Adopting the ISO plain language standard: guide

The Localization and Implementation Committee helps countries around the world to translate, adopt and implement the international plain language standard. 

It also communicates about the standard to different audiences:

  • plain language practitioners 
  • other people in the communications field
  • various sectors

Aim of this guide

You can use this guide to get the standard adopted in your country. The guide sets out how to do the following:

  • Find out the key questions you should ask your country’s national standards body about how ISO standards are adopted in your country (there is much variation between countries).
  • Find out who in your country might already be involved in similar work.
  • Find out what work may already be happening in other countries that you can learn from, particularly in other countries that use the same language(s) as your country.
  • Share what you learn with the International Plain Language Federation’s Localization Committee.

We have written an accompanying checklist document that summarizes the steps in this guide. You can use it to write notes in and track your progress.

Background on the plain language standard

How the standard was initiated and developed

For information about how the ISO plain language standard was initiated and developed, review these items:

  • read the International Plain Language Federation’s history of the standard, and 
  • watch videos about the project from Access for All, the online plain language conference held in October 2020 and in May 2021.

How ISO works

The committee prepared a How ISO works document. It provides an overview of the following:

  • how ISO works
  • how the plain language project fits into ISO
  • how you can be involved in the ISO project: either at the international level or just in your country

If you’re unfamiliar with the ISO world, then the rest of this guide will make more sense if you read that overview document first.

How to encourage your national standards body to adopt the standard

There are several ways you can encourage your national standards body to adopt the ISO standard.

Join the committee

If you want to attend meetings and have access to committee documents, you can join the Localization and Implementation Committee. To do this, send us an email using our contact form.

Note that to be on this committee, you must be a member of Clarity, the Center for Plain Language or PLAIN.

Before you start

Before you start, you need to find out whether your country’s national standards body (NSB) is a member of the ISO committee that manages the plain language project. That committee is ISO Technical Committee 37, Language and terminology (also known as “TC 37”).

If your country’s national standards body:

  • is a member of TC 37, then you can go to the next section, or
  • is not a member of TC 37, then you can encourage it to join TC 37. 

You can find the full list of countries’ NSBs on the ISO website.

The good news is that at least two plain language practitioners have successfully encouraged their country’s NSB to join TC 37. The process to join TC 37 is usually straight-forward, assuming your NSB wants to join.

Questions to ask your national standards body

These are the things you need to ask about.

Funding

  • Does your country’s NSB fund the work involved in adopting an ISO standard?
  • Or does it expect the relevant industry or similar to fund that work? If so, how much?

Process

  • What is your NSB’s process for adopting an ISO standard?

Who and how

  • Who can be involved in the NSB’s committees or working groups that do the work (localizing, translating, etc.) to enable the NSB to adopt the standard?
  • How can plain language practitioners and advocates in your country apply to be involved in that work?

When you have the answers to these sorts of questions, you might like to review the answers with someone on the Localization and Implementation Committee to see if other people have similar experiences that you may be able to learn from. To do that, send us an email using our contact form.

Connecting with or involving plain language practitioners in your country

There are various ways you can connect with, or involve, plain language practitioners in your country. For example:

  1. Reach out to people you know.
  2. Find colleagues in your country.
  • Find out if there are people from your country who are already involved in TC 37’s work. To do that you can contact your national standards body.
  • Find out if there are people from your country who are already involved in the Federation’s Localization and Implementation Committee. To do that, email the committee chair using our contact form.
  • Find people in your country who are members of Clarity, PLAIN or the Center for Plain Language, who might be interested in helping you. To find members, contact your Clarity country representative, look in the PLAIN member directory and contact the Center’s board of directors.

Translation process

If you will be involved in translating the standard, it makes good sense to do these things first:

  • Settle the key terminology, for example: what words will you use to translate author, reader, document, etc. 
  • Connect with the people on the Localization and Implementation Committee who are working on determining key terminology. You can do that by emailing us using our contact form.
  • Work on terminology with people in other countries that use your language(s).

Set a timetable

When you begin this process and liaise with the committee’s chair, set some goals for yourself and items you can track, to keep your work moving. You can use the checklist to keep track of these items, along with who you contacted, when you contacted them and what the results were.

Questions

If you have any questions about this process, contact the chair of the Localization and Implementation Committee. To do this, send us an email using our contact form.

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