5 Reasons Why You Should Maintain A Good Work-Life Balance
After having read Catherine’s post on I-would-not-work-with-them-again types of PMs, I thought I could add to the story by sharing from my experience as a PM. The truth is that, after having worked for a few years as a translator and interpreter myself, and having come across all sorts of PMs, when I started my own agency and had to do project management, I already knew what to do and what NOT to do when dealing with translators. After all, they are the heart and soul of my business.
While most of the people I deal with are really nice and reliable, I have come across a few that are less pleasant to work with. As I mentioned in a comment to Catherine’s article, there was this very rude translator who sent a translator’s report full of capital letters and exclamation marks (she was obviously yelling at us), not to mention words that could only be rendered in writing by replacing letters with “*”.
Here are a few more:
- Inconsistency:
A translation from English into Arabic in which the dates appeared in different formats throughout the document (e.g. 5.12.2000 and 5th December 2000). I emailed the translator and she replied (very defensively) that 5.12.2000 would not mean a lot for an Arabic speaker, while 5th December would. Fair enough, I was not challenging that since I don’t speak Arabic, all I was asking for was some consistency.
After complaining that she will skip lunch in order to make the changes (albeit it was quite a short document), she sent it back with all the dates in the format she had said it made no sense for Arabic speakers (!!!)
- Formatting
I am aware that Word documents are preferred over PDFs. But if that’s what the client sends, that is what we have to work with. I would never expect a translator working from a PDF to come up with the exact formatting, especially if there are drawings/shapes etc. But I would expect to be able to understand which bit is which without knowing the language. Right? Wrong!
A translation from English into French. Started checking. All was going really well, until I reached the last three pages. Seriously, my eyes hurt and my heart jumped. Imagine random bits of text spread out over three pages – a little text here, a little there, bits of text everywhere!
In the original document, that was a table containing some shapes with text. As I said, I would not have expected the translator to spend a lot of time re-creating the exact shapes, but drawing a table and writing the text there in the order the shapes appeared on the text would have been nice. Or inserting comments, or a key… anything but what he had done (he had clearly used OCR, although the instructions on the PO said not to, not to mention he had not checked his work to see the end result).
I sent it back only to be told he will charge extra for doing what he was supposed to do in the first place. I then (as a proper computer geek that I am) recreated the table and drawings and asked him to at least place the text in the correct places. He refused. Luckily I speak French (yes, also a language geek), so I was able to do it for him. He agreed at least to check and said it was perfect!
- Technicality
We had this translator that half way through the project decided the translation was too technical and could not do it. We had obviously sent her the document beforehand so she could have a look.
- Questions
Can you ask the client if this is correct? We actually had one translator who emailed us this question. Needless to say the client did not speak the language, that’s why he had wanted a translator in the first place.
- Comments
We all know that leaving comments helps. But leaving comments in the target language that neither the PM nor the client speaks?
But, as I said, these are exceptions, fortunately. There are plenty of translators and interpreters out there who are nice and a pleasure to work with. Just as there are PMs.
Author bio
Alina Cincan
I am a former teacher, translator and interpreter with over 8 years’ experience, now Managing Director at Inbox Translation. I am a language geek who likes to keep up to date with what’s happening in the industry. When I am not writing on my own blog, I am writing on other people’s 🙂. You can get in touch on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn.
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Great post! When I was working as a PM I saw things that really shocked me, like translators disappearing and never sending you the translation, one whose computer crashed exactly on the day he was supposed to deliver the translation and the only thing he could say was “find someone else”. Another translator, who was extremely good, always delivered late, without even letting you know. So, I completely agree with Alina’s final paragraph.
Thank you! I think there is a solution with very good translators that you know deliver late. Your deadline is in 6 days? Tell him 4 days (provided there is enough time to do the work, of course) and you will have your translation in 6 days. Just in time. 🙂
That’s exactly what I did! 😉 The client was very happy with the translations, so I just made sure I had a bit of extra time…
I wonder whether that’s the same translator, with whom I have been (happily) working for some 20 years…. 🙂
Very interesting comments. As it is the case with any professions, there are good translators and bad ones, reliable or unreliable ones.
You need to be selective. If you can’t sort the issue out with the person concerned, it’s better to look for another translator. There are a lot of very good translators out there.
