Why Should You Train Your Team in Their Native Language?

Imagine this: You train your team in a Preventive Maintenance Training Program delivered in English—but half your workforce mainly speaks Spanish: How confident are you that they’ll effectively apply what they learned? Unfortunately, this is the reality in many organisations around the world.

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Many organisations have multiple subsidiaries across different countries. These “global organisations” often have their business processes and documents in English, and that includes their training programs. They assume that training their teams in English is good enough. After all, employees can “get by” learning in the international language, right? But when it comes to maintenance, safety, and operations—where millions of dollars and the lives of people are at stake—just “getting by” isn’t enough.

In fact, my conversations with clients across the globe reveal a hidden but common problem: While many frontline staff can speak some English, they struggle to thoroughly understand an English training course in maintenance and reliability. And if your team doesn’t fully understand their training—mistakes happen, safety is compromised, and productivity suffers. That’s why training in your employees’ native language is important to the success of your team.

Yet many companies train their teams in a language that isn’t their own—and then wonder why the training doesn’t deliver results.

That’s why in this article, we’ll explore the hidden risks of language barriers in training, case studies proving the impact of native-language training, how multilingual training improves safety and productivity, and how you can train your team in their native language.

Language Barriers in Training

First of all, let me be clear: Miscommunication in training has REAL consequences. Especially in asset-intensive industries like manufacturing, mining, and oil & gas. Here’s what often happens when training isn’t delivered in your team’s local language:

Increased Human Errors

If workers misinterpret training, they’re more likely to make costly mistakes on the job. For instance, imagine a Spanish technician attending a preventive maintenance training in English. They might misunderstand a critical concept, such as the importance of creating high-quality work requests in the CMMS. As a result, you will have poor work requests that impedes your entire planning & scheduling process.

Higher Safety Risks

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) found that 25% of job-related accidents are linked to language barriers. Consider a scenario where a non-native English-speaking worker is given safety training that hasn’t been translated. If they don’t fully understand hazard identification, emergency response protocols, or PPE requirements, they might unknowingly put themselves and their colleagues at risk. This could lead to injuries, environmental damage, or even fatalities. In high-risk environments such as mining, oil and gas, or manufacturing, a misunderstood instruction can be the difference between a safe shift and a catastrophic accident.

Lower Retention

Workers may nod along in training sessions yet struggle to apply what they learned. Without training in their local language, concepts are often misunderstood and forgotten within days or weeks, making training ineffective in the long run. This leads to:

• Poor execution of maintenance tasks
• Increased reliance on supervisors for clarifications
• A workforce that lacks confidence in applying learned skills

Lost Productivity

When frontline teams are trained in a language they only partially understand, productivity suffers—often more than we realise. Important details get lost in translation, questions go unasked, and mistakes creep in. Instead of applying what they’ve learned, team members spend energy trying to interpret the content. This often results in poor execution and preventable errors that cost time and money. And the more technical the subject, the worse the outcome.

Effective training should remove friction. If your crew is battling language barriers during training, you’re setting them up to make a lot of mistakes. On the other hand, delivering training in their local language builds confidence, speeds up learning, and helps ensure critical processes are followed correctly from day one.

Research & Case Studies on Training in a Native Language

Training Industry Magazine has shared several case studies that prove just how important it is to train workers in their native language. These real-world examples show what happens when companies take language barriers seriously—and what happens when they don’t.

1. Food Safety Training

In the food manufacturing and meatpacking industries, a significant portion of the workforce consists of non-English speaking labourers, many of whom struggle with reading, writing, and communicating in English. This language barrier makes it difficult for workers to perform their jobs effectively, particularly in areas related to food safety and handling.

To address this challenge, a food safety training program initially developed in English was translated into Spanish and delivered to 1,265 adult learners. Pre- and post-training assessments were conducted to measure the impact.

Results:

• Food safety knowledge and handling behaviour improved significantly when training was conducted in the participants’ native language.
• Spanish-speaking participants scored an average of 96.6% on post-training assessments.
• The findings confirmed that identical training programs are far more effective when delivered in a worker’s native language rather than in a second language.

2. Wenner Bread: Reducing Injuries Through Bilingual Safety Training

The following is an account submitted to OSHA by Wenner Bread Products Company, an employer that has had success in reaching out to its Spanish-speaking workers. At Wenner Bread Products, language and cultural barriers were contributing to on-the-job accidents and injuries. A major challenge was that safety training and workplace information were only shared verbally, leaving many Spanish-speaking employees without a full understanding of key procedures.

To solve this issue, the company redesigned its safety program to include separate Spanish-language safety orientations for all new hires. Key safety materials, including educational, operational, and regulatory information, were provided in both English and Spanish. Daily and weekly safety briefings, as well as monthly safety committee meeting minutes, were also made available in both languages.

Results:

• A significant reduction in workplace injuries and illnesses.
• The company’s average injury and illness rate over 10 years was 5.1, compared to the industry average of 6.5.
• Improved labor relations with Spanish-speaking employees.
• A noticeable increase in productivity and product quality.

