Vacancies for translators without work experience – where to find them? Tips for a novice freelance translator How to start working as a novice translator

At the beginning of its professional activity Every freelance translator faces various problems. Some recommendations and advice for novice translators can help in mastering this type of activity.

The principle of achieving success in work is efficiency, which has its own specific characteristics.

Knowledge of any foreign language.
Perfect knowledge of the native language.
Knowledge of the subject of translation.

It is important for the translator to understand how much text he is ready to translate for a certain time unit, which is then valued in currency and shows the profitability of the translator’s work for himself.

If a freelance translator does not have a diploma, for example in financial or legal translation, he may set himself the goal of obtaining such a diploma or improving his language skills in the various areas in which he will be translating. A bunch of professional translators working without a diploma, being only native speakers. Only the quality of the work performed matters.

Where can I look for a job as a translator?

Many experienced translators advise starting your search with a translation agency. You should not take a passive position by posting your resume on job search sites; send it directly to a translation agency in your city; usually they are willing to cooperate with novice specialists.
If you want to deal with direct customers, pay attention to freelance exchanges. Particular attention should be paid to specialized services, such as the open translator exchange http://perevodchik.me/ and http://tranzilla.ru/. These exchanges stand out in that they allow you to post your open contact information and receive orders directly, without overpaying intermediaries.

Important tips that can be given to a beginning freelance translator are:

Improving language skills and acquiring new knowledge. If you follow these tips, you won't have any problems when doing translation work as a freelancer.
Thinking outside the box to find clients who need the knowledge of a freelance translator. There are always customers, but finding them requires effort.
You cannot accept an order if it is too difficult to complete. All professionalism consists in refusing a proposed order if there is no translation experience in the proposed field. Honesty with the client is more valuable than an order taken and not fulfilled. The approach shows the translator’s awareness of his capabilities, which will promote trust in him on the part of customers.
Discussion of emerging issues that will present the freelance translator as a scrupulous and thorough person who can be entrusted with the work. A professional translator does not guess the client’s wishes, but identifies possible difficulties and problems in the translation and solves them together with the client.
By doing specialized translations, especially those affecting the legal and medical spheres, the freelance translator must reproduce the author’s approach to the original text being processed. The task is not to literally reproduce the translation, but to convey the meaning of the text.
The translator must remember that when working as a freelancer, he cannot use the help of a proofreader or editor, so he evaluates the style and grammar independently.

A freelance translator must remember that market principles operate in the modern translation industry. Exclusivity and quality of translation services will be in greater demand. Today there are much fewer good, competent translators than it seems. At the beginning of his work, a translator must remember that excellent prospects open up before him in the future.

Many people who started doing this kind of work earlier and have already received useful experience, are ready to help a translator starting his career, as well as to warn him against many mistakes during his work.

If you know any foreign language, then you can easily earn money from home by translating. But first you need to learn how to become a freelance translator and reach your first customers.

If you start your journey incorrectly, then there is a high probability that you will soon quit this business. No orders - no money. I will show you the shortest and most profitable path from my personal experience.

And let's start with this question - what kind of knowledge and skills should a person have in order to work as a freelance translator?

Who can become a freelance translator?

What I will tell you here is in many respects at odds with the “generally accepted opinion.” But I have experience working as a translator and managing my own translation agency. That is, I studied this issue from both sides. So you can trust me =)

And here is the first interesting thought. People often think that to work as a translator you simply need to know a foreign language very well. That is, this requirement is always “by default”. But actually it is not.

The fact is that language is a very multifaceted thing. If you can, for example, speak English well English language– does this mean that you will good translator? Not at all. So-called “bilinguals” (these are people who have two native languages, for example English and Russian) often come to us for work, but they are completely unable to translate.

Translation and knowledge of a language are two completely different things. If you, a Russian person, are now given a description of some industrial chemical processes, you will not understand a word of it. Although everything will be written in Russian.

On the other hand, if you give the same document to a specialist in industrial chemical processes, he will understand everything that is described there without words, using only pictures and formulas.

Therefore, I have always argued and continue to argue that in order to be a good translator, it is not necessary to know a foreign language very well. But you must have a good understanding of the topic you are translating on.

Do I need to have a higher education in translation?

And here’s a second “interesting thought” to follow you up. In fact, a higher education in translation only hinders one from translating. Yes, that's exactly how it goes. If you are a philologist or linguist by training, or even a techie, you have a much better chance of becoming a highly paid translator than a graduate of the translation department.