“one whose computer crashed exactly on the day he was supposed to deliver the translation”
Unfortunately, that can happen.
“and the only thing he could say was “find someone else”.”
Unfortunately, that is sometimes the only possible answers.
The reason is the translation sofware: some translation software is unaccessible after a crash, which can lead to problems when you want to access your translation.
I hasn’t happened to me yet, but I once has a crash while doing a big translation (and rather a pleasant one, too).
But fortunately, I could work it out with a colleague – after talking with my client, of course.
Peter, luckily it hasn’t happened to me either but, as I mentioned in my previous post, I think every PM would understand that these things can happen (and we have all heard of Murphy’s law ;-)). I think in these cases it is very important to be proactive. I can imagine that it is frustrating for a translator, but they could also come up with alternatives. Personally, I think I would have preferred if he had said to me “sorry, my computer crashed, I need another 10 days to do the translation because I have lost everything that was in the TM”. I would have accepted it, afterall I had to wait anyway, after assigning the project to someone else.
You can’t imagine the sinking feeling a translator has when they do have a computer crash or technical hitch when they are more than half way through a big translation. It is not an unusual occurrence and sometimes happens when agencies transmit an “unsafe” file that is introduced into our computers and the conversion tool advises it is corrupt. We are unable to continue the project and have to start from scratch using a different method. The idea of not being able to deliver on time does create panic and the person who asked the agency to find another translator probably did so as a last resort, not having found a quick fix in time.
I have also lost time due to sickness/death of a pet. I am always loathe to disclose such reasons to a client/PM as it sounds like a “the dog ate my homework” excuse. At the end of the day, the client isn’t interested in our reasons for not coming up with the goods on time. Personally, if I have been forced to submit the project with a serious delay (after 24 hours), I propose to forego payment (unless it is the client’s fault for submitting a corrupt file). I do keep the client informed of delays and usually fair conclusions are negotiated.
I suppose it is also about how one says “find someone else”. As for sickness and death (even of pets), these are reasons to be taken seriously. It can happen to anyone and PM, translator and client should try and find a solution together.
Exactly, Alina! I just would like to point out that I was a translator before working as a PM and I am now, so I do understand what it is like for a translator. Of course I might be wrong, but I still think the translator was not professional. By the way, in that case, the file was perfectly fine, since 12 more translators used it and delivered their translations on time. 😉
Things can happen, always. But as a professional you should also make sure, as far as possible, that you never lose more than a day’s work. That means, you should backup your data on a daily basis. It takes a separate hard drive and about 10 minutes at most per day, so I cannot see, why this should be a problem. Also, if you translate large documents with proprietary tools/formats you should check, if you can produce a target document from it, right from the start or after a day, so you won’t face this problem at the end of the deadline.
Things can happen, but we also have options to keep the negative effects at bay. 🙂
During the short period I outsourced several years ago, I heard a lot of unbelievable excuses too, it’s sad to think there are “professional” translators like that out there.
did you ever hear someone that her cat died ans she was too upset to finish the translation? :))
Sure, but I always took the death-involving excuses seriously, you never know, a few of them could have actually been true! 🙂
I had not heard that one, but I do know how it can hurt when a pet dies. However, working on translations was good therapy for me.
Rudeness and lack of professionalism are even more frustrating though now that I think of it…
It’s very sad indeed. I have to say that, luckily, I didn’t meet any “rude” translators (I do remember a very rude PM from an agency we were outsourcing to though. Needless to say, I stopped working with them), but I was really surprised to see how unprofessional some people can be.
Asking the client for confirmation can be OK if they know the terminology in the target language (which they might well, for example, for information-technology translations into English).
But yes, translators need to use their common sense and do their best to be helpful. It’s called (basic) service :).
You are right, it is perfectly normal when it comes to terminology, but that was not the case unfortunately.
I don’t agree with the point ‘Questions’. Obviously I’m a translator and I came across inconsistencies and ‘cloudy’ texts I had to translate and – yes – I asked the recipient of the translation for an enlightenment. I have to tell that often he was the author of the text and I was translating in a different language from my mother tongue (Italian). In my main work (not as translator, but as sales assistant) I happen to translate in a different language from my native one, basically in English and basically quotes, user’s guides or website pages, those assigning me the task are mother tongue of the ST language so it’s not that strange (and sometimes absolutely necessary for the above mentioned reasons) to ask for clarification.
