Recruiting freelance translators is easy. Outsourcing work to freelance translators is easy. Paying freelance translators is easy. But what about recruiting, outsourcing and paying other translation companies?
In an ideal world, a database would be 20% freelance translators and 80% translation companies. It would make things so much easier! Project Managers could allocate entire projects to one supplier, without worrying about splitting files, coordinating deliveries, lengthy quality checks etc. Unfortunately, that is not how it usually happens in the real world. Working with translation companies can get very messy and stressful for a Project Manager. A small mistake can leave you with thousands of words untranslated the day before the deadline. It is true that this can also happen when working with freelancers, but the amount of work allocated to a freelancer is usually much smaller.
While working at Xerox, I resourced a job to a company that dealt with rare languages. It was a massive job, and they had a month to translate it. When the Project Manager checked with them regarding the progress of the translation two weeks later, it turns out they hadn’t realised that they had to download the files from the server, so they had not started the translation at all. I had to work overtime to resource part of the project with different suppliers in order to have it completed for the original deadline. That is when I learned that communication is the number one cause of issues between translation companies as several different people are usually involved in one single project: project managers from both agencies, account managers, vendor managers, a quality team etc.
I am sorry to say that this hasn’t been the only time that something like this has happened. Someone asked me the other day about my experience of outsourcing to translation companies, so I’ve decided to write about it as I see it in my day-to-day work.
Many translation companies never reply to my emails.
Being a Vendor Manager, I tend to take care of the administrative aspects of the collaboration: the signing of documents, asking for information about a company’s services etc. I know my requests may not make the top three priority tasks for Project Managers who receive them, but I always struggle to get an answer.
Flexibility is very important.
Sometimes, one agency may operate very differently from another, and lots of companies are not flexible or open to finding a balance that is good for both. I don't mean in terms of pricing, but for example, in the way they pay/charge per word, per hour, what services they are able to offer etc.
About 5% of the translation agencies I talk to won’t be able to adapt their rate to our fuzzy matches payment terms.
They seem to struggle with selling their services and translators' skills.
Nowadays, blind CVs are the norm. Clients love to have a high-quality blind CV of the people who are working on their projects. It is reassuring and compliant. Some agencies are unable to see it as an opportunity to sell their services and their translators’ skills. Just copying and pasting parts of their translators’ CVs in to a Word document or just deleting their contact details won’t do.
My advice: take some time to create a good blind CV template, complete with your logo, contact information, and attractive colouring and neat structure. This will show your translators' skills and capabilities, which is a must if you want to succeed in getting that project, as well as looking professional and being trusted by other translation companies.
Periodic collaboration reviews.
I used to think that periodic workload reviews were uninteresting and not useful, but this year, so far, I have had two with different companies, and now I want to organise some myself. Lots of companies don't put any effort into cultivating relationships with other companies. There are so many businesses out there, and they all offer practically the same thing at a similar price. The key is to understand that what makes your translation company unique is the value it adds.
A good business relationship, competent employees and good communication are what sets companies apart from the rest. Moreover, these characteristics are even more important than pricing sometimes. Regular calls and emails with the other company and periodic reviews about what has been happening develops the relationship between both companies and increases collaboration long-term.
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