Do you know why this happens? This is pure psychology. Imagine a person who spent five years learning to translate. And he thinks that he’s already learned how to translate. With his diploma he comes to potential customer- and there they tell him that all his knowledge is worthless.

And that they won’t pay him a lot of money. And they will pay the smallest penny so that he does not die of hunger until he learns to translate for real.

Imagine the disappointment and anger of such a person. Naturally, he decides that no one simply needs translators today. And he leaves to teach foreign languages or do tutoring.

But another person, a graduate of the Faculty of Philology, also wants to translate. And they also tell him that he doesn’t know how to do anything, and that they won’t pay him much. And the man... agrees. Because he himself knows that he doesn’t know how to do anything special yet. And he begins to study, and over time becomes a very good translator with excellent earnings.

Therefore, if you do not have a translation education, rejoice. You are more likely to succeed in this field.

What if there is no niche knowledge?

At the beginning of the article, I said that it is not necessary to know the language very well, but it is necessary to understand the topic. So what should you do if you don’t know much about any topic? You are not a doctor, not a chemist, not an engineer. Maybe I should go get additional higher education?

In fact, you need to study. But I strongly recommend that you conduct training in combat. That is, start translating on some topic, and after 2-10 orders, you will begin to understand it very well.

Yes, first sit with dictionaries and the Internet, but then you will see that the terms are the same everywhere, and the constructions and sentences are the same. And you will begin to translate literally “with your eyes closed.”

Agree, this is more fun than sitting at a desk for three more years and taking some exams.

Moreover, you don’t fully know which topic you will like - medicine or technology, or law? Get everything higher education– too time-consuming. So use initial period of his work as a freelance translator in order to decide on his niche.

And by the way, let’s take a step-by-step look at how to get your first order and become a freelance translator.

Where to find your first customers?

A translator has three main types of clients. The first is customers from various translation exchanges. The second is a translation agency. And the third is direct customers (firms, companies).

Most translators prefer to work through exchanges. This is the simplest, but least profitable option. Customers come to exchanges to find the cheapest translators.

Of course, exchanges are different. For example, the international exchange ProZ will allow you to reach foreign translation customers. But by this point you should already have a very good track record.

Russian translator exchanges are basically a haven for yesterday's students who have absolutely nowhere to go with their English.

I strongly recommend that you start working with a translation agency. There you will be paid more, and there you will receive a steady flow of orders. The customer came to the exchange once and left. And translation agencies will send you new texts every day.

Most likely, you won’t be able to start working with direct customers right away. Because you have to register there entity, do marketing, sales, and much more. You will spend all your time just doing this. So there will be absolutely no time to transfer and earn money.

Therefore, the “editor's choice” is a translation agency. But there is another difficulty with them.

How to get a job in a translation agency

Translation agencies are very distrustful of new translators. In order to at least somehow protect themselves from newcomers, they put on their websites the requirements of “1-3 years of experience as a translator.”

If you just send them your resume and test translations, they most likely won’t even respond to you. First, your resume must be written correctly. Download our.

Secondly, you don’t have to believe everything that is written on the websites of translation agencies. In fact, they will agree to work with you even if you have no experience at all. You just need to approach this matter correctly.

I wrote more about this in the article (opens in a new tab).

In short, translation agencies may risk contacting you with an order if they have absolutely no other options. All full-time and proven freelance translators are busy, but a new order has arrived and there is no one to translate.

And then they start trying new translators. If you have one, then there is a high probability that they will turn to you.

And this will be your first step on the path to wealth and fame.

By the way, what kind of “wealth” can a beginning freelance translator count on?

How much can you earn from translations?

Here I have two news for you - one is bad and the other is good. The bad thing is that no one will pay you much. When novice translators find out the rates at which they are offered to work, their eyes often pop out of their heads in amazement.

How so?! Only 120 – 150 rubles per translation page? Yes, this is hellish work - sitting and poking around in dictionaries, studying new topic, look for materials. Why do they pay so little for this?

In fact, not every translation agency will pay you 120–150 rubles. Somewhere they will pay much lower. In addition, the “hardness” of work is most often explained by the fact that the translator simply does not know how to work.

If this is his first page of translation in life, it will seem to him that it is simply incredibly difficult. He will translate 2-3 pages in a day and fall unconscious from exhaustion. But with experience it turns out that everything is not so bad. An experienced translator can translate 10–20 pages a day without strain (especially if it is an order for “his” topic).

As a result, the income of such a translator will reach six figures per month. Considering that he will work from home, in comfortable conditions, without bosses and getting up at 7 o’clock in the morning, this is very good.