3. DFW Airport: Bilingual Safety Training to Reduce Construction Injuries

During a large-scale construction expansion at DFW Airport, risk assessments revealed disturbing predictions regarding potential injuries and fatalities due to the complexity and scale of the project. Additionally, North Texas has a high number of Spanish-speaking construction workers, many of whom were experiencing higher-than-average injury rates on job sites.

To improve workplace safety, a mandatory 40-hour bilingual safety training program was implemented. Workers could choose between English and Spanish sessions based on their preferred language. The program also included terminology training, where Spanish-speaking workers learned key English terms for construction tools, while English-speaking workers learned the equivalent Spanish terms.

Results:

• Zero fatalities throughout the five-year construction period.
• Recordable and lost-time injury rates were significantly lower than both state and national averages.
• Lost-time injury rate was 0.42 per 200,000 hours, compared to the national average of 3.60 and the Texas average of 2.4 per 200,000 hours.
• Overall incident rate was 3.68 per 200,000 hours, well below the national average of 6.80 and Texas average of 4.3 per 200,000 hours.

4. Torcon, Inc.: Bilingual Training for Safer Job Sites

To remain competitive in the construction industry, Torcon, Inc. sought to expand its workforce by hiring more Hispanic workers. However, many of these workers lacked formal safety training, creating an increased risk of job site injuries.

To address this issue, Torcon developed bilingual site safety orientation programs and materials, ensuring that both English and Spanish-speaking workers had access to critical safety information. Health and safety posters, emergency evacuation procedures, and safety training videos were made available in both languages. Additionally, the company required all contractors to hold weekly bilingual safety meetings.

Results:

• An estimated 30% reduction in injuries at Torcon job sites.
• Improved employee relations and better communication between English- and Spanish-speaking workers.
• Higher client satisfaction due to improved safety performance on projects.

The Payoff of Maintenance Training in Native Language

Now, you might be thinking: “Is it really worth the trouble and costs to train our team in their native language?” To answer that question, let’s have a look at the value of maintenance planning & scheduling. If you watch this free course video, you will see that effectively implementing maintenance planning & scheduling can improve your team’s productivity by at least 35%, without hiring more people. To some organisations, that translates to millions of dollars per year. This can only be achieved by a team that’s been trained in Maintenance Planning & Scheduling.

Not to mention, if you don’t train your team in effective maintenance planning & scheduling, you risk missing safety-critical and production-critical tasks, unplanned downtime, and overall, a reactive maintenance environment—all of which are expensive.

Now, compare that to the cheap price of training your crew of, let’s say, 30 people—which would cost you a one-time fee of approximately $50,000. As you can see, the payoff is worth it.

As Henry Ford famously said: “The only thing worse than training your employees and having them leave is not training them and having them stay.”

The problem now is, it’s difficult finding the right kind of quality training that’s translated into your team’s native language.

That’s why at Reliability Academy, we’re making a lot of effort to translate our courses into multiple languages.

Roadmap of Our Translation Project

We first began pre-translating our Maintenance Planning & Scheduling course into Spanish for a group of 30 students from Minera Panamá, one of the largest copper mining operations in the world.

Because of the success of this initial rollout, Minera Panamá expanded the training agreement to over 200 students. In addition, another client also asked us to translate our courses to Turkish. To meet this demand and maintain high quality, we started fully translating our courses using advanced AI technology. These full translations include:

1. Transcripts
2. Video lessons
3. Assignments
4. Resources and Tools
5. Course Environment
6. Slides, Quizzes, and Assignments

The AI technology we use creates natural and engaging voice overs that feel like they were originally spoken in the local language. The voiceovers, examples, and terminology are adapted in a way that ensures the concepts are crystal clear. Nothing gets lost in translation. Just imagine how much easier it becomes for your team to understand, retain, and apply what they learn.

And here’s the best part: We’re not stopping at Spanish or Turkish. French translations are finished too—and more languages are coming soon.

Of course, we’re not naïve about AI. While it speeds up the translation process tremendously, AI alone isn’t enough. We discovered early on that AI can still make critical errors. For instance, when translating into Turkish, the AI translated “plant” as “herb”—technically correct in a literal sense, but completely wrong in the context of a manufacturing or mining plant!

That’s why every course translation is thoroughly reviewed and corrected by a professional human team of translators and editors. They ensure the technical accuracy, cultural appropriateness, and overall clarity of every module, video, and document.

In short:

• We use AI to speed up the work.
• We rely on experienced humans to guarantee quality.
• We deliver training that truly helps your team master preventive maintenance, planning, and scheduling—in the language they understand best.

Stay tuned, we’ll soon be announcing new language options, expanding our mission to help thousands of plants worldwide escape the vicious cycle of reactive maintenance.

Summary

Training your teams in their native language is KEY to your long-term success. By doing so, you eliminate confusion, reduce errors, improve safety, and significantly boost the return on your training investment. The case studies we explored make it clear that training your team in their dialect leads to improved overall performance.

That’s why we’re putting in a lot of effort and resources to translate our courses into multiple languages. By combining advanced AI technology with professional human translators and editors, we’re able to deliver accurate, natural, and engaging training that helps teams around the world master maintenance planning & scheduling, and preventive maintenance.

In an industry where small mistakes can lead to big losses, training your team in their native language is one of the most cost-effective investments you can make. If you want your teams to succeed, start training them in their language.