Newsletter
Newsletter December 2006
SIMCONSULT is 10 years old
On 1st October SIMCONSULT celebrated its 10th anniversary. On 1st October 1996 Susanne Schwarz started working for us, the partnership was entered in the commercial register as a relatively new form of business and we started offering the services of highly qualified interpreters, but how did we go about it? None of the partners had much of a clue about running an office and we were uncertain as to how to tackle the task ahead of us. Our skills lay in simultaneous or consecutive interpreting, in organising and recruiting teams of interpreters with the specialist knowledge and language combination for the relevant conference. Susanne Schwarz took the reins and quickly planned the running of the office so that everything went smoothly from the start.
Service platform
For us it was rather a daring experiment to set up this infrastructure with all the commercial risks involved as a platform to provide our services. An office of this kind was quite an innovation, not only in Germany but also among our colleagues in other European countries.
In the meantime we are convinced that SIMCONSULT has earned a reputation as a reliable business partner, our vision at the time has proved to be the right way forward and we look back with pleasure and gratitude at the developments over the past ten years.
Crowned heads, heads of state and heads of government
Since 1st October 1996 SIMCONSULT has recruited interpreters for royalty, heads of state and heads of government, politicians at all levels, sports personalities, NGOOs, for art and culture, science and research, industry, banks and technology, natural sciences and medicine, it was all part of the service. Over the past ten years SIMCONSULT has organised nearly 2.500 interpreter days in locations throughout Germany and in other countries from Central Europe to Spain. We regularly ask our colleagues from neighbouring European countries such as the UK, France, Belgium, Italy, Spain or Poland, the Czech Republic and other Central European countries to work in our teams all over Germany. We are very grateful that we can rely on the knowledge and language skills of so many competent colleagues.
Biggest assignment, strangest assignment
The largest event we organised in the past ten years was Expo 2000 in Hanover where SIMCONSULT provided the teams for nearly all of the conferences, including preparatory meetings with a total of 142 interpreter days and fourteen different languages.
Perhaps the most curious assignment was a recurrent conference on the subject of setting up 0190 telephone numbers for members of the oldest profession in the world.
Booths are installed, where are the synchronous translators?
There have been times when we received calls from panic-stricken event organisers at 9 or 9.30 in the morning, sitting in a room full of delegates and simultaneous booths and equipment, but without interpreters. The hardware had been ordered and delivered, but someone had forgotten about the software. Usually we manage, as on this occasion, to find colleagues at the last minute who just happen to be free that day not however a solution to be recommended!
2006 our 10th anniversary
We are coming to the close of 2006, pleased with the developments over the past ten years, but also endeavouring to put our work as conference interpreters and our services as recruiters and organisers to the test again and again.
And to you, our customers and business partners we would like to express our heartfelt thanks for your support over the years, in the hope of many more years of successful cooperation.
Your SIMCONSULT-Team