Megan Sharp

How did you land in this career, and was language always an interest of yours?

This was very much intentional for me. I grew up in a bicultural household, with my mom having immigrated to the United States (US) as a little girl with my grandparents from Mexico. While my childhood was filled with customs, traditions, and food from northern Mexico and the US, and I heard the familiar yet foreign sounds of Spanish being spoken at my grandparents’ house, I myself was not bilingual until I pursued it as an adult.

Early in my college studies, I switched from majoring in business to linguistics, which felt like opening the door to a new world that finally enabled me to connect fully with my family. It also introduced me to the inner workings of language systems across the globe, starting a lifelong learning and career path for me.

After earning my master’s degree in Spanish Literature and Linguistics, I was accepted at MIIS, where I studied the Translation and Interpretation track and took advantage of the suite of localization offerings. After MIIS, I started my career as a translator and interpreter.

Over the years, I worked in a premier cancer hospital as a medical interpreter, the District Attorney’s Office of New York as a legal translator and interpreter, and finally as a verbatim reporter at the UN. There, I had the responsibility of rendering speeches from the highest ranks of royal, political, and non-governmental organization (NGO) leadership in English, regardless of their language of delivery. Upholding the dignity, prestige, and work of these distinguished individuals, as well as protocol and procedure for the official records of the world’s most influential international organization, was the name of the game. These experiences grounded me in the importance of cultural nuance and context, and they allowed me the privilege of affording all people the same level of care that would be given to an English speaker.

With the onset and uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic, I chose to pivot to localization management. I reached out to my network about any potential roles opening up, and on the fateful day I inquired about Verizon, a role had just been approved.

The transition from linguist to localization manager was not something I took lightly. I understood that it would require adjustments and learning — shifting from the art of translation to the art of managing projects, vendors, technologies, budgets, and stakeholders. What I have noted from the beginning is that this work is first and foremost about the people we work with and for. It is equally important to foster relationships internally and externally to carry a request from ideation through production as it is to keep the end user at the heart of the process. The breadth of opportunity to learn and grow in varied ways makes each day a new adventure.

What professional skills or qualities do you credit toward landing your current role?

Maintaining a passion for learning, listening to and working collaboratively with others, and being committed to doing my best have always been key to my happiness — and success — at work. When we feel fulfilled by how we spend our time, what we produce reflects that satisfaction in spades.

Moving into localization management allowed me to expand my skillset and stretch myself as a leader. Every day, I choose to show up caring about the people I work with and the work we have the honor to do. Ultimately, we are bridging gaps by designing or adapting experiences for speakers of other languages. The centerpiece of my motivation is making people, regardless of culture or language, feel included in an experience — whether it’s an international meeting, court hearing, or product offering.

Language technology is at the heart of most localization conversations these days. How have AI technologies impacted your processes and workflows?

AI has been extremely useful in terms of efficiency in a variety of areas, such as fleshing out project briefs, kickstarting ideas, and analyzing large datasets. And then there are more localization-specific applications like managing translation memory, using AI-powered translation workflows, and interpreting and generating reports — all of which require careful oversight and collaboration to pilot, deploy, iterate, refine, rinse, and repeat. These applications have produced important time savings to reinvest in other more strategic areas, like creating scalability, developing new features, launching new research, and deploying optimized processes.

Where do you see the future heading with respect to AI and other emerging technologies?

I think there is a lot of potential for AI and emerging tech to shape the future of work. There are still many tasks today that could benefit from automation, integration, and smart tools, which would free up more executive think time. To achieve that wider adoption, it is necessary to build security frameworks internally in order to truly maximize usage, which can otherwise be limited from existing tools on the market.

One thing in particular that could be improved with AI is the place of meetings in corporate culture. On the one hand, I feel the proliferation of meetings speaks to our desire to be connected to the people we work with. But on the other hand, I believe (or hope) that in the future, we can use our time together to more meaningfully connect, rather than go down a checklist. I see a future optimized by AI at the task level that allows us to have blue-sky discussions, brainstorm, innovate, and shape strategy — leaving things like statuses, touch bases, and routine needs to technology. In other words, I see great opportunity for more human potential and leveraging talent, as we are freed from the administrative burden that constrains so much.