By Callum Darragh

On Friday 16 April 2026, I had the pleasure of attending the 2026 annual conference of the Chartered Institute of Linguists. As it was my first conference with CIOL, I genuinely didn’t know what to expect. I had been a student member during my Master’s degree in 2020, but only got around to renewing my membership in January of this year. As I am based in Luxembourg, I hopped on a flight the night before and made my way to the venue of Bush House, King’s College London the next morning.

The name Bush House was familiar to me, and I didn’t know why until we were informed that it used to be the headquarters of the BBC World Service. Coincidentally, my mother used to be employed by the BBC German Service in the early 90s when she was working in London and recalls having many fond memories of the place. Not only was I standing in a building personally connected to me, this building had been a genuine embodiment of languages and culture for generations. I have been to many swanky corporate venues in my time, but the history of this building could not match any glass building with a skyline view of the Thames and Canary Wharf.

Bush House, King's College London, photographed by Callum on the day of the Conference

Not too long afterwards, we were ushered into the seminar hall. There was a broad mix of conference attendees among our ranks. The standard members such as myself, students and fresh graduates, in addition to the veteran translators and interpreters. If you counted the years of experience in that one room, it must have been hundreds, and that is most probably an underestimation! We were welcomed to the conference by CEO, John Worne, and then the day began with a number of speakers from all across the industry presenting extremely interesting and inspiring talks.
 

Conference speaker Ibrahim Kadouni delivers his presentation to a packed room
 

I only starting scaling up my website and business at the beginning of 2026, and I have been constantly asking myself, “is this a good idea? Have I made a mistake?” The standard on LinkedIn has been complaints about the increased use of technology and AI creating exponential difficulties for translators and language service providers (LSPs) and how many have or are contemplating leaving the business entirely. While these arguments are valid and I am not in a position to complain as I receive a full-time salary, and am doing this as my second job, my LinkedIn algorithm didn’t exactly leave me feeling overly optimistic.

This is the feeling I arrived with, and not to speak for others, but I assume many shared this feeling on the day of the conference too. Naturally, this was the overarching topic of conversation throughout the day, and a certain level of anxiety surrounded this theme.

This is not the impression that the different speakers gave at all. And no, I don’t think they were trying to convince me against a trend that I refused to see the reality of, and I don’t think anyone was denying reality either. They did not deny that the market proved challenging, nor did anyone deny the fact that translators needed to adapt drastically in order to overcome the AI trend. Rather, they said adapting is something translators needed to do in order to survive.

The main thing I got from these talks was reassurance. Reassurance that there genuinely is a future as a translator and LSP if we are willing to adapt to the new challenges facing the industry. But also reassurance that it is not only translators who are facing these challenges. These trends face each and every industry, from solicitors, to IT programmers, to people in my industry - the financial services sector.

The feeling I got coming out of the conference was that there is still a need, and indeed a demand, for translators; and as long as we are willing to adapt to the new trends presented to the industry, such as moving into localisation, post-editing, or specialising in more subject matters, for example, then this new trend is just like when machine translation and CAT tools (computer-assisted translation tools) also created disruption in the market over the past two decades.

Another trend that was spoken about, and is genuinely something that is noticeable in my work whether that is on LinkedIn or in my job in the financial services sector, is the concept of ‘AI fatigue’. AI fatigue refers to AI-generated posts on social media, for example, and people being less likely to be engaged with it, as well as the content creator’s creativity being stumped.

I am emphasising that there is a need for ‘human-generated’ content, not only because our brains are wonderful and come up with amazing ideas, but because we are at risk of losing the ability to think critically and creatively. It is in our very nature to solve problems in this manner, if we are to lose it, we are at risk of being permanently understimulated.

The nature of being a translator is not the same as when dictophones were being used in the 1980s and every office had a separate translation and proofreading department.

The times are simply different. We have to be all of these things, we have to view ourselves as something like a ‘language consultant’. I am personally not a fan of that term, but that is hardly what matters. If we can still provide a product that people are looking for, which they are, this is another trend that will be able to overcome.

To summarise, I feel positive! I enjoyed the event and networking. Personal human connection is not to be underestimated - it is in our nature. The connections we forge with people are the very sense of our being. So please, come to these events if you are able to - you will not regret it!

Callum Darragh, pictured here at the CIOL Conference, is a Sworn Translator and Member of the Chartered Institute of Linguists.

You can reach Callum on LinkedIn and via his website.

Views expressed on CIOL Voices are those of the writer and may not represent those of the wider membership or CIOL.