Three other U.S. companies will be discussed in the next article of the series featuring successful U.S. companies that have gained advantage over their competitors on the world markets by relying on translating companies. Established in the late 1970s, Portal Air grew rapidly and is now one of the largest U.S. companies to provide freight and cargo services to customers throughout the world. The senior management of the company that is based in Philadelphia was quick to realize right from the start of their business that they could hardly be successful, were there not translation in the contacts with their foreign customers. This is why they hired the Philadelphia Translation in order to get expert advice. In order to stay highly competitive, the company must constantly develop and offer new range of services. Flying express cargo routes is only one of them. Keeping an airline flying and the airport open in any weather is a hard task, so Portal Air has the capacity that allows it to excel at keeping its commitments to clients. The company’s values are customer satisfaction, fair treatment to employees, quality of services, safety of work, teamwork and trust.
With its headquarters in Saint Louis and retail stores in cities all over the world, Steel Hardware, Inc. is the second company featured in this article. The high quality of service the company offers would not be possible to maintain without the expert assistance by the Saint Louis Translation Services in their communication with foreign clients. Every Steel Hardware store is run by local entrepreneurs, who are hard-working, passionate and are very often involved in local community events. Coming in all sizes and shapes the Steel Hardware stores all over the world can be large rural stores or small, urban stores or something in between, but they all offer hardware products of the highest quality. Founded in 1944 by a small group of Saint Louis hardware store owners, the company’s initial aim was to allow buying in bulk at low prices by individual stores. This would provide good opportunity to the smaller stores to compete with the larger ones on equal terms. For more than half a century customers have been able to find at Steel Hardware advice and products that would help them complete their projects as well as dependable service. What makes Steel Hardware different from any other store is that its private label products are all stamped with a quality guarantee ensuring that not only the leading national brands provide the best quality.
The third company that this article presents is BM-COM, which is one of the largest direct selling telephone communications companies in the world. The company provides services that people demand like long distance calls, wireless and DSL internet, home security and satellite TV. Another service offered by the company is the video phone service which allows customers to have a face-to-face talk without leaving their office or home. The company has been based in Milwaukee since 1977. However, it was originally founded in Brookfield in 1969, but moving to a larger city was the only way to enter the big markets. Harry Procter, Stan Dobson and Greg Stevenson, who were the co-founders of the company, realized that only by working in close cooperation with the Milwaukee Translator would they succeed on an international scale. Currently operating in countries throughout South and North America, Europe and Asia, the company is also famous for its charity, as it has donated large sums of money to organizations that support causes such as child wellbeing, restricting domestic violence, aiding victims of sexual harassment and abuse rehabilitation.
It was in the early days of the alliance that the two companies it consisted of realized that because the national cultural aspects of the two partners were obviously different, they had to adhere to it unreservedly. Furthermore, at the beginning the usual cultural clichés of French eccentricities frightened the Chinese company, whereas the same involuntary biases of their Chinese counterparts equally challenged the employees of the French LaFever and made them feel uneasy. A Chinese Translation organization, assisted by advising them to recognize and acknowledge the resistance of such negative emotions without being censored, was part of the team of consultant psychologists that was hired with the aim of reducing the impact of the cultural crisis on them. This would only be possible if the two parties were able to acquire a sense of the self and subsequently a sense of the other, which in other words would mean they should endeavor to reach this inner frontier without trying to conquer the other culture and instead identify the positive features of the other party. In order to make this objective come true a particular attention had to be paid to language and cultural issues, but more specifically, the emotional climate for success had to be created through the metaphor.