As a translator, I haven’t come across situations like these. But I now see that the risks of outsourcing are plenty…
I disagree for the Questions section. Sometimes, the client may have an in-house team/subsidiary in the target language or still have preferences for a specific term in the target language. It is not systematic that the client asks for a translation without knowing the target language…
I probably was not clear enough in the example given. As Oliver wrote above (and I agreed), when it is about terminology or preferred terms (especially to ensure consistency), it is perfectly OK to ask and clarify.
However, in this case, it was neither a specialised translation nor in a language that the client spoke or had access to.
I am not sure what you mean by “It is not systematic that the client asks for a translation without knowing the target language”. Most of the times this is the main reason they need us. Yes, certainly, there are cases where they understand it well enough for informal correspondence and they need translation for professional purposes (contracts, brochures etc.), but, like I said, most of the times they don’t know it.
In the days when I was sending out work to other freelances, I always – unless it was completely impossible – left some room, dates-wise, between the date I requested the translation from the freelance and the date the client requested it for precisely these reasons – computers can crash, people can get ill, and it was just less stressful all around to have some leeway. (Remember when translations had to be sent by post, rather than arrived in your inbox at the click of a button?!). As a freelance, I now realise that some agencies don’t appear to leave much leeway at all. I suppose the best thing would actually be for both sides to have a better idea of how the other side operates, rather than guessing. Some agencies want a job back first thing, but I generally have no idea whether that day is the client’s deadline and they simply spend the rest of the day checking the translation, or whether they’ve allowed an extra 24 hours, or what.
With regard to persistently-late translators, if they’re sufficiently good that you want to keep on using them, then I’ve always factored in a couple of extra days, just in case.
Once upon a time…
My computer crashed one or two days before I was supposed to deliver a 6 weeks work translation I was already checking before delivery.
The good part is: I back up everything! So I was able to go at a cyber café and send the client an email apologizing, explaining what happened and asking for a few days more in order to check and perfect the translation, the rough draft of which (saved when I just finished translating) I attached to that same email. Luckily, the client understood (and he’s still one of my clients).
However, where I live there are often problems with power and phone lines, especially during the rainy season, so I’m used to jump through hoops to make clients happy. 🙂
Eleonora,
Your comment encouraged me to talk about my own mishaps.
My laptop crashed three weeks ago at 5.30am. I was up very early to do a final check of a translation that was to be delivered by 9am. Miraculously, I managed to bring my laptop temporarily back to life, trying not to panick, worked on my translation and sent it off at 8.30am. After that, my laptop never woke up. The tech guy confirmed its ”death” about a week later. True story. 🙁
Last summer, on holiday, internet went down. I had to call my client in England to say there was going to be a delay and explained why. They assured me it was okay. I was so relieved when internet was back. I delivered the work at 2pm instead of 1pm so I guess my guardian angel is doing a good job… 🙂
Magda,
you have to know that, due to very bad power lines, here power goes up and down, and back and forth anytime all the time. Even with a protector, this is not good for the health of a computer.
Besides, dust cannot absolutely be controlled here (tropics are famous for being dusty in the dry season and muddy in the rainy one) and you can find it everywhere, even where you just finished wiping.
As a result of all that, my PC goes KO regularly enough (not that often but even too often from my point of view), but who works as a freelance translator must not panic, ever. 🙂
Eleonora and Magda, unfortunately these things can happen and, although it is unfortunate, I think if the translator explains what happened and shows some willingness to finish the job, like you both did, then I am pretty sure a PM would understand. It’s a different story if the translator just says that the computer has crashed and you need to find someone else, when you know there is not enough time to look for someone else and start the translation again.
Absolutely! Things like this can happen to anyone, and when the translator explains and does their best to find a solution, it is understandable and acceptable.
Funny, this is a situation I am actually dealing with right now, where I, as a translator have been given a PDF (a scanned document) of The Annual Financial Statements and Board Reports of a conglomerate. Naturally, all the numbers have to be changed as NL uses points to separate thousands where we use commas. None of the tables converted properly from PDF to word, so I have had to set up all the tables again. And the headers and footers change from section to section, as some of the texts were originally on company paper and others on the Auditor’s paper.
