Mario Freitas Dec 6, 2015:

Right, Kindness Sorry, I see you haven't. But the community seems to have. ;)
Have a nice day too. Sunday is a good day for resting, not for working. What are we doing here? Translators!

kindness (asker) Dec 6, 2015:

Olá Mário,

I didn't choose any answer. :-)
Have a good day!

Mario Freitas Dec 5, 2015:

Exactly! That's how I started the discussion.
Anyway, I think you chose the best answer.

kindness (asker) Dec 5, 2015:

Sorry for replying so late ...

After asking the company: “Em relação à palavra colaboradores, refere-se a todos aqueles que, de alguma forma, funcionários ou não da (company’s name), contribuem para o seu bom funcionamento.”

The context: translation of a Quality Management System manual.

I found: “Stakeholders can include owners/shareholders, suppliers, competitors, society, employees and customers.”
“A new standard, ISO 9004:2000, Guidelines for performance improvement, can help companies effectively review and prioritize stakeholder needs.”
In http://www.qualitydigest.com/sept02/articles/03_article.shtm...

“Ensuring to stakeholders in a clear and transparent manner, the implementation of a Quality Management System that emphasizes continual improvement;”
In http://www.apcergroup.com/portugal/index.php/en/certificacao...

In http://www.iso9001help.co.uk/integrated-management-system-ma...
Integrated manual template (Addresses every clause of ISO 9001, ISO 14001 & OHSAS 18001) Example

http://www.iso9001help.co.uk/Integrated-Management-System-Ma... (page 8).

My translation was « associates » at first, but with further research I changed my mind.

Richard Purdom Nov 25, 2015:

http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/organization/mapp I doubt if McKinsey was translated from PT.

In fact the trouble with all the answers to this question, and in fact most questions on Pro.z, is that 'suggestions' are stuck up, including occasionally by yours truly to be fair, without any decent research or proper links. This is devaluing the whole system.

'It quickly became clear that the success of the high-performing collaborators resulted from more than just expertise or affability. When the company compared them with its other salespeople.........'

Mario Freitas Nov 25, 2015:

@ All, The use of "colaboradores" is precisely to use an euphemism and to make the worker feel more important, as very well mentioned by Rafa. Portuguese is full of that. And I have also seen the term "associates" used in several documents in EN for the very same purpose, whereas "collaborators" tend to be used in PT-EN translations, not by natives. It's like translating "parágrafo único" to "sole paragraph". Things you will only see in PT-EN translations.
I will stick to the "associates", as I see no other term that is actually used in English to refer to all those who provide services to a company (not only those with a labor bond, yet all contractors as well).

Rafael Sousa Brazlate Nov 25, 2015:

@Richard, thanks for the link. I tend to agree with this suspicion here:

"I suspect the original motivation was to find an alternative to employee which sounded more impressive and designed to make the employee feel more important."

Richard Purdom Nov 25, 2015:

well I'm not that sure either way, which is why I didn't (dis)agree with any of the answers, they all mean different things to different people, (and usage in the UK and US differs) http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/214467/associates...

Rafael Sousa Brazlate Nov 25, 2015:

@Richard, this is precisely why we should use associates, it is an euphemistic use. As well as colaboradores, which was not traditionally used to mean employees, but only to mean colleagues, comrades, coworkers. Now it is being used in reference to any person working to and in a company. It is critical to maintain this aspect of the language.

It is also a HR jargon, not common language. I have recently translated an Ethics Conduct from a big American retailer into Portuguese. They used associates throughout the document to refer to their emplyees and individual vendors, exactly as Mario explained.

Richard Purdom Nov 25, 2015:

safest to keep it vague like the original and go for 'collaborators' imo. There is a tendency in HR jargon to avoid the traditional separation between employees and employers and use this type of term. As Mario said, 'Stakeholders' is much more wide ranging. 'Associates' is generally used for someone at your level (co-worker), or a particular legal status, so I wouldn't use that.

Mario Freitas Nov 25, 2015:

@ Kindness Watch out for stakeholders. The term refers to any party involved and interested in the companys activities, including community members, entities, government authorities, shareholders, etc., some of which have never set foot in the company. IMO, colaboradores cannot be translated as stakeholders, above all, when you have the "sociedade" in the same phrase, which involves several stakeholders, and is therefore separated from colaboradores.
Don't you like Rafael's suggestion (associates)? I think it fits well.

kindness (asker) Nov 25, 2015:

Thank you for your suggestion, Richard, I will.
Nick's translation is closer to the one I was looking for, but I'm going to use "stakeholders" (http://www.significados.com.br/stakeholder/), since in this particular context, "colaboradores" means much more than employees. I asked the person who gave me the translation and ... Mario is absolutely right about his explanation. :-) - Thank you! :-)

Mario Freitas Nov 20, 2015:

but... "colaboradores" are not only employees. The name is used to refer to any person who provides services to the company: employees, contractors, third-party workers, etc.
For example, if you outsource the cleaning and security services (very common these days), the workers of the third-party provider who work in your company will also be "colaboradores" (faxineiras, copeiras, vigilantes, motoristas...), and they are not employees of your company.
Likewise, if you have an engineering company, you'll hire many enigneers as contractors (PJ), and they will be "colaboradores" without any emplyment bond with the company.

Richard Purdom Nov 19, 2015:

Isabel, if you were going to phrase it like that you'd need possessive apostrophes for each subject. Avoid this by using Carolyn's suggestion without 'those in' (the standpoints of the management, company, and employees.)!