The translation profession is one of the professions that encompasses the greatest number of aspects in the labor market, a reality that is due to the long-standing vagueness when it comes to defining the functions and responsibilities of a translator. Moreover, this continues today as a result of using this label generically to refer to a number of specialized professional profiles that exist not only in purely linguistic tasks, but also in all kinds of areas related to management, administration and cross-cultural counseling.
For this reason, it is sometimes common for companies and individuals who require language services to fail to find what they are looking for or are unable to search precisely for what they need and ultimately hire inadequate services. Furthermore, both within and outside the profession there have been lengthy discussions about the qualities that a professional in this sector should have, a matter that is by no means trivial since these views are what shape staff recruitment processes, the skills and abilities required of translator profiles, and the criteria for assessing professional performance.
And, if we stop and think about it, a translator is not limited to translating. Let’s further consider some well-known circumstantial questions: What is translated? What workflow is followed? Who translates? Who sends the translation? How should the translation be carried out? Where is it going to be translated? When is an assignment due? Why does a completed translation work when it reaches its destination or not? Why does my client want to continue the business collaboration or not? The answers to these and many other questions will all demonstrate that translation is a profession with a very well-defined workflow and that it is not only related to the ability to perform cross-language tasks or other related ones, such as editing, cross-checking, adaptation, transcription, interpretation, etc. in the wide range of services offered by language professionals and translation agencies. Translation, as mentioned on many occasions, does not exist by itself, but occurs in commercial circumstances that require a structured and reproducible methodology which successfully consolidates a reliable and success-oriented working approach. To do this, we tend to find companies that identify each of the gears comprising this mechanism and employ people specifically trained in each of those disciplines to perform those particular tasks. As such, we have professionals specialized in client acquisition, in human resources, in project management, in accounts, in the provision of interlinguistic services per se or in quality assurance, among others. In many contexts, however, these roles are not so different, so it is common for the same person to take on the responsibilities and tasks of several organizational figures. One very clear example is that of freelance professionals, who must make themselves known in the market or forge good connections in the sector, manage production (from the moment proposals are received, to consulting, translation and controls, until delivery and continuing with the subsequent follow-up processes to measure satisfaction) and keep all the relevant documentation and accounts up to date for the appropriate administrative purposes. All this leads us to establish a profile of the figure of the translator who is essentially multidisciplinary and who must have a highly developed capacity for adaptation and learning in order to face the challenges posed by their profession every day.
Specifically, we could talk about the multidisciplinary nature of translators in terms of language services offered, since they are not limited to the mere provision of cross-language correspondence. All material is encompassed in a specialty area, meaning that translators are, first and foremost, experts in one or more subjects or people who are very skilled when it comes to documentation, since translations must be adapted to their target audience. Therefore, when we are looking for a translator, we are also looking for a body of knowledge that enables them to reproduce texts as someone who understands that area. Furthermore, translation involves a series of tasks that go beyond offering a translation option for a foreign unit of meaning. Translators must have the ability to correct themselves accurately, review the work of other translators with objectivity and a critical mind oriented to quality, communicate with other experts to obtain explanatory information, and communicate effectively with clients and other parties involved in the translation process. Added to this is also the need to incorporate all sorts of technology resources into their work methods, since said methods allow them to offer a much more streamlined service that is adapted to technologies used by clients in their respective businesses. CAT tools, quality assurance and company resource management software, and the new contributions of artificial intelligence are key elements for defining a translator profile with mastery and commitment.
Lastly, a professional translator must be able to draw on a range of individual skills, such as time management, stress management, taking on responsibility at a business and interpersonal level, and the required versatility to be able to adapt to all the challenges posed by performing this activity on a daily basis.
Therefore, finding the best team of professionals cannot be limited to a quick search for translators or a basic comparison of price ranges. To achieve quality translations, we must rely on the advice and good work of professionals who are committed to the needs of their clients, good practices in the translation industry, and are motivated to evolve towards a future that knows how to combine technological advances and the immeasurable contribution of human capital.
Ref. de la imagen:https://ethic.es/2023/03/la-gig-economy-esta-acabando-con-nuestra-salud/
