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Free resource: our comprehensive guide to successful multilingual events — planning, interpreter briefing, equipment and everything in between. Fill in the form here to receive it.
There is a version of a multilingual event where everything runs smoothly. And then there is the other version.
The event that works
The interpreters step into the booth confident, the terminology is familiar, the speakers’ names are already in the glossary, and the audience hears a clear, accurate interpretation from the first word to the last.
The event that doesn’t
The interpreter encounters a fifteen-slide presentation for the first time as it appears on screen, a speaker who goes by three different initials no one explained, and an acronym that means something completely different in the source language than in the target one.
The difference between those two versions is almost never the interpreter.
It is the brief.
In short — what to send your interpreters
- The agenda, with timings where possible
- Speaker biographies
- Minutes of the previous meeting
- An acronym and terminology list
- Presentation slides, ideally with speaker notes
What a brief actually is
A client brief is not a formal document or a lengthy process. It is simply the collection of materials and context that you share with your interpreters before the event.
The professional standard
According to the General Terms of Work of AIIC (the International Association of Conference Interpreters), conference organisers are expected to send interpreters a complete set of documents — the programme, agenda, minutes of the previous meeting, reports and any other relevant material — in each of the working languages, as early as possible and no later than 15 days before the event.
That standard exists because preparation directly affects quality. There is widespread consensus in interpreting research that interpreters work better when they prepare in advance.
Yet in practice, materials often arrive late, in incomplete form, or not at all. Organisations sometimes hold back materials because presentations are still being revised. That is understandable, but waiting until the event begins creates avoidable risk. Interpreters do not need perfect final files to prepare effectively. They need enough context to build terminology and understand the speaker’s intent.
What belongs in a strong brief
There are a handful of documents that make an outsized difference, and most of them take very little effort to gather.
The agenda
The foundation
Interpreters keep the agenda in view throughout the event, alongside their glossary, participant list and other key documents. Knowing the session structure, the topic sequence and the timing of speaker rotations allows the interpreter to mentally prepare for each transition rather than reacting to it. Where possible, including timing on the agenda is also helpful, as it allows interpreters to manage their own handovers and pacing.
Speaker biographies
Matters more than most clients expect
Speaker bios help interpreters anticipate accents and speech patterns before the event begins. Knowing that a speaker is a non-native English presenter from a specific region, or that another tends to read from a prepared script at speed, allows the interpreter to adjust their approach before the microphone goes live.
Minutes from the previous meeting
The most overlooked document
If your event is part of a series — a board meeting, a working group, a recurring industry conference — the minutes from the last session contain the exact terminology, names and discussion threads that are likely to come up again. Sending these gives the interpreter immediate context that would otherwise take hours to reconstruct through independent research.
An acronym and terminology list
Highest value per minute spent
This is perhaps the single highest-value item in a brief, relative to the time it takes to prepare. The UN’s own conference guidelines specifically call out the importance of providing interpreters with explanations of acronyms and technical terms before the event. Every sector has its own shorthand. What is obvious to everyone in the room may be completely ambiguous to someone encountering it for the first time in a live setting. A simple list — even one page — removes that ambiguity entirely.
Presentation slides
Ask for the version with speaker notes
Slides round out a strong brief. When PowerPoint files are shared in advance, it is worth specifically requesting the version that includes speaker notes under each slide, as these are often removed from the version distributed to delegates but contain exactly the context an interpreter needs.
Why this is the client’s superpower
Interpreters are professionals who will prepare thoroughly regardless of what they receive. They will research the topic, build their own glossaries and find background material from whatever sources are available. Research confirms that obtaining first-hand materials from clients directly is the most efficient and accurate way for interpreters to prepare. When clients provide those materials, the interpreter’s preparation time is spent going deeper rather than starting from scratch.
The brief shifts the advantage to you as the organiser. It means your interpreter arrives already familiar with your organisation’s language, your speakers’ habits and the themes on the agenda. It means fewer moments in which something is glossed over or approximated because the term was never encountered before. It means the event you have spent weeks or months planning is represented accurately, in every language, from the opening remarks to the closing summary.
This is not a complicated process. It is a checklist. And it is one of the most direct ways a client can influence the quality of the interpreting they receive, without changing the interpreter at all.
Planning a multilingual event?
At Translators Family, we guide clients through exactly this process as part of how we plan every multilingual event. You can read more about how we work on our conference interpreting page.
Written by Oleg Semerikov, founder of Translators Family. This article first appeared in our newsletter, In the Interpreter’s Booth.
