The Boomerang Effect

Multiple problems with an exhibition catalogue I translated earlier this year led to major delays, and the scheduled 6 weeks turned to 6 months. When the publisher emailed the team about the issues this was causing, the leading author of the project sent a dismissive reply, which only highlighted his lack of awareness, preparation and...

When is “Urgent”?

Need it for yesterday? Sure. Please join the queue. Almost everyone wants their translation as soon as possible. Although never ideal, “urgent” is not necessarily an issue, but if you want us to be super nice and meet your deadline, you'll need to be super nice and help us too. Anticipate Remember: no document, no...

Consolidate Your Files

If your translation project consists of multiple small documents, it may make sense to you to send these small pieces as they are to your translator, but bear in mind that it will take longer and incur a project management fee. As we all know, switching between tasks increases the time it takes to complete...

Forget Magic and Telepathy

Some translators are not so keen on working with direct clients (as opposed to agencies) partly because clients are not always familiar with the translation process. For me, working with direct clients is far more rewarding, and it is an opportunity to help people better understand, and therefore appreciate, what we do rather than see...

Join the Translators’ Conversation

When two translators meet, you can bet on the questions that they will ask each other; they are always the same. Yet it is never boring. In fact, it is an important conversation and clients can benefit from asking those same questions to any translator they meet. While these questions make handy ice-breakers, they also...

Shed a Little Light

I have recently started to work on an ongoing multilingual project (an online art-collection management tool) which is proving a challenge for everyone in the team due, amongst other things, to the end client’s lack of experience with translation projects. As an online tool, the platform only has occasional sentences in isolation, the bulk of...

Who are you Writing for?

Who your readers are is a major factor for the form and content of any text. Are you addressing an expert readership on a specialist topic, or designing a marketing campaign for a particular section of the population? Is your audience local or international? If you are targeting an international audience, your text is very...

No Tricks, Just Treats, Please!

Communication is only effective if it is clear. If your thorough translator identifies any tricky bits in your text, such as ambiguities due to vague words, confused syntax or erroneous punctuation, they will send you a list of sentences and clauses to clarify. And that's good news: it shows that they are keen to get...

Translators can Count too

While most clients simply ask service providers for a quotation, the occasional client approaches translators with their own rates and terms and expect nothing more than a yes or no reply – not unlike an employment offer but without the interview or a chance for the translator to negotiate or explain what they can offer...

Teaming up for Clients

Here is an article I have written, published this month in The Linguist, the Chartered Institute of Linguists’ magazine. When looking for translators working in other language pairs on behalf of clients, the response to my search for a suitable candidate can be of mixed quality and standards. This article gives fellow linguists tips on...

How to be a VIC (I): Be a Good Communicator

This is the first of a series of posts on how to be a VIC (very important client) to your translator(s). There is no shortage of tips out there on how to be the best at what you do. But how about enabling others to give you their best? If you want the best translators...