Client background

Livewords is a large translation and interpreting agency. They offer a great variety of specialisations in both translation and interpreting. Livewords, former Concorde Group, was in an overall transition phase. Rebranding, Optimizing work processes, replacing software and even moving to a new office.

My Role

Node 1 (a digital solutions company based in Amsterdam) approached to:

  • Analyze the workprocess of Livewords, for both translators and interpreters
  • Mapping the ideal process
  • Analyze available existing software in the market
  • Support the rebranding process
  • Support the organisation with UX for their app ‘LW GO’ and tooling ‘LW Xpress’.
  • Analyse what’s needed for the portals for both clients and vendors, matching the ‘ideal process’

Analyse en research

I really needed to start form scratch. So I first had to explain what UX was about, and why usability is important.

  • Learn and listen. I interviewed and talked to a lot of people, to understand what the translation/interpreter business was about.
  • Process.  First of all, I held several experience map sessions to get insight in their workprocess, helping them to let go of ‘old habits’ and undergoing the change of seeing the big picture.
  • Needs and pain points.  Along the way it became clear that a lot of work was done manually and time-consuming.
  • Setting objectives. After a couple of sessions we had focus and a good starting point of the ‘ideal process’.
  • Personas. User personas needed some introduction. But after some introduction, we managed to get real insight in their user groups.
  • Trends. The translation business is very competitive. And the new technical changes are moving fast. So I added a trend analysis.

fig 1.0

Research outcome

  • No more time-consuming manual tasks. The sessions have successfully led to the mapping of the ideal process for translation. With the focus on automated processes and less time-consuming and manual operations.
  • Optimalisation work processes. The ‘ideal process’ was mapped for both translation as interpreting. Although the interpreting workprocess was not entirely automated, we did manage to optimise it as much as possible.
  • Transform the ICT landscape ( Node 1)
  • Buy software, eliminate costs, buy new software according to the principle ‘buy before build’. The analyses lead to a final candidate, based on the criteria and ‘ideal process’; offering a cloud-based solution and support of the automated process.
  • Transform the client portal and vendor portal based on the user needs ( fase 2)

Rebranding & tooling

I did some rebranding activities for LW GO ( app), LW Xpress ( tool) and designed, reviewed and interate the processes  and prototypes using tools like Axure, Sketch and Flinto. The key here was to design, review and iterate until we had a smooth user experience and good performance.

Some illustrations