A Tale of Collaborative and Valuable Teamwork

One day, a woman from Texas decided to write a book for children. She realized her culture is very rich, where you can find Spanish and English speakers in the same place. So, she thought that she needed to write a bilingual book.

Even though she had a great idea, she was not good at Spanish at all. So, she decided to hire a translator in person from a Hispanic country. Unfortunately, she got injured, and she couldn't move. So she then tried to use an app on her phone to hire someone. Finally, her mission was successful, and she found her translator.

In the meeting with the language professional, she said, “I need to translate some expressions from my book, like ‘practice makes perfect.’”

The translator really wanted to please her, so he responded, “Well, we say ‘la practica hace al maestro’ in Spanish.’”

The meeting took a while, but the woman was fascinated and decided to work with him because she saw how valuable it was to include the translator in her project and how much she learned.

Before the meeting ended, she asked, “What's your name?”

He replied, “My name is Luis.”

“I am Lethy, and I'm glad that you are part of our team.”

Luis was confused because he thought it was just her.

The next week, Lethy invited Luis to meet her team, which looked very professional. There was a project manager, two graphic designers, a product manager, and many other fellow translators.

In their first meeting, they translated some vocabulary related to objects in the house, for example, "spare change” (coins) and “rubbing alcohol” (isopropyl alcohol).

Luis was honest about his ability and confessed, “I don't know what they mean.”

So, the team explained to him what they meant in their own words, “We think ‘spare change’ is coins that you can find in your sofa or on a bookshelf to buy something later.”

And Luis said gratefully, “In my family, we say ‘moneditas.’” So, the team took note and wrote it in the book.

Then, Luis asked, “What about rubbing alcohol? What is that?”

One of the graphic designers said, “Well, rubbing alcohol is used to clean wounds.”

Luis tried to look up the definition in the dictionary and found that it was “alcohol isopropílico,” but he still could not understand what it was. Finally, a member of the team showed him the rubbing alcohol from the other room.

So now, Luis understood what the proper word was and said, “Yeah! I remember! I have one of these in my house, but I say ‘alcohol de uso medico.’ We should include this word instead of the other one because it seems more commercial and popular.” The team agreed with him.

After working for a few weeks, the team and Luis realized that it is easier to get better ideas simply by collaborating and being part of the team.

At the end of the month, the book was published and put in libraries and bookstores, and it was tremendously successful. And thanks to Luis, who helped to make a reliable bilingual product, and their collaborative and valuable teamwork, the book conquered the market and was sold out.

Written by Oscar Felipe Núñez Alfaro.

Edited by Kate Linsley.