When translating, I take all of these issues into consideration and make every attempt to produce a document that mirrors the orginal as closely as possible.
I can’t believe there are professional translators out there who would not do that.
I did indicate to the customer that this of course means more work for me, and more time, and that was understood but in my opinion, to deliver a document that doesn’t look as good as it should, or is not translated with consistency and consideration of the wishes of the client, is just not done.
Go find another job if you are not service oriented.
Oh, and I also back up as I go along, onto a separate hard disk; that was a lesson learned the hard way!
Thank you, Geraldine, for confirming that most translators are indeed professionals who go out of their way to do an exceptional job.
As for backing up learnt the hard way, it happened to me as well. Not as a translator, as I had learnt the lesson a few years before that. It was my final year at university and during the summer before the start of the academic year as well as half way through it, I had gathered all the materials I needed to write my dissertation, when my hard-drive crashed. Dead. Gone. Could not recover a thing. Had to start all over again. Lesson learnt. It later proved to be useful in my career.
I keep an external hard disk plugged into my USB socket on the computer, and carry out a Save and Save As, to my computer and the hard disk about every ten minutes and before I take a coffee break, or shut off for the day. Yesterday I made a silly mistake in the document (aforementioned) and when I was changing points to commas in the numbers, mistakenly changed every point in the document.
Thankfully, I realised it on time, and just pulled up my back up!
Great post!
What I sometimes miss when dealing with freelance translators (who I outsource part of my jobs to) is more common sense and (more) willingness to see it from the other perspective.
I came across translators who simply wasted their and my time being over-critical about the source text (as if I were to blame) and deaf to my suggestion that maybe they could “translate” their criticism into a few practical recommendations for the client (and I know clients who are really grateful when the translator helps to improve their original text).
Some of these translators couldn’t take any criticism at all. For them, any editor is the “enemy of the people”.
As for PDFs, I always try to convert them myself (I am rather experienced at that).
But perhaps, the most important thing is – I wish there were more translators who would understand that a client (who orders a translation) needs a translation not for the sake of translation. He/she needs it to serve as a technical manual, a legal contract, a presentation or a marketing article exactly like his/her original would, only for somebody who doesn’t speak his/her language. So please think (more) about your client’s target group, fellow translators. Please bear in mind that translation is mostly a means, not an end itself.
It can help to ask explicitly who the translation target readership is, as this may not always be clear.
Sometimes, for example, it turns out that many of the users will not be native speakers of the target language (eg hotel guest information translated only into English), which affects how you should write the translation.
Sometimes, the text is for a publication with a particular house style, and it can save time to factor that in at the outset, rather than changing things (and changing others back) at the last minute.
If I have some, I always give practical recommendations. After all, we are human beings and clients too could make mistakes.
As for thinking about client’s target group, that’s not up to us; the client should have already done that long before giving us the text to traslate.
We just have to perform a good translation. If we do, meaning, content and intent of the original text will be found in it. However, if the quality of original text is not good, the translation will mirror that too – no matter how hard the translator tries to make it better.
It is exactly this attitude (“why, we just have to perform a good translation”) that really gets me going. What is your competitive edge? Sit and wait for instructions, texts of a better quality, definitions of a target group? If you are to “perform a good translation”, that is if you are to provide documents in another language that help your client in his/her communication with his/her clients, partners, etc., you’d better be a specialist on par with your client. You should be knowledgeable about the subject matter and, if you want your client to treat you as a specialist, it won’t hurt to – pro-actively – get a better idea about your client’s business and target group. Use your common sense. Can you “perform a good translation”, if you have no idea what the document is about and who it is addressed to? Who is the target audience if it is a publication in an industry magazine or a corporate brochure? I don’t mind asking questions, but if it is, say, a corporate presentation, perhaps it also helps to have a better look at the title slide.
I thought we were talking translation here not writing. And I think we can start from the assumption that whoever translates a document is a specialist in a specific language pair and field.
