French Language Services for Events – What You Need to Know

Planning an event with French speakers? You may want to read about what Knockhundred can offer you. Here’s a whistle-stop tour of some of our French language services for events you may be planning. 

Event planning is stressful at the best of times. Ask any frazzled event planner in the days running up to (and throughout!) an event they may be been working on for months up to the day it is all pulled off, hopefully, without a hitch!  Adding multiple languages into the mix can only add to the stress levels. Here we look at the preparation you need to make if you need to secure appropriate French language services for your events. 

Language services for events? Where do I start?!

The first thing you need to do is get your brief together. What are your requirements – if it’s in person, your delegates will need to understand their schedules, options for break out sessions, where to get their lunch, even where the loos are! They will need confirmation emails, perhaps they have an accompanying app to guide them throughout the day or days. All of these will need to be multi-lingual, never mind the actual content of keynote speakers or interpreting for break out sessions – where you may need live captioning and/or interpreters. 

Online meetings and events

Your delegates will need instructions on how to register, how to access the meetings online, and how to navigate into breakout rooms or how to simply ask questions during each session. You may also require remote interpreting services for Q&A sessions and Live captioning. 

Your brief for French language services for events

Once you have your brief together – and this could include, as mentioned above:

• Documentation and reading materials
• Instruction emails
• Directional Signage 
• Interpreters – face to face or remote 
• Live captions 

… you can now get some quotations from a language services provider. If you have a budget in mind, please do share it. Your language services provider can provide a practical guide as to what is achievable for your budget and give you some realistic solutions.  

Securing linguists

At this point, you can go back to the main planning and leave the language requirements to your service provider to arrange for suitably vetted and experienced French linguists. You can also request simultaneous interpreting services which is most commonly used for events.  Keeping your service provider updated with any changes to the schedule will ensure everything goes smoothly! Experienced interpreters will work in pairs to ensure the flow of the keynotes are communicated to the participants. They will capture the nuances of each speaker’s content in the French language and ensure the information is accurate and succinct. 

Let us take the stress out of ensuring the language aspects of your event are taken care of. 

You can find more info about language services for events here. And as an example of what Knockhundred can offer, here’s some more info about French language services for your events in London. If you are planning a UK based voluntary event, there is a useful gov.uk guide here.