It’s very important to do some realistic self-assessment to determine if a career as a freelance translator is for you. Translators need a lot of skills besides fluency in at least two languages; translators need to be excellent writers in their native language and need to be interested in and skilled at terminology research using both paper dictionaries and the Internet. Translators also need to be avid readers in their native and non-native languages in order to keep up their language skills and their knowledge of world events.

Equally important, and the subject that we’ll focus on in this book, is a translator’s ability to run a business. When you work full-time for an employer, you have one job title. When you work full-time for an employer, you have one job title. When you work for yourself, you’re not only the translator, but also the department head for sales and marketing, technical support, customer relations, accounting and facilities maintenance. Unless you’re willing and able to pay someone to do these tasks for you, you’ll be doing them yourself, in addition to your regular job.

Before you launch yourself into a translation career, it’s important to ask yourself a few questions. Are you the type of person who is often described as highly motivated, driven, a go-getter; or do you have trouble following through on a plan once the exciting idea stage is over? Are you consistently able to meet deadlines with almost no supervision or direction, or do you head off to shopping websites as soon as the boss disappears? Do you have the multi-tasking skills necessary to manage multiple clients and deadlines at once, or does this type of work leave you feeling overwhelmed and wondering where to start?

In addition, it’s important to factor in a start-up period of at least six months to a year when launching your freelance business. Of course this is just an estimate, and the length of everyone’s startup period will vary, but for translators who work in a relatively common language pair (for example French, Italian, German, Spanish or Portuguese paired with English), it’s best to budget on at least six months of doing a lot of marketing and working less than full-time.

For some people, for example parents of small children or full-time students who are looking for some supplemental income, the spotty cash flow of a startup period may not be a huge concern.

If you’re planning on translation as your full-time income, you’ll need to either continue your current employment while your translation business gets up to speed, or plan on living off your savings or a loan during this time. It can help to focus on the fact that with a consistent and reasonably aggressive marketing effort, you’ll have years to enjoy your freelance lifestyle and income after your startup phase ends.

So to all of you out there wondering, “What exactly does someone with a degree in foreign languages do for a living?,” I wish you happy translating!

If you are interested in freelance translation career, contact translation agencies via Translator Jobs site. Find out more about Translators jobs

When there is a downturn in the economy and sales start to plummet, one of the first things many businesses start to do is downsize in an effort to curb costs. Since the early 1980’s, this has become a common practice for many businesses. The negative effect on employees is one of devastation. Those who survive downsizing tend to lose morale and trust in management. The psychological effect results in anxiety, paranoia that they are next on the list to be laid off, and an overall unhappy work environment. However, there are measures a business can take to reduce the number of layoffs during bad economic times.

The following are a number of tips a business can implement that can reduce the negative effects of large scale downsizing:

1. Companies can use job recruiting services to hire employees who have the skills to meet the company’s long term vision and goals. This will lessen the chances of having employees who are expendable, and then, a less chance that there will be massive layoffs.

2. If the business has a number of different departments, cross-train your staff so that during difficult economic times, they can be moved around to other departments instead of being laid off.

3. When positions within the company open up, hire from within the company. This will ensure that employees get a chance to stay employed, and if there is a concern about near-future economic instability, management does not have to fill the position that the employee left in order to take the new job. As well, managers should periodically assess their career development skill requirements to identify skills that their employees will need to acquire positions that become available. This will allow employees to acquire skills and education to fill positions that become available.

4. Management can work with human resources consulting to identify which employees are ready to move into management positions. When the employee moves up the corporate ladder, management can leave their previous position vacant.

5. Management can offer employees special incentives to come up with new and innovative products and services to market and sell in order to generate more revenue.

6. Management can implement cost saving strategies. This can include: reducing hours during difficult economic times, working a four day week, and laying off employees for a few weeks to save money, but then bring them back to work. As well, when an employee retires, do not fill the position, ask employees to work a few extra hours volunteering, and offer a leave of absence to some employees until the economy starts to recover.

7. Offer employees shares and stocks in the company in return for taking a pay cut.

8. Offer the employees the opportunity to buy into the company and become part owners.

Although downsizing has shown to be an effective way of cutting costs, most companies prefer not to layoff a large number of employees. Fortunately, with a little creativity and good business management plan, a company can take measures to reduce the negative effects of downsizing on employees, the business, and the staff that survive downsizing.

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Introduction

If you are interested in getting a particular job, you know that salary is going to be one of the things that you look at. If you are interested in getting a promotion to a better job with the same employer that you currently work for, you know that salary is going to be one of the things that you look at. If you are interested in becoming a representative for the union that you currently work for, you know once again that negotiating your salary is easily the best thing that you could learn how to do. In all of these cases, the salary is easily something that you can negotiate to a better level than at the start. Here are some tips to help you do just that.

Set Aside Time

A lot of times there are going to be employers that will not take your request for a raise or a renegotiated salary package seriously unless you demonstrate to them that you are indeed serious about it. Popping into your boss’ office for a few moments, asking the question, getting rejected and then taking off is not taking this process seriously. In order to show that you take it seriously, you need to do a lot more than that.

For starters, you can set aside a large block of time in order to go through those negotiations. Make sure that your employer knows that the time is being set aside for that discussion and also make sure that you have an appointment with them for that amount of time so that they know what is coming up. If you do nothing else but this, at least both parties will understand what is happening before things even start.

Ask Questions

Just because your employer says no to your request does not mean that you should get discouraged and despair of ever getting what you want. If they say no to your request after you have laid it out for them, ask questions politely. Try to find out why they said no and try to find out exactly what it is that is keeping them from granting your request. In most cases, there are some things that you can do in order to improve your status with the company before going back and asking again. There is nothing wrong with working towards a goal, but you really do need to know what that goal is before you actually start working towards it.

Keep Working

The worst thing that you can do as an employee is to get bitter when you don’t get what you want. Instead of playing the bitter person, instead play the person that is a company player. Continue doing your work even after getting the no. Show your employer that you are a serious professional that is only asking for what they think they deserve. These types of unspoken messages do have an impact and you will certainly feel it the next time the issue comes up.