Reading a well written text a specialist can understand intent and target of the document from the terminology and tone, and very few or no questions are needed to have a precise idea about what that document is meant for. And I completely agree that a good text might improve with little “ad hoc” changes.
Poorly written texts, instead, usually need to be completely rewritten – which is not what a translator is supposed to do – and a hundred little changes I could suggest will not make a bad text any better.
But good translation IS writing. We’re writing the client’s text in another language. I agree with Valerij.
Unless you are speaking of the mere act of typing the text, I must disagree; for we are not writing but translating.
If we were writers, clients would give us subjet and directions and we would compose a text. But we are translators, hence, clients give us an already written text that we have to render in another language. And we have to stick to it, cannot change it as we like because is already written.
And this is the problem with poorly written texts. By appropriate choice of terms we can only make them more appealing in the target language, especially if it is a creative translation, but quality of the text remains poor.
Example: you have to translate “Today is a sunny day”. Whatever wording you use to render it in the target language, you must convey the meaning of “Today is a sunny day”, no more, no less. That’s the translator’s job. You cannot translate it “Today is a lovely day, there’s a pleasant breeze, air is crystal clear and a warm sun is shining high in the unclouded sky”. That would be a rewriting, not a translation.
No matter what you do to render it in a better way, a poor text remains poor.
A useful assumption when translating is that the text has a message to convey and that it is in the interests of both its author and its readers that the text be readily comprehensible.
Translators are writers in the sense that we choose the words to express the original text’s meaning. To be a writer does not imply that you necessarily invent meaning; it may simply mean that you craft words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs with an end in view. There are numerous ways to phrase a particular idea; it is up to us to choose a wording that accurately reflects the meaning of the source text and has the desired effect. That is writing. An author of a novel crafts words to express an original idea that is in his/her head; translators craft words to express an idea that is articulated in the source text.
If we are given a marketing text that is not very effective in the source language, are we serving our client’s purpose by giving them an equally ineffective text in the target language? I think not. That is part of the value that we have the ability to add (in consultation with the client, of course). In certain genres, absolute literal fidelity may be secondary to the text’s purpose.
It is always nice to take a look at the other side of the coin.
The one thing I cannot understand about agencies is their unwillingness to help proofreaders and translators work together. They always hold the proofreaders identity a secret from the translators and vice-versa.
I look at proofreaders and editors as part of MY team. Sometimes I even mark a portion of a text and ask them to get back to me when they get to that point. At times, when discussing possible corrections with my favorite proofreader, we arrived together at the best solution – neither hers not mine was good enough!
Whenever I receive a job from a new agency I always ask them to provide my information to the proofreader so we can collaborate. See, sienna, dark-beige and amber do not look the same for everyone; or the position of a comma may be just a stylistic and unnecessary change, or a semi-colon could do a better job. I believe in working together – and yes, it will depend on the type of text.
I completely agree, Giovanna.
Looks like they stick to the ancient Roman say: Divide et impera. 🙂
Translation agencies would do much better if building teams instead of having many single remote workers, because our work is aimed to deliver translations that perfectly mirror the original texts and sometimes, working at our pc, we could find ourselves stuck somewhere, missing a productive debate widening our viewpoint.
It is a lovely suggestion, indeed. However, not everyone is happy for their details to be shared with others and there is also the Data Protection Act to consider.
There is no violation of any data protection act since the information is already being shared for translation purposes. As for privacy, it is simply a matter of asking the professionals involved: “We prefer to work in teams, so we are asking your permission to share you email address with the translator/proofreader/editor/xxxxx. ”
Easy. Simple. And a great addition to everyone’s ROI.
Catherine, great article! It reminds me of a conversation with a relative, who asked: “Why don’t you become a translation agency?” I replied, “because I don’t want to deal with ‘prima donna’ translators.” That’s not the only reason, but it’s high on my list.
My most important reason for not outsourcing (since we’re a company now) to more translators than the one we’ve been working with for years, is the delivery timing problem many translators have, along with the failure to notify you about the delay and the stupid excuses they provide thinking I’m stupid enough to believe them…
I know precisely what you mean Catherine and I find hard to believe there are translators out there who would not take this job seriously. You won’t survive otherwise….
I believe that translators should work together and learn from each other.
