Life as an Operations Director

Operations Director Joanna Góralczyk-Weitz is our guest in a brand-new “Life as a…” segment.

Can you briefly explain your area of expertise?

Joanna Góralczyk-Weitz: I’ve been working as an Operations Director at Argos Multilingual for 2 years. I started my career as a Project Manager, learning the ins and outs of the translation process. Later, as the head of the Medical Project Management Team, I was involved in developing customized and holistic solutions for clients in the Life Sciences industry, while at the same time maintaining close relationships with clients and suppliers.

What is the role of an Operations Director?

JGW: I combine a strategic and operational view on the localization process. I’m leading various teams of localization specialists towards the goal to produce high quality products/translations on-time. In other words, I help Sales to bring on new clients and then I’m working with other departments to implement and support customized workflows and solutions for clients across all industries and just generally keeping an eye out that we’re carrying out the processes that we sold to the client.

What are the challenges when working with different departments at the same time?

JGW: The biggest challenges when working with different departments simultaneously are conflicting interests leading towards the same goal. Let me give you an example – the Project Manager would like to meet the tight deadline requested by client and receive a completed DTP task ASAP. However, the DTP specialist insists he or she has enough time to perform DTP including a QA stage, ensuring the final product is of the best quality. My role is to manage goals and expectations between departments to make sure that, at the end of the day, our clients are happy with perfect products delivered on time.

What do you believe is essential for maintaining a successful localization program with a Language Service Provider?

JGW: Communication is the most essential from my perspective. We can adjust to clients’ needs only when we know them. We listen to our clients, we know the challenges they have and we can help. Our goal is to be a partner to our clients, not just a service provider. Very often, our solutions also mean that when client implements them, we’ll make less money. However, by doing this, we gain another happy client that can trust our knowledge and expertise.

The second aspect is building a dedicated team of professionals who support our clients. Most of our clients have dedicated Project Managers and teams working for them behind the scene. They have proven many times already that even the most extraordinary project can be delivered on time.

What do you most enjoy about your job?

JGW: I love working with people. I know that many people from Argos said that in previous ‘coffee breaks’, but again, I must admit that we’re lucky. The team we built at Argos allows us to be successful in cooperation with clients and suppliers. We started as a small company but we grew fast and still we’re growing in a way we really want to – adding talents to various teams, but keeping the insight on clients. Simply put, we like our clients and we want what’s best for them.

Have a look at further blog posts from our “Life as…” series:

• Life as a Life Sciences Project Manager
• Life as an IT Project Manager