To mark their 20th anniversary, the Hong Kong Jockey Club Scholarships called upon us to produce a bilingual commemorative book. From planning and managing the entire project to conducting interviews and creating content in both English and Chinese, our editorial team was on hand to ensure the project ran smoothly – and that the end result was a top-quality product that was inspirational and emotive.
Service
- Interviewing
- English & Traditional Chinese Copywriting
- Translation
The Challenge
One of the city’s most prestigious scholarship programmes, Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) Scholarships celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2018. To mark this significant milestone, HKJC Scholarships wanted to produce a bilingual commemorative book featuring scholars’ inspiring, real-life stories. The scope of the project was large, and everything from planning to information gathering, content creation and printing needed to be completed in four months.
What We Did
Project planning and management
The Giles editorial team helped plan the project from the very beginning. We met and worked closely with the HKJC Scholarships Secretariat and their design vendor to discuss the theme, workflow, schedule and content. Besides having a tight timeline, the project also involved a large number of stakeholders. During the four months spent working on the book, we kept all stakeholders updated on a daily basis.
Interviews and content creation
We kicked off the project by conducting over 50 interviews within a single month. We began every day with a conference call with the secretariat, to collect background information on the JC scholars to be interviewed that day. This allowed us to identify what made each interviewee special and draw out a unique angle. Interviews were conducted in English or Cantonese, according to the interviewee’s preference. We transcribed every interview as a reference point to ensure absolute accuracy.
Translation
All articles were written first in Traditional Chinese, then translated into English. As always, we used our unique transcreation process. Once the initial translation was done, the copy was edited by a native English editor to create a natural tone and flow. Then a final check was done by our Chinese team to ensure accuracy. During the process of interviewing, copywriting and translation, the Giles team showcased its unique strengths in bilingual content creation.
The Payoff
The Hong Kong Jockey Club celebrated the 20th anniversary of HKJC Scholarships at its annual HKJC Community Day race meeting. Over 500 JC scholars were invited to join the event, and each attendee left with a 20th Anniversary Commemorative Book. A digital copy of the book was sent to eight universities in Hong Kong as part of HKJC Scholarships’ ongoing support for education and the community. The book is an emotive testament to the power of scholarships to change lives.
