Message from the President
Welcome to the Australian Institute of Interpreters and Translators (AUSIT) new face on the Internet. It has been a while in coming, but now that we are finally here, it is just a start of a long journey into the 21st century. We look forward to sharing it with you all, Australian translators and interpreters.
The Australian Institute of Interpreters and Translators (AUSIT) is the national association for the translating and interpreting profession. It was founded in 1987, bringing together existing local associations and specialist groups and now has branches in each State and Territory. It is the peak industry body for our profession in Australia and an important voice nationally and internationally in the Asia Pacific Region representing the interests of the profession at all times and in all Australian and international contexts, to uphold the highest professional ethics, to promote the importance of the translating and interpreting profession to governments and the corporate world, to promote and organise professional development activities, to provide a forum for the study and advancement of translating and interpreting knowledge, practices and procedures and to create better public understanding of the translating and interpreting profession, thereby reinforcing public confidence in it.
AUSIT is run by volunteers, with all its official office bearers being experienced language professionals, who generously donate their time on an honorary basis.
Our national signature events, the Biennial Conferences and National Excellence Awards, show what we in AUSIT can do when we work together. They clearly showcase the huge amount of talent and skills we have amongst us.
AUSIT members are interpreters and translators, but many of them are also skilled and learned in many other professions: nurses, lawyers, engineers, business consultants, marketing specialists, architects, journalists, copywriters, researchers, academics and business coaches.
The AUSIT National Council will continue to request information from members and other stake holders to make informed decisions for the benefit and growth of the profession as a whole.
The world around us has changed and AUSIT needs to change with it if we intend to remain relevant in our market. We need to become our own futurists. Otherwise, someone else will impose their vision of the future on us. We need each and every one of us for the change to happen, because the only real resource an organization has is the intellectual capacity of its members. Our Institute is measured by what intellectual property we hold collectively, what intellectual property we inject into it individually. AUSIT needs to produce a new generation of leadership-savvy members who will continue moving AUSIT forward on its way to success and growth. As AUSIT, we need individuals to lead the organization. The challenges of our time are more pressing, more complex and more misunderstood than ever before.
Ask not what your profession can do for you: ask what you can do for your profession.
On that note, I would like to thank all those members who are asking what they can do, and those who have answered the call when the profession asked for their contribution. This includes all those past and present office bearers and those contributing in their own ways.
National President
Daniel Muller
1 August 2011