To roughly estimate what you can expect in terms of money, use ours (opens in a new tab). It will show you quite accurately how much you can earn and under what circumstances.

Yes, I forgot to mention the good news. If a translation agency loves you, they will be willing to pay you much more than their other translators. Sometimes even much more. But how to evoke this very love?

What will they be willing to pay you for 2 times more than others?

What do you think the customer is generally willing to pay for? By the way, this is the third and final paradoxical thought in this article.

Most translators will say that the customer is willing to pay “for quality”. And of course they will be wrong. The fact is that the “quality” of translation is an even more multifaceted concept than the “level of knowledge of a foreign language.”

I often give this example. Company X needs to clear the cargo through customs. And to do this, they need to provide a translation of the packing list for this cargo by 12 o’clock. The most important thing that should be in the translation is all the numbers and dates. If there is no agreement in paste perfect, no big deal. Nobody will even notice it. But if only one number is missing, the cargo is wrapped.

Therefore, from the customer’s point of view, a high-quality translation in this case is a translation that is done quickly, and all the numbers are in place. For such a translation (even with grammatical errors) - he will kiss you, quickly transfer the payment, and then continue to contact only you.

But if everything is perfect from the point of view of translation, but the translation itself was ready only at 13 o’clock, and the cargo went back to mysterious China... Then you are in big trouble. And no paste perfect will help you.

So here it is. The most important thing that customers are willing to pay for is responsibility. I will never get tired of repeating this. If you take a translation and complete it by the specified deadline, they love you. If you don’t refuse work and don’t disappear from the sight of the translation agency for weeks, they love you.

It is very difficult to find such a translator. And they will be afraid of losing you. And therefore, when you ask to increase your rate per page “a little”, they will agree. And with these “little bits” you will very soon earn much more than other translators. Therefore, develop responsibility in yourself. They pay for it.

Conclusion

I hope now it’s clearer to you how to become a freelance translator, and how to generally approach this matter in order to start earning money quickly and a lot.

If you want to quickly improve all the skills that are needed to be a real translator (including that same responsibility and discipline), sign up for our course.

There you will learn all the secrets and tricks that will allow you to quickly join the ranks of elite translators. And this is a completely different level of life.

See you later!

Yours Dmitry Novoselov

Six tips from MSLU teacher, former translator of USSR leaders Andrei Chuzhakin on how to become a high-class translator

Without knowledge of the Russian language you will not become a good translator

The translator must have excellent command of a foreign language. But first of all, he must perfectly know his native language - Russian. First, reading classical literature will help here. In particular, such masters as A.S. Pushkina, A.P. Chekhova, L.N. Tolstoy and many others.

In addition to the classics, it is necessary to read newspapers and magazines, going so far as to study in detail the annotations for medicines and instructions for household appliances. This will help you be fluent in different styles of language: journalistic, official business or scientific. When translating into your native language, you do not have to reinvent the wheel; you will have the necessary supply of standard phrases and expressions that are used to describe the same medicine or airplane. Also, watch your speech living conditions, think about what you want to say, construct your sentences correctly. As a result, you will bring your speech skills and abilities to automaticity, you will speak correctly always and everywhere.

Be erudite

With proper persistence, anyone can learn to speak a foreign language. But if you do not have knowledge of geography, history and, for example, politics, it is impossible to become a good translator. It is very difficult to translate a speaker's speech if you do not know the subject of the conversation. You will be aware of events if you watch the news every day and read analytical publications in the media, both in your native language and in a foreign language. Nowadays both the Internet and satellite television help with this. If you make any mistakes when translating into English or it is difficult for you to find an exact analogue in Russian when translating English proverb, it's forgivable. But if you have a vague idea of where Vietnam is and don’t know its capital, then this is serious. If you do not know who the Prime Minister of, for example, Canada is, there can be no talk of any transfer at the highest level.

Read the works of the ancient Greeks and the Bible

Knowing how it is customary to greet each other in a particular country or how one should behave at the table, that is, knowledge of etiquette, is prerequisite for the translator. And yet, it is necessary to study the history of Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece, read works of that time, such as Homer’s Iliad. It is imperative to know the Bible. In high-level negotiations, it is very common to translate quotations from the Bible and Latin proverbs. Knowing them, firstly, will help you immediately figure out which expression is used and from which plot. Secondly, all this has been translated a long time ago, and you will be able to use forms in your speech that are known to everyone. At the same time, you definitely won’t look funny.

