Meet Central Europe Conference 2022

In the middle of October, a three-day-long Meet Central Europe Conference 2022 (MCE) took place at the X-Bionic Sphere resort in Šamorín near Bratislava, Slovakia.

MCE is a place for every key player in the translation industry: translation agencies, freelance translators, and mainly vendor managers. I’ve held this position at LEXIKA for years now, so I had the opportunity to attend the 4th annual edition of this conference.

Meet Central Europe – Where we started and where we are now

MCE was founded based on the initiative of four national translation agency associations: the Hungarian Proford, the Czech ACTA, the Austrian AATC, and the Slovak ATC SK. The conference aims to gather industry-specific knowledge, as well as encourage the participants to seek inspiration from their foreign colleagues and maintain contacts (or establish new ones).

LEXIKA representatives have attended all four editions of MCE. Read about our impressions of the 2019 conference in this article. Then, the pandemic threw a wrench into the works. And even after skipping one year, we were still unable to meet in person. That is why in 2021, instead of travelling to the Austrian city of Innsbruck, we took a virtual trip to Mars to explore the wonders of modern technology.

After the involuntary two-year hiatus, this year’s edition finally welcomed its visitors in person. After countless virtual business meetings, where we could only see each other through screens, we deeply welcomed the opportunity to shake our colleagues’ hands and talk face-to-face.

An informal meeting of vendor managers, predominantly from European translation agencies.

What inspired us at Meet Central Europe

The 2022 conference explored topics relating to the pandemic: mental health, the hybrid workplace model (a combination of in-office and remote work), the pitfalls of long-term remote work, and non-verbal communication in the digital age.

The panel discussion faced the elephant in the room—inflation, which was major issue for everyone this year, not only the translation industry.

MCE once again introduced its staple programmes and initiatives for starting translators. We got to see how some agencies operate, as well as how they try to practically interconnect university translation training with future jobs. We admit that there is a lot of room to improve in aiding junior translators. On the other hand, many countries across Europe face this challenge. Agency representatives from Estonia, Italy, and Turkey all gave their presentations on the issue. However, other participants from countries like Austria and Portugal, who joined the debate, also saw these gaps between young translators’ training and their professional lives.

The Cinema room filled with beanbag chairs was the favourite lecture space.

MCE supports Ukraine

When it came to topics of discussion, understandably the situation in Ukraine was first and foremost. Many representatives of Ukrainian agencies honoured us with their presence. Two of them delivered emotional speeches on how the war has been affecting the day-to-day life of the Ukrainian people.

The conference attendees had a chance to buy an “MCE for Ukraine” sticker. All of the proceeds from the sales are donated to Camp Žilina, which offers help and accommodation to refugees.

The conference programme was packed. Occassionally we didn’t even have time for coffee if we wanted to make the most of it. We experienced three days packed full of inspiring speeches, stimulating conversations, and networking opportunities.

The 2022 MCE conference completed the cycle during which all of the participating countries had the opportunity to host the conference. Next year, this undoubtedly unique conference will return to Budapest, where it all started in 2018.

Találkozunk Budapesten!