Scaling IDRC’s Bilingual Board Meetings & Town Halls with KUDO + MS Teams

Use Case
Board Meetings, Global Town Halls / All Hands Meetings, Live Events (Virtual/Hybrid)

Audience
Bilingual Workforce

Languages
English French (Canadian)

Summary

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) is a prestigious Canadian crown corporation that invests in research in developing countries, shares knowledge with policymakers, and fosters global alliances to improve lives.

Being a bilingual team, and in accordance with Canada’s Official Languages Act, they needed a reliable way to support bilingual communication across high-stakes meetings and large-scale events.

By integrating KUDO directly into Microsoft Teams, IDRC ensures professional, real-time language interpretation in both English and Canadian French, enabling inclusive participation across board meetings, global town halls, and hybrid events.

The Challenge

With stakeholders, leadership, and teams operating across regions, every IDRC meeting must be accessible in both English and Canadian French. But as the organization scaled its use of virtual and hybrid formats, several challenges emerged:

Consistency across formats: Board meetings, all-hands sessions, and live events each required different levels of coordination, making interpretation difficult to standardize
Operational complexity: Managing interpreters separately from meeting platforms created friction in scheduling and execution
Scalability: As global participation increased, ensuring consistent language access across larger, more frequent sessions became harder
User experience: Switching between tools or workflows disrupted both speakers and attendees

IDRC needed a solution that could deliver high-quality human interpretation—without adding complexity to how meetings were run.

Services Provided

Scaling IDRC’s Bilingual Board Meetings & Town Halls with KUDO + MS Teams

Professional interpretation in EN & FR (CA)

Native integration with Microsoft Teams

Highly secure and reliable solution

Smartphone-accessible captions in real time

The language interpretation and live translation during the event were good.

Geneviève Gagon | Events & Meeting Coordinator

The Solution

IDRC implemented KUDO’s integration within Microsoft Teams to embed professional interpretation directly into their existing meeting environment.

This approach transformed interpretation from a logistical add-on into a seamless part of the meeting experience:

Native integration with Teams: Interpretation is accessible within the same interface employees already use.
Professional human interpreters: Real-time interpretation in English and Canadian French ensures accuracy, nuance, and clarity in high-stakes discussions.
Scalable across use cases: From board meetings to global town halls and hybrid events, the solution adapts to different formats without added complexity.
Streamlined operations: Scheduling, managing, and delivering interpretation becomes centralized and predictable.
Improved inclusivity and engagement: Participants can follow and contribute in their preferred language, leading to more effective communication and decision-making.