Bilingual staff vs professional interpreters: making the right choice for your organisation
When an organisation faces a communication situation involving two languages, a seemingly practical solution presents itself: use a bilingual member of staff. It is available, familiar with the organisation and does not require a separate procurement process. In many situations, it works well enough. In others, it creates risks that are not immediately visible but become costly when they materialise.
This article sets out the key distinctions between relying on bilingual staff and commissioning a professional interpreter, and provides a framework for deciding which is appropriate in a given situation. For professional interpreting services, BeTranslated provides interpretation in all formats and language combinations.
What bilingual staff can and cannot do
The limits of fluency without interpreting training
Being bilingual means having native or near-native proficiency in two languages. Being a professional interpreter means having developed the specific cognitive skills to process speech in one language and render it simultaneously or consecutively in another, under time pressure and without error. These are different abilities. Research consistently shows that untrained bilinguals, when placed in interpreting situations, make significantly more errors, omissions and additions than trained interpreters, even when their language proficiency is equivalent.
Role conflict and ethical complications
A bilingual staff member who interprets is simultaneously functioning in two professional roles. This creates conflicts. In a medical consultation, a bilingual nurse who interprets may soften distressing information to protect the patient, or omit a clinical question that seems intrusive. In a legal hearing, a bilingual colleague who interprets may unconsciously (or consciously) edit what a participant says to serve the organisation’s interests. Professional interpreters operate under a strict code of professional ethics that requires accuracy, impartiality and role boundaries. Staff members do not.
When bilingual staff are adequate
- Informal internal meetings where all parties have some shared language capacity
- Routine administrative exchanges with low legal or clinical stakes
- Situations where the bilingual staff member is also professionally qualified in the relevant domain
- Short, simple communications where the risk of error is low and recoverable
When professional interpreting is required
- Medical consultations, diagnoses, informed consent and discharge instructions
- Legal proceedings, police interviews, asylum hearings and depositions
- HR proceedings: disciplinary hearings, dismissal meetings and grievance procedures
- Commercial negotiations involving contracts, pricing or binding commitments
- Any situation where accuracy is legally, clinically or commercially consequential
- Situations where the bilingual staff member’s neutrality cannot be guaranteed
49.1% of adverse events involving patients with limited language proficiency result in physical harm
Compared to 29.5% for patients with full language proficiency — Divi et al., PubMed, 2007
This research finding illustrates the clinical cost of inadequate language mediation in healthcare settings. The same principle applies in legal and employment contexts: when communication is imprecise because an untrained bilingual person is managing the interpretation, the consequences fall on the participant who had least control of the process.
Source: Divi et al., PubMed, 2007
The practical decision framework
The question to ask is not “Do we have someone who speaks the language?” but “Does this situation require accuracy, neutrality and professional accountability?” If the answer to any of those three is yes, a professional interpreter is the appropriate choice. If the consequences of a misunderstanding are negligible and recoverable, a bilingual colleague can manage the exchange.
Professional interpreting in Belgium
BeTranslated provides professional interpreting in all modes appropriate for the Belgian and international context: simultaneous and consecutive interpreting, remote interpreting, healthcare interpreting, court interpreting and business interpreting.
A situation requiring a professional interpreter rather than a bilingual staff member?
Contact the team with your requirements. A coordinator responds within 24 working hours.
Three routes available:
- Submit via the online quote form
- Call +32 485 85 30 89
- Email hello@betranslated.be
