning”. At the top of his agenda was communication, and this actually anchored his entire talk. Wilbek reckons communication is a vital management tool.

The fact that Wilbek himself is a communicator made his claim all the more believable. He delivered his talk fluently – without notes – and with skill, confidence and assurance. His winning mentality came across loud and clear, and there wasn’t a hint of the famous Danish modesty. Take note, Danish companies out there!

Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish Prime Minister, delivered his talk with little modesty. Key points in his talk were that Denmark needed to be more competitive in the global market and that Danish businesses need to continue acting responsibly. He claims that CSR is a branding parameter for Denmark. We’re keeping a close eye on that, Mr Rasmussen.

His claim was however backed up by Zac Goldsmith from The Ecologist magazine. Goldsmith had apparently read the Danish Government’s newly released action plan on corporate social responsibility. He referred to the style and tone of the writing, which made it positive and interesting to read. (I’m not sure how he managed to read it because I haven’t yet found an English version.) After his positive words, I look forward to reading it myself.

So there were several highlights and it was an afternoon well spent out of the office. However, I do have one major gripe. What’s with the tagline “Doing well by doing good”? Why does it need to be in English? The entire conference is aimed at Danish businesses and all the speeches were in Danish (except of course Goldsmith’s). It’s all about Denmark, so it makes no sense to have an English tagline. Did they fall into the trap of wanting to appear hip?

One of the big problems was that it sounded out of place when people said it in the middle of a Danish sentence. Especially when pronounced “Dooing vell by dooing goood”. This was one of the few instances where the high communication standards of an otherwise good afternoon slipped.

Sounds good, huh? But is it possible when it comes to copywriting? Many of our customers seem to think it is - and are using long-term service contracts to achieve it.

In short, this means creating centralised supplier contracts with fewer suppliers. Because the supplier builds up a relationship and knowledge of your company, you get a better end product and use less time on briefings. And you don’t spend time negotiating a new contract for each job.

Here’s what our managing partner, David Hoskin, has to say about it. “More of our customers are looking to solidify their relationship with us in this way. It allows them to build up trust over a number of jobs until we’re viewed as an extension to the marketing department. We can be called upon when things get busy – and guarantee to always have writers available to get the job done on time. Also, with this level of trust and insight into the client, we’re able to support other agencies who offer a unique service on a project but don’t know the client so well.”

So, could this be the death of supplier juggling? Read the full article to find out more.

At Eye for Image, the English language is our bread and butter. So the recent debate on the use of Danish versus English in the Danish business community and educational institutions hasn’t gone unnoticed.

To those of you who haven’t been following the debate, here’s a quick recap. In spring 2007, the Minister of Culture, Brian Mikkelsen, appointed a language committee or “Sprogudvalg” to study the Danish language and evaluate if there was a need for a Danish language law.

Last month the committee published their findings in a report, “Sprog til tiden”. The committee found that the Danish language is thriving better in some areas than others, but that there’s no need for a Danish language law.

One of the committee’s conclusions was that the Danish business community needs to strengthen their use of the Danish language. And what’s more, the business community has a responsibility to ensure that English doesn’t automatically become the language of corporate Denmark.

But the Danish Chamber of Commerce (Dansk Erhverv), who represents 20,000 member companies, doesn’t agree. According to Christian Tanggaard Ingemann, Market Director at Dansk Erhverv, the Danish language isn’t under attack, and that increased use of English as the working language in education, research and business won’t marginalise the Danish language.

Dansk Erhverv believes that the way forward is to secure the use of English in educational institutions, while maintaining the use of Danish in trades and educations where the job market requires it.

Whatever way you look at it, English is here to stay. With so many Danish companies operating in niche areas, they have to take their products and services abroad. And as Ingemann points out, English isn’t only “nice to know”, but “needed to know”.

So, yes, English is necessary if Denmark is to remain competitive and communicate with the world around us. And personally, I don’t believe that the increased use of English in the Danish business community and at universities will spell the death of the Danish language. It will continue to evolve of course, like all languages do, but that’s “nice” isn’t it?

Transcreation seems to be something of a buzzword in the translation and communication world at the moment. But defining exactly what it is can cause some issues. So why all the hullabaloo?

Japanese-web.com puts it like this: “transcreation is to translation what copywriting is to writing.”

Basically, the concept is that while a translation merely recreates the original in another language, a transcreation takes the feeling, ideas and messages, and renders them in the new language. And in order to do that, as the name suggests, a transcreator must be creative. They have to understand what connections the original text is making with readers, and carry that over into a new language, complete with the cultural references, idioms and expressions that make the original text work.

But not everyone agrees - especially not translators, it seems. And it’s not hard to see why. The concept of transcreation relegates translators to delivering a second-rate service. They are no longer specialists. Instead they become word-for-word automats blindly following the meaning - but not the essence - of the original. Suddenly, a transcreation agency can charge more than a translation agency. For some translators, the transcreation concept appears somewhat…well…created.

This is put rather nicely by John Yunker.

If the original text is rubbish so is the translation
We’ve all seen translations that are dull and poorly worded, falling well short of engaging an audience. But maybe this isn’t always the translators fault.

The current translation versus transcreation debate assumes one key point - that the original text is already excellent. This should be the case for high-profile ad campaigns (sadly, it isn’t always); but it’s rarely the case when a text has been developed in house by a non-professional copywriter. When this is the case, a translation has no chance of delivering great text, and transcreation becomes re-writing in another language.