I often think about outsourcing. There are times I could do with having someone to outsource to or share a project. In all the occasions that I felt real pressure, I resisted. I didn’t want to take any risks. Risks such as spending time to edit or dealing with payment issues. Delays with payments especially.
What I simply do is stick to a very rigid schedule. In the beginning, I thought it would be impossible but now I see it was the right thing to do. No panic. That’s vital. Communicate with the client. Try negotiate, see if they can extend the deadline even if it’s just for 3 hours. Those 3 hours could be a life saver. That of course would depend on the relationship with your client. If they know you, trust you and respect you, you will get those extra 3 hours or an 9am next day delivery instead of 6pm previous day deadline. Translators with children know what I mean 🙂
But that day when my laptop broke down (and having caught a very bad cold almost at the same time) I emailed a colleague I *trust* and asked if she could provide me with names of translators she had already “put to the test” in case I needed help… Just in case.
Agencies have inserted themselves between the translation profession and a potential client, and have shaped the translation sector to suit their own business models.
If, as a consequence, they are using a lot of unqualified or poorly qualified translators instead of professionals, it is time they had another look at reality.
They have been driving down rates to a para-professional level and below, insist on treating professional translators as casual workers picked up in a parking lot for a day’s work (ProZ et al), and insist on using the translators’ money to fund their own working capital.
I think that qualified professional translators would do well to differentiate themselves from the ‘translation industry’ and stopped encouraging the increasing number of ‘intermediaries’ by working for them.
These intermediaries compete by price-cutting and ever shorter delivery-time promises, and in the long run, a fall-out will be inevitable. I for one do not want to be in the room when it hits the fan, so I will only work for direct clients, professional colleagues of good standing, and agencies operating as professional practices (where the owners/partners are qualified translators themselves and need additional capacity. Never quote on or accept an assignment without seeing the files. Never quote a rate per word, always a fee for the entire project.
Intermediaries who offer no added value, but instead take a large percentage of what may already be an inadequate fee for professional services by simply inserting themselves between the clients and the translators, must not be encouraged in any way. They will always end up using cheap (read unqualified) translators and as a consequence bring the entire profession into disrepute by complaints such as those described above.
If you are a qualified, experienced professional, it is time to wake up and start acting as one.
I couldn’t have put it better myself, Louis. Most of the agencies usurp the term “agency” itself, being neither a true agent of a customer nor of a translator, preventing the interaction between language professionals and their clients and, generally, driving down the market and compromising the profession of a translator as such (think of the term “vendor”).
While there are agencies that operate like that, Louis, there are some that value both customers and translators. I am sure there are some that use unqualified staff, but I still hope most of them do vet their linguists and make sure they are able to offer high quality services.
As for the role of agencies, it is not merely about “inserting themselves between the clients and the translators”. Let me give you an example: suppose a client needs their brochure translated (and proofread) into 10 languages. What variant would they choose? Find 10 translators and another 10 proofreaders themselves (and ideally check each one of them) or go through an agency that already has qualified linguists on their database (that have gone through a thorough selection process) and can handle such a complex task? Not to mention the translators should also be specialised in a particular field.
Think of it this way: your sink is leaking, so you call a plumber. But if you want to build a house from scratch, you would probably look for a construction company.
“Suppose a client needs their brochure translated (and proofread) into 10 languages. What variant would they choose?”
Oh, there are quite a number variants, e.g. one of them:
http://anmerkungen-des-uebersetzers.com/2013/04/03/enter-stridonium-the-islands-third-way/
Quite, Valerij.
I certainly would not give the time of day to an agency that refers to professional translators as vendors.
Whilst there will be many in the translation ‘industry’, as opposed to ‘profession’, who are ignorant of the meaning of the word and merely use it as ‘jargon’ learnt on the job, there will be others who use and deliberately promote the term to further their own interests.
The most stupid excuse a translator ever gave to me:
“I don’t want to do it. It’s for a tattoo.”
It was for a tattoo, but in the meantime he had excepted the job, so he shouldn’t have bailed out.
Converting PDFs seems to be becoming the norm; however, as translators, our task is to translate not convert PDFs into workable documents. I am happy to do that, but usually charge a fee to do so, which a lot of times is not accepted. If you spend a day or more setting up a workable document to translate, shouldn’t you be compensated for that? Shouldn’t the party giving you the assignment provide you with a working document? I welcome your feedback.
