SAP Says “It Gets Better” — Now in THIRTEEN Languages
In honor of Global Diversity Days, which kick off today at SAP locations around the world, and in response to your feedback after we released the It Gets Better: SAP Employees film on June 7 this year, we’re honored to announce that we have just released translations of the film into eight new languages, including closed-captioning in English for the hearing impaired.
Update: Thanks to later volunteer contributions from the community, we added four languages to the original effort, so we now have 13 languages total (AND a soundtrack: http://soundcloud.com/forjeffrey/my-shoes-for-jeffrey).
The translations appear as subtitles on the video on YouTube (click the “cc” button on the player):
If you aren’t familiar with the film, it encourages young people to reach out to get help if they are experiencing bullying and rejection because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. The film features employees from all over the world, including Steve Fehr, who lost his son Jeffrey to suicide after years of anti-gay bullying, and our co-CEO Jim Snabe.
New today as well, as a special gift to the film’s viewers and supporters, we have produced the score of the film into a song that you can freely download:
Here are the languages:
- Chinese
- English (closed-captioning for the hearing impaired)
- French
- German
- Hindi
- Italian
- Portuguese
- Russian
- Spanish
And the additional languages by volunteer effort from the community:
- Bulgarian
- Croatian
- Serbian
- Slovenian
This release provides a good opportunity to talk about two additional things:
- Why this matters to SAP globally
- The state of acceptance for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people around the world
For the first point:
Says out gay SAP executive Jan Grasshoff, SVP, Head of Talent Leadership and Organizational Design, who appears in the film:
There are different kinds of cultures including country cultures and corporate cultures. At SAP, we have a strong corporate culture. Diversity is something that we at SAP have to live across the globe in all our subsidiaries and all our countries. We recognize that in different countries there are different regulations, cultural backgrounds, behaviors, and levels of acceptance. We at SAP cannot try to adjust ourselves to each and every country’s regulations. We have to live one culture, and our one culture and one SAP is all about inclusion and embracing diversity. As one SAP, we have to live this consistently across the company.
Which brings us to the second point:
The realities around the world of what it means to be LGBT vary widely. In some places in the world, it’s not even legal to be LGBT, and penalties can be harsh. If you live in one of the locations with full protections and support for LGBT rights, I hope this gives you some perspective and appreciation for what we have gained. If you do not, you know how far we have to come, and you know there is support for a brighter future for LGBT people. So please, above all, reach out if you need help to make it to that future – even if you have to reach around the world to do so.
We are indebted to those who help spread the message that It Gets Better. Thank you.
PS: As I write this, I’m honored to also announce that It Gets Better: SAP Employees is debuting today in SAP’s Newtown Square office, with SAP colleague Steve Fehr in attendance. Steve also filmed an interview that will be appearing in a 1-hour special on bullying airing tomorrow night (Tuesday, October 9) on NBC affiliate KCRA3 in Sacramento and beyond – please check your listings and tune in at 7pm Pacific.
Hi Moya,
Thanks for sharing this! I don't know how hard it was to get this translated, but now the message can reach many more people - fantastic!
Sue
Great job (again) Moya! I think you and SAP are doing an amazing job with this video and am glad to find out that it has been translated so that more people can hear the powerful message. It makes me proud to be part of the SAP Community and I really like to hear that "SAP is all about inclusion and embracing diversity".
Best Regards,
Karin Tillotson
Thanks Susan Keohan and Karin Tillotson - before I ever had the privilege of being co-mentors with you, you both did so much to share this message online.
I'm glad you recognize the value of the translations. Now the whole transcripts are also searchable in each language. Hopefully, for people looking for help, this provides more of a way to find it.
Check this search query, for example:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=teasing+bullying+throwing+eggs+highschool+miserable&oq=teasing+bullying+throwing+eggs+highschool+miserable
Been there? You're not alone...
Great news! Since YouTube is blocked in mainland China, maybe our colleagues there can help post a copy on http://www.youku.com/ or something similar to make sure the message gets out to everyone.
Thanks Jason!
We actually checked with SAP's own Youku and other social media channels. The sentiment was that although attitudes are evolving on LGBT people in China, it's still unusual for companies to discuss initiatives like the It Gets Better Project.
Individuals however are free to share with their own social networks. If anyone has a personal Youku account and would like to upload our Chinese captioned version, let me know and I can point you to a download.
thanks much,
-m
A little late, but I wanted to jump in with an update that I edited the post above to reflect the four additoinal languages added after this release -- thanks to popular request and effort from the community:
Indebtedly yours,
-m
I am so happy this wonderful message of love is available in so many languages.
This is great and I'm looking forward to 13 more 🙂
Thanks Susan Keohan and Jason Lax -- I'm really proud of these additional languages -- we added them all by request. Almost immediately upon release, we were asked for translations in the first eight languages -- including captions in English requested by a colleague for her deaf son. We worked with formal translation services internally who were very generous. And then when we released these, the viewer community around the world wanted to add these four more. We checked and tested for quality for the final release, but this was truly a wonderfully crowdsourced effort. Now search terms on YouTube will help struggling people across the globe. Thanks for your support!