Listen, think, interact ... Now execute

From March 22nd to 25th, I was at the Annual GALA Conference in Sevilla, the greatest event in the translation world, where I had the pleasure to meet old friends, but also, new ones, and above all, listen to great speakers and attendees, think about how the things they said impact my business, and interact with a nice group of leaders from the translation and localization industry. It was fun! The more you give, the more you get. The power of GALA.

I was first impressed by Meritxell Guitart, our first keynote speaker, who went from 0 to 200 million in about 6 years. She shared with us her passion and unique way of doing business. Their main goal is not translation, but instead they make their clients better because Hogarth WorldWide helps them reach their goals with global audiences. If you stop talking about price and cost, and you start concentrating on value, everything changes. Take a look at Hogarth WorldWide if you want to learn more.

The second day started with the wise words from Jochen Hummel, founder of Trados, and now chairman from LT Innovate, among other ventures. He shared his vision on how the Internet of Things changes our relationship with languages, and how LSPs and language technology companies would better work together to make a better future. We cannot do everything alone, you have a deeper impact by cooperating. The power of sharing, again.

After the great masterclasses on Wednesday by Benny Orr on M&A and exit strategies, Jo?l Sigling on Machine Translation from a user perspective, and Adam Blau on sales, Paula Shannon delivered an excellent keynote on how Lionbridge has dealt with innovation, and how you need to break the rules to be successful in this overcrowded market. I was impressed by the OnDemand group they have built, whose revenues are already around 4 million. And I think her speech was perfect, even some of her words are still in my head: in some years, there might be no LSPs.

Besides keynotes and masterclasses, there were many interesting sessions. My top three are: Fabiano Cid on how to do sales and marketing on a shoestring, Britta Aagaard and Robert Etches on the evolution from ownership to accessibility in our world, and Diana Sanchez on how to disrupt an underserved market such as online publishing. Besides, many other sessions will have an imact on our business, I'm 100% sure.

Now it's time to execute!