This paper begins by reviewing briefly some of the key demands of the professional translation environment. It then considers what determines whether or not a translation is useful for its intended purpose and what is the nature of the type(s) of translation competence required to achieve this. It touches upon the role of different contributory aspects of the translation programme, including translation theory but also an introduction to IT and the use of electronic corpora (comparable and parallel) with the graduate programme. It refers to the undergraduate and postgraduate programme in Translation Studies at Aston University, to demonstrate how it aims to combine theory with practice in order to equip students with the relevant analytical and documentation skills, so that they are competent to work in a variety of subject areas on a range of text types and still produce functionally.