Becoming a Translator
The road to your first translation job
Now that you know a bit more about the translation industry, you may be ready to take your first steps on the road to becoming a professional translator.
As mentioned earlier, the market is competitive, and credibility and experience are keys to success.
The best way to gain experience is to start working as an employee in either a translation agency or as an in-house translator for a company in your preferred field.
In order to obtain the position, you must have experience. This can come via an internship and/or through volunteering.
Working as an in-house translator will allow you to learn your trade in a real-world environment and provide you with plenty of hands-on experience. It’s a steep learning curve; but you’ll learn a great deal and gain confidence in your abilities within the first year or two.
Don’t wait to finish University before applying for your first translation job. You could start learning about the industry, networking with people and building your portfolio while you’re still studying.
The first place you should start looking for opportunities is at university. Often universities will have employment schemes to help you gain some experience. These schemes can provide you with your first opportunity to enter the industry and to see first hand how translation agencies operate.
This will prove invaluable later on if you decide to approach translation agencies for in-house and freelance jobs.
Where to find translation internships
US
UK
European Parliament
European commission
Don’t forget to use the internet to search for opportunities. Become familiar with Google’s advanced search options as they will be useful throughout your career.
Start here: http://www.googleguide.com/advanced_operators_reference.html
Begin with something simple. For example, try this search term to find translation agencies advertising for internships.
PS. You can also check out JobHero for more internship-finding tips.
Where to find volunteering translation opportunities
We recommend that you visit the following websites as they are constantly looking for translators. Most of them are humanitarian organisations, so you can feel that you’re making a difference and improving the lives of others, while gaining vital skills and experience:
Ashoka: this social enterprise charity uses the slogan ‘Everyone is a Changemaker’ to respond to social challenges. With many worthwhile causes, it is a great place to begin your career in translation, particularly for those of you who speak fluent French or Spanish.
Translations for Progress: a charity that was specifically created to help students gain experience as a translator.
Global voices: an international community of bloggers who report on blogs and citizen media from around the world. Global Voices encourages participation and contribution, and welcomes volunteer translators and proofreaders.
UN Volunteers: while not exclusively translation related, opportunities can be found here.
TED Open Translation Project: translate TED talks! Useful AND interesting, what more could you ask for?
International Children’s Digital Library (ICDL): an organisation that needs help from volunteers to translate children’s books, the ICDL web interface, bibliographic information about books, and author biographies. All languages are welcome.
Translators Without Borders: an organisation that undertakes the translation of documents for humanitarian groups such as Doctors Without Borders, AIDES, and Handicap International FIDH.
Khan Academy: The Khan Academy is a non-profit organisation whose goal is to provide free education to everyone, everywhere.
Idealist: participate in volunteering activities. Sign up to the email alerts to receive custom volunteering opportunities directly to your inbox.
How to find an in-house translator job
If you have followed the previous tips and have done some volunteering and/or an internship, or you feel that you’re ready to take on a challenge and wish to skip those steps, it’s time to look for in-house jobs.
Using Google
You can start your Google search for jobs with a simple search query, for example:
translation + “work for us”
“translation” “work for us”
“translation agency” “careers”
You can also check on each individual job site using their own inbuilt search functions. But wouldn’t it be great if there was a way of pulling a list of jobs from several websites at once?
Luckily…..there is!
Copy and paste the following search strings in Google’s search box:
site:totaljobs.com OR site:monster.co.uk OR site:jobs.guardian.co.uk OR site:londonjobs.co.uk OR site:reed.co.uk intitle:”spanish+translator” + London
site:totaljobs.com OR site:monster.co.uk OR site:jobs.guardian.co.uk OR londonjobs.co.uk OR reed.co.uk inurl: spanish translator
NOTE: make sure you change the bold parts to reflect your city, language, and job-searching websites in your country.
If you are in the UK, here are some websites you can use in the string:
www.iti.org.uk and www.iol.org.uk
www.totaljobs.com
www.toplanguagejobs.co.uk
www.eurolondon.com/foreign-language-jobs.htm
www.multilingualvacancies.com
www.fish4jobs.co.uk
Using Social Media
With recruiters increasingly using Social Media to recruit staff, there are often plenty of opportunities that can be found on social networking sites. When it comes to job searches, LinkedIn and Twitter are probably your best bet.
With over 277 million users, LinkedIn deserves its own guide. 94% of recruiters who use social media use LinkedIn as their preferred platform to find candidates. This means that you simply must be on LinkedIn if you are looking for a job.
- Use advanced search to line up contacts in industries
- Optimise your profile
- Complete it (LinkedIn will inform you of the completion percentage of your profile)
- Write something catchy – while remaining professional
- Ask for recommendations and make sure they are authentic
- Use a professional photograph
- Insert keywords – what would your ideal recruiter search for?
- Translate your profile into your other languages. Again, ensure these are done to a high standard.
Remember to use #hashtags to find the role you are looking for and use it to connect with the influencers and facilitators in your industry.
Applying
Once you have created a list of agencies you would like to approach, don’t spam them. Take the time and go through their websites. Often, they don’t want you to send them an email and prefer you to fill out an online form instead. If you don’t follow instructions on applying for roles, you’ll simply be wasting your time as no one will look at your application.
If you are applying with a cover letter, keep it short and functional. Make sure every word on your cover letter and CV has a reason to be there.
Your cover letter
Keep it short and divide it into four parts:
- Greeting
- Who you are
- The relevant skills that you have
- Why you want to work for them
Remember: The sole purpose of the cover letter is to get people to open your CV. So make it count.
Your CV
The main rules are: make it easy to read, don’t omit important information, and be sure to remove information that is irrelevant to the role or company.
Another resource for a great CV: http://wantwords.co.uk/school/
Ready to go freelance and search for clients?
