Revealing a rich history and commitment to customer service
A new client recently inquired if we could translate handwritten materials. We said “yes, depending on the handwriting” and asked him to scan some of the document and send them to us for evaluation. Upon examination we found a beautiful Cyrillic script which we initially believed to be Russian. It was sent to one of our Russian team members, who sent it back saying it wasn’t Russian, but he believed it might be rare extinct language spoken in the Ural mountains.
After doing some research, we could find only one translator who listed this rare language as a specialty. Upon receiving the document this translator declined, saying it wasn’t that language. We sent it to a few other team members, all of whom said it wasn’t any language they were familiar with. At this point some of our team members were ready to give up, but not Jeff Walsh, a dedicated account executive. He contacted the client and instead of declining the project, he asked a bit more about the document – its origin, and anything else the prospect could tell us.
As it turns out the document was written years ago by a Jewish gentleman who lived in a remote part of Russia. He could speak Hebrew, but could not read or write it. He only could read or write Russian. So it appeared that the document was probably Hebrew words, spelled phonetically in the Cyrillic alphabet.
When Jeff reported this, our entire team said there was no way that we could do it and satisfy the client. We were looking for a translator who had to know English (the target language) and Hebrew (the source language) who also knew Russian. But not only would he have to know these three languages, he would not be “translating”, but rather sounding out each word from the Cyrillic and trying to figure out what Hebrew word sounded it like and also made sense in the context. Rather like putting together a jigsaw puzzle without having the picture on the puzzle box to look at. A non-existent language.
Once again, Jeff wouldn’t take “no” for an answer. He personally started going through our register and every other resource he could think of; looking for someone with English/Russian/Hebrew capability.
The end of the story is that Jeff found a talented resource who not only had the proper skills, but also had an interest in the subject matter and the history of this document. So, through persistence and dedication to customer satisfaction, Jeff, and Verbatim were able to find a way to translate the materials from a non-existent language, into what the client wanted. It is this kind of dedication and commitment that make a difference to our clients, and makes Verbatim Solutions what we are today.