The newly formed alliance LaFever-Quan Dong was the result of the effective acquisition of the latter by the former, speaking in financial terms. LaFever’s insistence on continuing to use the LaFever-Quan Dong Alliance metaphor has played a major role in portraying the transaction as an alliance, which has happened due to the fact that LaFever has never stopped placing such enormous importance on this portrayal. The use of the hyphen between the words LaFever and Quan Dong is the first point that stands out, and its use is governed by the idea to show the single entity both organizations represent. As the French Translation association that was employed by Quan Dong pointed out, the union between two persons is based on a legal relationship, while in military terms, it implies the agreement of two parties joining their efforts to face a common enemy, presenting a united front to win against the opposition. Thirdly, in business terms, it designates a partnership based on conviction, parity and justice, while in religion it refers to the treaty concluded between God and the Hebrew people and in rhetoric, it refers to the meeting of two different group concepts.
The alliance LaFever-Quan Dong evokes various other images and some of them are: competition between the European market and the Asian market; two competing car manufacturers for a position in the Asian market; the strengths of each party involved, their creative design and manufacturing innovativeness; as well as the juxtaposition between two different cultures, the West and the East, French and Chinese. When the notion of global citizenship was realized this led to the encouragement of the process in which the alliance raised the concept of a global citizenship, which claims to complement the identities of all parties involved. To overcome cross-cultural challenges, they hired a Korean mediator, who suggested that a strategic metaphor was to be developed which should strengthen the concept of the alliance and maximize communication within the alliance. English was to be adopted as the lingua franca of the new organization, suggested the Korean Translation proprietorship, that brought valuable help to the mediator in the negotiations.
In the second article of the series featuring successful U.S. companies that have been in a close connection with translating companies in order to gain advantage over their competitors on the world markets three other companies will be discussed. One of the largest U.S. companies that provide cargo and freight services to customers all over the world is Portal Air, which was founded in the late 1970s and since then it has grown quite rapidly. The only way to stay competitive on the world market for the company was to start a partnership with the Philadelphia Translation Services that were going to provide the necessary expertise in the communication with the foreign partners. That was a decision made by the senior management of the company that is based in Philadelphia right from its establishment. In order to stay highly competitive, the company must constantly develop and offer new range of services. Flying express cargo routes is only one of them. Keeping an airline flying and the airport open in any weather is a hard task, so Portal Air has the capacity that allows it to excel at keeping its commitments to clients. Safety of work and fair treatment to personnel, customer satisfaction and high quality of services, trust and teamwork are the company’s major values.
Second in this article will be discussed Steel Hardware, Inc., which is based in Saint Louis and has retail stores around the globe. The Saint Louis Translation is the company’s comprehensive guide in communication and negotiation with foreign partners, so that the company can keep the high level of service it is known for. Every Steel Hardware store is run by local entrepreneurs, who are hard-working, passionate and are very often involved in local community events. Coming in all sizes and shapes the Steel Hardware stores all over the world can be large rural stores or small, urban stores or something in between, but they all offer hardware products of the highest quality. The company was founded in 1944 by a small group of Saint Louis hardware store owners, and it enabled individual stores to buy goods in bulk to at low prices. This meant that the larger stores in their market faced an effective competition by those smaller stores. For more than sixty years Steel Hardware has provided dependable service, advice and products that help customers complete their projects. Private label products bear a stamp with a guarantee of quality, which makes sure that it is certified to be as good as, and in many case even better than, the leading national brands. This is what customers should expect to find at Steel Hardware stores.
Selling telephone communications directly is the business of one of the largest companies in this sphere – BM-COM, and this article will tell us some more about it. Wireless and DSL internet, home security, long distance calls and satellite TV are services that are always on demand and BM-COM is there to supply. Another service offered by the company is the video phone service which allows customers to have a face-to-face talk without leaving their office or home. The company has been based in Milwaukee since 1977. However, it was originally founded in Brookfield in 1969, but moving to a larger city was the only way to enter the big markets. In order to be competitive on the world markets the company co-founders Greg Stevenson, Stan Dobson and Harry Procter hired the Milwaukee Translator with which they have worked in close cooperation. Currently operating in countries throughout South and North America, Europe and Asia, the company is also famous for its charity, as it has donated large sums of money to organizations that support causes such as child wellbeing, restricting domestic violence, aiding victims of sexual harassment and abuse rehabilitation.