I'm a big fan of Douglas Adams' trilogy "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". In the books, Adams solves the problem of how aliens from different planets understand and communicate with each other by introducing us to the Babel fish. A small creature that, when inserted into the ear or its equivalent, instantly translates from any alien language to your own.

Why am I telling about an alien fish you might ask? Well in today's global marketplace, more and more companies are conducting business in languages other than English. That's not always an easy task and so, according to a recent Globe and Mail article, researchers continue to work on developing an electronic version of the Babel fish but it might take a while yet.

Electronic speech translation devices have been available for some time now but they are not really suitable for real-time conversation. E.g. According to the article, a sentence may not be able to be translated until the end of that sentence or even the end of the next, to clearly capture the idea being put forward. Clarity is crucial to make sure that the device is capturing what is truly being said and not upsetting or angering the recipient through mistranslation.

The hope is that, one day, people will be able to conduct business transactions by video without being able to speak the other's language. That day may be still quite a way away but within five years, it is anticipated that speech to text and text to speech translation technology could provide opportunities to discuss new business opportunities with foreign customers in real time.

Of course, you never know, someone might invent the Earth's version of a Babel fish sooner than we think.

If you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to contact me at carol@workforceplanningboard.com