Practice your written translation

Many countries have their own forms of writing not only documents, but even letters, and not only business ones. You should definitely know all these cliches. In France, for example, if a doctor refers a patient to another doctor, he writes to his colleague that it was a pleasure to work with the patient and he wishes his colleague the same. Little things like this you should know. Therefore, you just need to sit down at your desk and draw up various documents, certificates and letters in the form of the countries whose language you speak. After drawing up the documents, they need to be checked in all sources that are available to you, first of all, of course, in educational literature, for example, in spelling dictionaries and other manuals.

Watch your appearance

Often when translating you will have to come into very close contact with people. Therefore, in addition to daily personal hygiene, you should pay Special attention oral cavity, in particular fresh breath. In this situation, we are not talking about the need to brush your teeth. You should also take care of your mouth throughout the day. Various breath freshening products can help you here. In addition, you should always have well-groomed hands and hair. Men, by definition, cannot have too long hair. Your clothing should be in neutral colors and you should not draw more attention to yourself than the person you are interpreting. This point especially applies to women. No cleavage. A formal suit, blouse and soft makeup - this is what a female translator looks like. Remember, high-level meetings involve eye contact between leaders, whether politicians or businessmen. You should help negotiate, and not take the fire yourself.

Learn cursive writing techniques

Remember, a translator not only translates from a native language into a foreign language, but also vice versa. He writes down everything the guest says. This is necessary so that after the negotiations, with the help of an interpreter, a picture of the negotiations can be drawn and analyzed. In this case, cursive writing helps the translator. You can develop your own cursive writing system, the main thing is that it helps you quickly write down and then just as quickly transcribe your notes. One sure way is to write down key nouns. They will help you quickly remember not only specific words and expressions of guests, but even their facial expressions.

Summary

Andrey Chuzhakin, Translator
Born on September 1, 1949 in Moscow.
Education: Moscow State Pedagogical Institute named after. M. Toreza, translator-referent (English and Portuguese), Academy of Social Sciences under the CPSU Central Committee.
He worked in the international department of the CPSU Central Committee, focusing on developing countries in Africa. Founder of the “applied theory of interpreting and translation cursive writing.” Author of the “World of Translation” series and other textbooks.
Teacher at Moscow State Linguistic University, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor at Moscow State Linguistic University, Faculty of Translation.

Highly paid work from home on the Internet is also available for polyglots and simply for those who, in addition to their native language, speak at least one more. Working on the Internet as a foreign translator is more highly paid and in demand compared to the work of a copywriter, however, in this regard, it is also more responsible, requiring confident knowledge and skills.

Where to start working as an online translator?

As a rule, all remote specialists can be divided into two types:

1. freelancers working through exchanges;

2. freelance specialists.

Freelancers look for clients on their own, acting at the same time as both a specialist in translation work at home and a manager who decides when and with whom to work. Communication with your customer often occurs at the director level. Freelance specialists mainly work as translators for publishing agencies and translation agencies according to the scheme: received an order, completed it, received a new one. As a rule, such workers’ pay is significantly lower than that of their fellow freelancers, and communication with the customer here takes place at the employer-employee level. However, such specialists do not need to constantly worry about regularly searching for a new client and whether tomorrow there will be work to translate texts, and this, undoubtedly, is an advantage of this type of cooperation on the Internet.

Necessary skills to work as a remote translator

Work on the Internet is most in demand for the translation of German and English texts, as statistics show. But it won’t be special labor find well-paid jobs on the Internet for freelancers who speak Spanish, French, Turkish, Finnish, Polish and Italian. Competent translation of texts into these languages is sometimes even more highly paid due to the difficulty of finding an appropriate specialist on the RuNet, while almost every schoolchild in the post-Soviet space studies English.

Quite often, on exchanges for translators, when registering new users and before allowing them to complete tasks, the administration asks to fill out a special form indicating work experience and attach a scanned copy of a diploma of relevant education and a resume. It is also not new for new users to perform test task for translation.

Current and verified exchanges for making money as a remote translator

If you experienced specialist, confident in his competence and aspiring to high paying job translator at home, you can immediately start looking for the use of your abilities on the Internet in one of the large translation agencies, among which we can recommend the following:

perevedem.ru;
vacancy-perevod.ru.

After mastering some skills of working on translation of texts on these exchanges and filling out your own portfolio, you You can confidently begin searching for a more affluent customer. The work requirements for the above projects are basically the same: you will be asked to provide a diploma, portfolio, recommendations with previous places work (if any). If you are suitable, you will be hired with probationary period, upon completion of which you will be among the remote translators agencies. The average cost for translating texts at home for technical content here is $12 per 1000 characters, and for literary content – $3.5.

