Count instructions in several languages: wording that avoids confusion

On count day a Korean manager writes the instruction "Stop counting at the cut-off." One colleague turns it into Uzbek and another into Russian. One team stops moving goods, another switches off the scanner, and a third stops counting and goes to lunch. A translated instruction is not automatically an understood one. In many plants managers read Korean while floor staff read Russian or Uzbek, so the wording of an instruction becomes part of the control itself.

Where meaning gets lost

• Words with several meanings: "check" can mean look at, or verify by counting again. The same goes for "stop", "close", "zone", "location" and "cut-off".
• Softened phrasing: Korean business writing often says things like "it would be good if you could...", which reads as optional once translated.
• Long sentences with several conditions: translators and machine translation both reorder them.
• Abbreviations and in-house words such as WIP, SKU or "Line B" are not in any dictionary, so they are simply misunderstood.
• Numbers and dates: 03/04 may be 3 April or 4 March, and the decimal mark may be a point or a comma.

Write short, fixed sentences

1. One sentence, one action, in the order in which the worker does it: "Scan the location label. Scan the item label. Enter the quantity."
2. Begin the sentence with the verb, so that the instruction is clear.
3. Always use the same word for the same thing. Do not use synonyms for variety.
4. Avoid idioms and abbreviations, and spell out units (pieces, boxes, kg).
5. Write the month as a word and the time in 24-hour form.

A glossary of about ten terms

Put a short glossary on the first page. Each term needs one line of definition and one line of example.

• Zone: a part of the warehouse marked on the floor plan, counted by one team.
• Location: a rack level or bin with its own label.
• Cut-off: the moment after which movements are recorded separately. Example: until 18:00 we count as usual, after 18:00 every movement goes on the red sheet.
• Hold: goods set aside until a decision is made; they are not counted.
• Recount: a second count made by a different person.
• Unmatched: an item that cannot be linked to any code.

Keep the same order and the same layout in every language version, so that a supervisor who reads two languages can compare line by line.

Pictures and layout

• Add one photo or drawing for each main step: what a location label looks like, where to scan, what a hold tag looks like.
• Place Korean and the local language side by side, or make separate sheets with identical numbering, so that line 4 says the same thing in both.
• Use large type, keep it to two pages at most, and laminate it for the zone entrance.
• Put the supervisor's name and phone number on the sheet, so that a person with a question knows whom to call.

Test it before the day

Give the sheet to two people who took no part in writing it. Ask them to explain each step in their own words, or to do it in a small zone. Mark every place where they hesitate and revise. Have the translation made by someone who knows warehouse work and checked by a second person; machine translation is only a first draft. Put a version number and a date at the bottom, and collect all old copies. After the count, ask the team which line caused the most questions and fix it before the next count.

For illustration, two storekeepers read a twelve-line instruction and misunderstand three lines, among them "close the zone", which one reads as "lock the door". The line is rewritten as "Mark the zone as finished on the plan and tell the supervisor."

Summary

With multilingual instructions, the aim is not a perfect translation but the same words leading to the same action. Short sentences, shared terms, pictures and a trial run are enough. Smart Inventory agrees the work instruction and the terms with your local contact before the start, and its team on site works from the same sheet.