Global Insights: Localization, Language Preservation, and Remote Work with Eddie Arrieta

Eddie: I want my content in my language. I was like, okay, it is going to be like 80% of the people are going to say put it in my language, which we will not do. But it would tell us that we should have the magazine in French, in Chinese, in Japanese. And absolutely localise it. Like even per continent, over 75% of the respondents say, keep it in English. Now that is surprising. And I was like, we need to keep asking this forever because it does tell us something that might be particularly interesting about humankind. And it is when we find a common language to communicate, we find common ground of understanding. I think English is far from being a lingua franca, and I do not think we will ever get to something like that. But English allows for right now a neutral gateway to most areas in the world, in specific industries.

Brian: Today we are here with Eddie Arrieta, CEO of Multilingual Media. Eddie is a salesman, entrepreneur, humanitarian and baker. He helps companies globalise and localise by providing exposure opportunities and media consulting. Eddie, welcome to The Native Experience.

Eddie: Thank you, Brian. I am super happy to be here.

Brian: Tell us about yourself and what you are nerding out on right now.

Eddie: I am a Colombian citizen from a city called Sincelejo. I was fortunate to finish high school on scholarship in the UK in 2003 to 2005. That is how I learned English and was able to go to college in the US. I became really curious about producing at world-class level from anywhere in the world. I discovered remote work, which allowed me the freedom to work from wherever I wanted. I have two kids, Marco who is eight and Mateo who is four. My wife Lauren and I are here in Sincelejo enjoying family.

Eddie: Professionally, I have been doing a lot of different things, mostly on the tech side, working in communications and marketing, but ultimately building companies and helping companies grow. Right now I am fortunate to be CEO at Multilingual, a media company with an amazing physical magazine that gets sent to thousands of people around the world. It surprised me that people still love to have things in their hands.

Brian: You also have a bakery?

Eddie: That is right. We wanted to have a place in Sincelejo, which is probably one of the smallest cities in Colombia. The challenge is how do you make a city like this grow at world-class levels. So we thought, how about a bakery that offers world-class service and perfect quality food. We added elements of Republican architecture to the look and feel. It has a great name, Maria Bonita, which is a song in Mexico but also a type of bread from this city. My wife manages the business with family partners.

Brian: How does having many different tracks help you offer a native experience?

Eddie: It helps identify what your strengths are. Across the many different experiences, you can tell very quickly what you are really good at and not so good at. That helps me find people who are much better than me at the areas of no interest to me, so I can focus on where I provide the most value.

Eddie: We are working with a Japanese company and I was very Western with my approach. Here is the pipeline, here is what I suggest, here is my counter-proposal, here is how much it costs, when are we closing? The entire response from this culture was, let us digest the information, let us talk internally, let us get to a consensus, let us send some information back. The pace completely changed the way I envisioned a lot of the work we do with different cultures. If there is openness in culture, you should be able to adapt. People at the end of the day have the same essential needs. We are nothing but the compendium of each other's cultures.

Brian: Tell us about the local impact at Multilingual.

Eddie: We recently ran a survey with our readers and asked them if they liked our content to be translated into their native languages. My intuition was that 80% would say yes. Like even per continent, over 75% of the respondents say, keep it in English. That was very surprising. We need to keep asking this forever because it tells us something about humankind. When we find a common language to communicate, we find common ground of understanding. English is far from being a lingua franca, but it allows for a neutral gateway to most areas in the world in specific industries.

Eddie: Where we are localising is going into the stories and case studies applicable to the locales. As an example, we have a story on Mayan interpretation in Mexico and how a huge number of indigenous Mayan people have crossed the border to the United States and they do not speak English. Some of them do not speak Spanish, they speak Mayan. People might never come across this story unless a language-related publication covers it and presents it in a language acceptable to most.

Brian: How is AI impacting you?

Eddie: I do feel for everyone whose jobs are directly affected. What AI cannot do is create proper insights. What it cannot do is have what I call texture. By texture I mean the flavour you get when you read a novel. Writers write in their very particular ways. Multilingual has a tone. That tone can only be added by people. Our most popular content is not generated by AI.

Eddie: What we do is use AI to structure or outline potential outlines for articles. If we have press releases and sources, we determine the best structure so AI can give us a piece of content that we can edit. That piece needs tweaking because it does not have texture. But the system learns over time. It transformed the way we produce, allowing us to focus on long-term work, interviews with companies, and things of much higher value.

Eddie: We are also doing research on our own content. Looking into how much we have written in the past 35 years, which topics have been popular. Those large amounts of data and topics, AI does a much better job of figuring out. That allows us to give insights to our partners.

Brian: Talk about remote work. What has been your experience?

Eddie: My experience with remote work is positive overall. There is a huge need for structure. Most companies do not know how to manage remote work. I learned from a company called Torre. They have a remote work structure, very structured, documented, everything ready to be accessed. I use dailies. Every day we meet for 15 minutes or 30, just see our faces through cameras and connect. That allows for much more connection and gives structure to the team.

Eddie: I also ask the team to write a daily. Every day I write down what did I accomplish since my last update, what am I going to accomplish today, and what are my long-term goals and the progress on those. Every single day we write that. It helps us understand what everyone else is doing.

Eddie: The biggest downside of remote work is you lose physical interactions. But that is if you do not know how to use the freedom. I motivate team members to have local action, volunteering or projects within their city. Companies should meet in person. Nothing replaces face-to-face. If we can get the budget that would be used for office space to get everyone to travel and see each other for a week, that is very intense engagement.

Brian: Does having remote team members in various countries make Multilingual more effective?

Eddie: Absolutely. Our Colombian writer is very different to our Croatian writer. Being a global company allows us to integrate different perspectives and tones and texture to the magazine. When we hear feedback from clients in Saudi Arabia or Japan, we get confirmation of what are some of the human things that apply to Japan, to Colombia, to Saudi Arabia. Having the ability to centre yourself because of your culture is a really big win.

Brian: Gaming seems to be a frontier for localization.

Eddie: Roblox allows players to chat in their own language. The system translates into your native language and everyone else sees their own language. They are testing voice interpretation now. There will come a time where you speak in whichever language you want. It is getting to the Babel Fish from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Gaming allows for a lot of innovation and testing because there is so much engagement.

Brian: What is your advice on providing a good native experience?

Eddie: When you get close to your audience and start talking about community, you think about compromise and commitment. I think when you are looking into providing a native experience, you have to think about how you compromise with that audience. One of the things we do is a quarterly survey. Every three months we ask readers about the magazine. We constantly seek their feedback. That feedback provides texture on the community. We asked if they wanted content in their own language. Over 70% said keep it in English. So in this world, my native language is English. You have to think about each world where you want to provide the native experience as having its own specific unit. You want to keep constituent elements with integrity. Certain values and aesthetics produce certain effects. Stay true to that as much as possible. Compromise, ask for feedback, and measure whether the indicators tell you that you are providing a native experience.

Brian: Eddie, thank you very much. Love to have you back on again.

Eddie: Thank you. I am really happy to be with the real Brian.

Brian: Eddie Arrieta, CEO of Multilingual Media. Remember, always strive for authenticity and embrace the power of native experiences.