If you are planning a conference or meeting that will require the use of interpreters and you don’t know the first thing on how to go about it, here are 8 things you need to  find out when using interpreters.

  1. What languages will you need
  2. What is the topic of the conference
  3. Dates or number of days of the conference
  4. How many delegates
  5. Will there be participation from the delegates
  6. Where is the conference going to be
  7. What is the layout of the room
  8. Are there breakout rooms


What languages will you need

Knowing the languages you will need is very important when using intepreters as it would help identify which interpreters needs to be contacted for your conference. There are different costs per language, which means that French interpreters costs differently from Mandarin interpreters, for example.

By providing exactly which ones are required will help you better in budgeting for your overall costs.


What is the topic of the conference

Knowing the topic of the conference is the second most important information you will need.


Because this will help your interpretation agency identify interpreters who are knowledgeable, skilled, and experienced in this topic.

This also gives you some assurance that the quality of the interpretation will be better than if the intepreter is not familiar with the topic at all.


Dates or number of days of the conference

Date/s or the number of days in a month and year is the third most important information we need as this will help determine;

  • availability of interpreters
  • availability of equipment and technicians


How many delegates  

The number of delegates will help determine the number of receivers with headsets or microphones will be required.

Will there be participation from the delegates

If the delegates are expected to actively participate throughout the conference, then individual delegate microphones will be provided.

If there is a budget constraint and you would still like to provide microphones to the delegates, then one microphone can be shared between two delegates provided that the delegates sharing the microphone speak the same language.

In other words, two French delegates can share one microphone. One Italian and one French delegate cannot share a microphone.


Where is the conference going to be

Location of venue is important to know in determining logistics and possible locally-based interpreters as this will impact costs.


What is the layout of the room

There are several room layouts used in a meeting or conference. These can be boardroom, classroom, cabaret as examples. We will look at the different types of layout in another blog.

Layout will help the technical team bring the correct number of cables and other peripheral equipment necessary to ensure that the delegates will not have any problems hearing the interpretation or the proceedings of the meeting.


Are there breakout rooms

Breakout rooms are when the main delegation are split into smaller groups and going into a different room from the plenary room.

If there are breakout rooms then the following additional information will be needed;

  • how many breakout rooms
  • what languages will be needed in each breakout room, if there are several
  • is the plenary room going to be used as a breakout room
  • are the breakout rooms happening at the same time or one after the other


If you would like more information regarding this subject or have any questions or comments, let us know and we are happy to help.

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