Separately, I would like to highlight the Littera.ru agency, which has non-rigid employee selection measures: to work from home, you do not need a diploma or other formalities, just download a trial task, properly complete the translation, send it for verification, and that’s it - you’re accepted. The only caveat that is immediately mentioned this agency– small payment. So, if you don’t have a diploma yet, but you confidently speak a foreign language, welcome to Littera.ru, where a job as a text translator is always waiting for you.

In addition to specialized agencies, you can work online at home to translate various texts on freelance exchanges. The Copylancer.ru and FreelanceJob.ru exchanges are considered the best and most proven among such projects for making money on translations. Earned funds are withdrawn here regularly via Contact or Webmoney. For newcomers to translation work, we can recommend such projects for making money as Weblancer, Free-Lance. Here, responsible and talented beginner performers earn about $200 a month from home. Also good for new translators are such multifunctional projects as Etxt.ru, TextSale.ru, Advego.ru.

The profession of a translator and everything related to the work of a professional translator - my two websites are entirely dedicated to this:

Translation-Blog.ru What types and genres of translation exist. Glossary of translation terms. Review of useful Internet resources for translators
website- How the translator translates. Theory and practice of translation

In doing so, I relied on my own almost 40 years of experience in oral and translation. I hope that the information contained on these two sites will be useful primarily to beginning translators and those who are just planning to study to become a translator.

In forums and on translation portals, novice translators often ask questions about the profession of a translator, often having a rather vague idea of the profession of a translator, the nature of translation work and the qualities that a professional translator must have in order to successfully engage in translation, receiving from this not only moral satisfaction, but also ensuring financial stability.

Yuri Novikov

What qualities should a translator have?

Everything will depend on what specific type of translation you choose for yourself and how intensively you will engage in it.

But there are qualities that are very useful to any translator:

Good memory

Wide erudition

High literacy in native and foreign languages

Flexibility in relationships with customers and fellow translators

Clarity and Commitment

High efficiency and hard work

Willingness to constantly maintain and improve your language translation skills

Willingness to learn new things subject areas and types of translation, if required by the situation on the translation market

Mobility (for an interpreter), that is, readiness (especially while young) for constant travel and flights both within the country and abroad

What qualities and professional skills does a translator need?
(on the Translation-Blog website)

How to become a translator?

To begin with, of course, there must be a desire and ability for languages.

Learn a language to a professional level

Learn to translate (at a specialized university, on courses or independently - that is, by doing practical translations).

Not all professional translators have a language education. Probably no more than half or two thirds. Of those who graduate from language universities, only a few become professional translators.

At the same time, many of the practicing translators have never studied translation theory and, at best, have only heard about it at some short-term courses or translation seminars.

Translation is a profession where the final result is important, and not a piece of paper about completed courses or a successfully passed exam.

If you work hard at language and translation, you can almost always achieve a good translation level over time (“Learning by Doing”).

For a translator to be “established”, you need about 10 years of experience. And then there is development in breadth. Therefore, it is very important in these first 10 years to decide exactly what types of translation to engage in and from which languages to translate. By the age of 35, you need to make a professional decision.

Although it often happens that working as a translator becomes only the first step in a career, a kind of passing stage. And then the person goes into business, finance or some other field of activity. Sometimes related to language (in which case good knowledge of a foreign language will be a good help). But it's not at all necessary.

Yuri Novikov

What translations are best?

Nowadays, most novice translators certainly want to immediately become simultaneous interpreters, having heard that they are supposedly paid some incredibly big money. But at the same time, few people think that not everyone can become a synchronized swimmer.

Simultaneous translation is one of the most difficult types of translation. An excellent knowledge of the language and the basics of translation theory is not enough for this. Before becoming a synchronized interpreter and interpreting in the booth at conferences, you must first achieve a high level of non-simultaneous interpretation and maximally expand your vocabulary of general and general technical vocabulary. Some people, after their first experiences with simultaneous interpreting, develop problems with pressure - and the dream of simultaneous interpreting has to be abandoned forever.

Therefore, choose those types of translation that are within your capabilities and where you will feel comfortable. You shouldn’t immediately start with translation extreme.

Yuri Novikov

All about simultaneous translation - on the Translation-Blog website

How much do translators get paid?

If your only goal is to “earn money,” then you probably shouldn’t become a translator. Translation work does not guarantee a high level of income.

Then it’s better to immediately go into business, the banking sector, or promote some of your brilliant ideas.

Highly qualified professional translators have a good level of income. But it’s still hard work every day. For example, a project manager with knowledge of the language is usually a less dusty job.