I agree. Though I will convert PDFs into workable documents, I do usually charge for it. Mostly a surcharge to my standard word rate. It has been my experience that customers accept this. Also, when I translate a magazine and actually produce an InDesign version in the target language, I charge extra per page to do so. Good customers know that your time is valuabe and that this type of conversion costs time, therefore money.
You are both right. Producing an InDesign version in the target language, or being asked to work from a pdf while expected to come up with the exact same format should be charged extra. I totally agree.
The problem with those pdf’s is that they eat away all time you gain by using TM’s and CAT. So you should at least react by not giving discounts for repetitions.
Usually if the formatting is complicated I charge more.
If it’s editable, I use the original formatting and I don’t charge more.
But once an agency ordered a translation from me (it wasn’t their first order) and asked me to keep the formatting “as good as I could”, which I did. Although I spent time copy and pasting everything in boxes and correct the automatic formatting, I didn’t charge more. There were slight differences in the police but everything was in the right box and looked very similar to the original doc.
The agency said it wasn’t exactly the original formatting, that they would hire a graphic designer and deduct it from my invoice. I refused of course and I can tell you I was stunned by such an unprofessional attitude. I had always delivered excellent, well scientifically researched, translations on time to that agency but now I don’t know if I will ever work with them again. Maybe it’s just one PM but still.
Nathalie, if the agency needed a graphic designer because the client wanted the final document in a certain format, they should have definitely taken that into consideration and add DTP as a service, not deduct from your rate. Your role was to translate the document, and from what you said, you tried to keep the formatting as close to the original, so I am with you on this one.
After a few decades as PM in a localisation studio I do recognise your points. However I think we should always blame ourselves first before blaming the people that we decided to hire.
Inconsistency
Check the source documents on this. Chances are that the translator returns a translation with the same inconsistencies as in the source document. Maybe it was done on purpose – you can’t always tell and if you think you can, you’re probably wrong :-). If the source doc was correct, find another translator. The rest sounds as some sort of miscommunication. Be aware that your translator is probably a native speaker in his own language and especially in instructions, rather use a less elegant sort of intl/business english, even if it doesn’t sound as nice as it could be and doesn’t do right to your eloquence.
Formatting
No excuse here. You should first make any document translator-friendly before sending it to your translator(s). I had the luck to be able to write my tools for this (extracting translator-friendly text and placing back the translations).
Translators should not be IT-freaks. Give them ‘plain’ text in Word and you’ll receive it back exactly as delivered in the first place.
Being able to understand ‘what belongs where’ should not be dependent on which languages you master or not. What if your translation is Hungarian, Finnish…? You’ll be totally lost.
And yes: tables require special attention. From you especially. If you look at the document before sending it out, you’ll see where you can expect problems.
Besides that: if you send out for 18 languages, do expect all 18 translators to spend half an hour each on drawing tables and copy-pasting texts from a PDF…? I always thought that was my job.
Technicality
Ideally you work with a known pool of translators and you’re aware of their strengths. When you have to source new capacity, sh*t happens. Learn from it and next time ask for references in similar fields of expertise before assigning. (I agree that he/she should have looked more carefully, especially for a new client/assignment – but hey, maybe he neede the job very badly…)
Questions
If there is no reference material supplied (let alone TM’s or libraries), questions are not strange at all. If it’s about a big account of yours, you probably could look it up in earlier translations or send them to your translator. Even on your client’s website, one can often see what terminology is appropriate for them.
If it’s totally new work, tell the translator to follow his own judgement consistently. He will understand.
Comments in the target language
Comments in the target language are very useful, especially if the proofreader doesn’t speak the source language – quite common. He’ll know exactly how to adjust the doubts of a translator. Ideally, his amends are returned to the translator as well, so he’ll know what to do next time.
(I hope there is a proofreading stage… maybe there wasn’t one in place but your translator was in the dark abiouyt that?)
It often comes down to tech-savvy language-geeky quality control in each phase of the workflow. There’s more to translation and localisation than forwarding emails and a quick check afterwards. If the people who we hire have problems with our assignments, we are doing something wrong in the first place.