GALA Champion Aki Hayashi

Sign up for our newsletter on globalization and localization matters.

Aki is a Senior Manager of the Globalization Program Management Office at Dell Technologies. She leads a team of Program Managers and oversees the globalization aspect of Dell’s strategic programs including Marketing, Digital, and Events to help enhance the global business landscape and customer journey in the fast-paced technology industry.

Watch this interview in which she talks about volunteering for the GALA conference program committee, joining the Interpreting Special Interest Group, the concept of total event management, and best practices to make a multilingual event inclusive and accessible.

02:20 Volunteering for the GALA Conference Program Committee

Volunteering for the GALA Dublin Committee was one of the highlights for me in 2023. I would say it was one of the most enriching experiences I've ever had. 

I knew we had a huge responsibility of setting the theme of the event and selecting the topics that are relevant to a wide range of audiences. It turned out to be a great opportunity to learn about the organization and how the GALA conferences are put together from the program perspective.

04:28 Volunteering for the interpreting Special Interest Group

We wanted to really strengthen the information sharing, particularly on the quickly evolving technology landscape. 

05:32 What is Total Event Globalization? And what are the main challenges?

The idea of total event globalization is making sure that there are some kinds of translated content from the very beginning of the customer engagement to the very end, so that at least the audience knows what is available in their language and how to access it.

There are two main challenges. First, the lack of understanding on the event organizer's side regarding the benefits of adding languages or not adding them. Another challenge I would say is the budget constraint. Unfortunately, the budget is often the key driver of the localization scope and we have no control over it.

08:57 Best practices to make multilingual events truly global and inclusive

For us at Dell building a relationship with the event team has been really important. I would highly recommend working on building that trusted partnership with the event organizers.

I get it that it might not always be possible to have that kind of relationship with your event organizing team, so the next best possible recommendation would be creating a journey map with all the content and the communication touch points pre-event, during the event, and post-event. Try and find the minimum viable solution to optimize the customer experience for your audience.