Training for Translators

Classes for translators and interpreters

Getting started as a translator


Corinne McKay

Six things every beginning translator needs to know

Last week’s ATA conference reminded me how very intimidating and scary one’s first few years as a freelancer can be. What’s stressful? Basically everything. Everything you write or say to a client or a potential client; every translation you proofread and re-proof and re-proof, worrying that there’s a horrific error hiding in there somewhere; every marketing effort you make, worrying that it will fail, or that it will succeed and you’ll have too much work. So, as a small step toward decreasing that anxiety, here are six tips (based on past blog posts) for those starting out in our profession!

You need to know, #1: How to find good agencies to apply to. That link leads to a post I wrote in 2015, and there are also some excellent comments on it. In a nutshell: use Payment Practices or a similar tool to vet the agencies before you apply to them, follow up on all responses you receive, and ask other translators for referrals.

You need to know, #2: Whether it might be viable for you to work with direct clients right away. That link leads to a post I wrote earlier this year, and the comments include lots of first-hand advice from translators who took the direct client route, or who decided not to.

You need to know, #3: How to decide how much to charge, other than by using fear, or vague speculation about what other people are charging. This post dates back to 2008 (not that I’m feeling old…), but the information in there is still the information I give students and consulting clients today, minus the part about the euro breaking the $1.50 barrier!

You need to know, #4: What not to include in your marketing materials. This post is from 2014, and again, make sure to read the comments. It’s really hard not to fall back on a) your life story, and b) the same marketing pitch every other translator uses, but this post includes some tips on where to start.

You need to know, #5: What might cause you to fail at this. This post is still one of the most-read on my blog, and its 112 (!!) comments are well worth browsing as well. Whether you’re just considering freelancing, or whether you’re in “failure is not an option” mode, it’s important to look at the pitfalls that swallow a lot of people.

You need to know, #6: How to break out of the low rate market if you’re stuck there. Lots of translators start out working for low rates; there are valid reasons for doing that in certain, time-limited situations. But you’ll definitely burn out if you stay in the low rate market for too long. This post and its comments offer some ideas on how to move on to better work.

I hope these are helpful to the newcomers who follow this blog!


Corinne McKay

If you can't out-think the competition, out-work the competition

A brief thought here, before Thoughts on Translation goes on hiatus for Spring Break! It’s a crossover thought from another area of my life, playing the lute (my mid-life crisis obsession!).

I don’t have a ton of musical talent; actually way, way less than a ton. I can carry a tune and clap to the beat of the music, but that’s about where it ends. But in the two and a half years that I’ve been playing the lute, I’ve found a compensatory mechanism: practicing more than most people do. Having trouble with the rhythm in a tricky piece? Practice more. Can’t play the hard part fast enough to keep up with the rest of the group? Practice more. Can’t play chords without sounding like a dying cat? Practice more. Practice doesn’t totally overcome a lack of talent, but it’s a good all-purpose solution. You up your practicing from 15 minutes a day to 20, to 45, to 75, and suddenly things get a little easier.

Let’s apply this to translation. When I started translating, I had a Master’s in French, some translation experience (internships, pro bono), but essentially no contacts in the industry, and no experience running a business. So, when experienced translators said, “You could apply to lots of translation companies…like 75 or 100,” I figured that 400 was a better target. If experienced translators said, “You could try asking potential clients for informational interviews,” I started asking any potential client in Colorado for an informational interview. I pretended that I would “be in their area” as an excuse to have coffee with them and ask about their business. If people suggested, “Add a personal touch,” I started sending a handwritten thank you note to everyone who responded (in any manner) to my inquiries. My sense was that if I couldn’t out-think the competition, I could at least out-work the competition, and that might turn out better in the end.

I’m not saying there’s no place for talent, or working smarter instead of harder, or for strategizing and optimizing. In our industry for example, if your language skills are poor, there’s no way to compensate for that: you just have to improve your language skills. But assuming that your basic skill set (the language equivalent of carrying a tune and clapping to the beat of the music) is solid, I’m inclined to follow NBA player Kevin Durant‘s advice, “Hard work beats talent, when talent fails to work hard.”


Corinne McKay

Work/life balance advice for beginners: pace yourself

As I mentioned in my last post, I’ve been enjoying hosting In the Balance (video series on work-life balance). It’s a topic I think about a lot, probably not least of all because I live in a “lifestyle town” (an expression that I learned only recently!) where prioritizing one’s non-work interests is very much the norm.

Today, a student in my class for beginning translators asked an interesting question: how would this advice apply (or not apply) to beginning freelancers, who want to have time to sleep, exercise, etc. outside of work, but who also need to actively build up their businesses.

Here’s the two-word answer: pace yourself. The advice that applies to experienced translators applies a little differently to you, but the goal is the same: don’t burn out, and let yourself enjoy some of the “free” in freelancing. Here’s what I mean: for experienced translators, work-life balance is largely about setting boundaries; it’s about achieving a similar level of financial security to someone who has a traditional job, but with the flexibility and independence of freelancing rolled into the mix. So for example I leave work at 2:30 three days a week so that I can be home when my daughter gets home; every Sunday night I sign up for my exercise classes for the week, and I treat them as I would a client appointment–I do not change them unless it’s absolutely unavoidable; I don’t work on weekends, even for my A-list clients; I try to avoid answering e-mail outside of working hours, because I don’t want my clients to expect that they can e-mail me at 10PM and get a response.

But when I was a beginner, things looked a lot different. When a client e-mailed me at 4 PM on a Friday and offered 8,000 words due Monday morning, I was elated. For years (literally, years) I worked from 7-10 PM, even on weekends. When a client called, I dropped everything, because I couldn’t afford (literally and figuratively) to miss a single job. But at the same time, you cannot work in that kind of “always on” mode all the time and remain excited about the job. So here’s the trick: pace yourself. Realize that when you’re building up your business, you have to go into overdrive sometimes. You have to be available at times and in places that experienced translators are not (month of August: great time to pick up new clients; ditto for the week between Christmas and New Year’s). But you can’t work in perpetual overdrive or you’ll absolutely burn out. So, pay attention to your pace!


Corinne McKay

Videos: In the Balance

Since the beginning of September, I’ve been doing a video series called In the Balance for Andrew Morris’ Facebook group, Standing Out. The series focuses on work-life balance issues that translators, and freelancers in general, face. It’s been a lot of fun to create the (very basic; I’m not much of an a/v person!) videos, and especially fun to read the discussions about work-life topics.

I’ve decided to start cross-posting the In the Balance videos here, with a one-episode delay. I’ll kick things off with the first three videos (episode four, “dealing with low moments,” comes out on Standing Out tomorrow), and from now on I’ll post a new one every two weeks. I’m looking forward to hearing what you think about these topics as well! If you watch until the end of the video, there’s an audience participation component in each one.

In the Balance, Episode 1: Work/life balance and what it means to you to be alive

In the Balance, Episode 2: I can’t, versus I choose not to

In the Balance, Episode 3: Creating positive habits