Lost in Translation

I've been on a project that involves working with a group in Argentina.  It has been challenging for a number of reasons:

• It involved the taking of samples to genotype for specific genetic markers on cattle in Argentina.
• Due to regulatory restrictions and potential intellectual property issues, the evaluations had to be made either in the U.S. or the U.K.
• Import restrictions of animal tissue into those countries from Argentina is very strict due to potential spread of infectious disease so, the DNA had to be extracted there before shipping.
• The company we had partnered with is U.K. based.
• The genotyping ended up being done in the U.S.
• Results were then transmitted electronically to us for analysis.
• Gaining regulatory clearance for importation was made more difficult due to the transitions to a new Executive Team in the U.S. who insisted on reviewing all past policies before allowing the clearance.
• There were language barrier issues -- not just in the words themselves, but their understood meaning within common usage of multiple cultures.
• There were cultural barriers -- primarily the sense of urgency is lacking in Latin America.
• There was an individual within our U.K. partner's organization who was somewhat obstructionist due to fears we were usurping her territorial authority.
• There was the inherent bureaucratic dawdling of U.K. based companies -- if there is no clear policy, do nothing.
•  Since much of the data was collected in Argentina, the combining into a uniform database was complicated by the terminology.
• Standards for a large subset of the data are different in Argentina vs. in the U.S.
• Time seems to have a very different meaning in Latin America.

Thankfully, we have almost completed the collection and collation stages of the project.  Now come the analysis and reporting.  Let's hope we connected all of the dots correctly....