r * p * h * d * w
where:
r = rate
p = pages per hour
h = hour worked per day
d = days worked per week
w = weeks worked per year

Let's try plugging in some numbers. Say that you charge $30 per page, you translate 2.5 pages per hour, you work 4 hours per day (that's actually optimistic for hours worked in a corporate environment), 5 days per week, and 50 weeks per year. Call this person Average Allie.

Average Allie:
$30 * 2.5 p * 4 h * 5 d * 50 w = $75,000

Now, let's say you charge $40 per page, and translate 2 pages per hour, with time worked the same (Quality Quinton).

Quality Quinton:
$40 * 2 p * 4 h * 5 d * 50 w = $80,000

Now, let's say you charge $30 per page, but translate 3 pages per hour (Fast Frank):

Fast Frank:
$30 * 3 p * 4 h * 5 d * 50 w = $90,000

Curiously, it seems to generally be more lucrative to be fast than expensive.

How about people who work for very low rates ($10/page, or $0.05 word — certainly not unheard of), but work long hours (8 hours/day, no vacations) to make up for it? I'll also assume that they're not very fast (1 page/hour, because those charging the lowest rates are usually the least skilled, and the unskilled are usually slow too). Call this person Poor Peter.

Poor Peter:
$10 * 1 p * 8 h * 5 d * 52 w = $20,800

When people say that it's impossible to make a living as a translator, I think that they must have a scenario like the one above in mind.

To me, it's pretty obvious that the way for people like Poor Peter to improve their incomes is not by working more (increasing the values of h, d, or w), but by becoming better translators, so that they can work faster (increasing p), and charge more (increasing r)

Even more unusually, I'm getting direct clients who ask for very low rates as well. This is rare because when a direct client cuts out the agency, they can already get a good deal by splitting the difference of the agency's markup, and my existing direct clients are very happy to pay me 50% above my agency rates.

My impression is that a lot of translators got spooked in 2009 after not getting any work (one colleague told me she didn't have any work at all for around three months), and out of desperation started taking any work that came along; and now translation buyers are trying to capitalize on this by searching out super-low rates.

Fortunately for me, I have more offers for work than I can handle at my current rates (in fact, I've even raised my rates this year with a couple of clients), but I wonder how long this trend will continue.

Things are tough for lots of people now — the Consumerist reports that 22.5% of Americans are unemployed or under-employed — but I still want to ride out the current Great Recession at my current rates!

When I started translation in the 1990s, old hands would tell me about the "good old days" of Japan's bubble economy, when they'd get 30 yen per word for manual work. The days of those kinds of rates are sadly long gone, but I hope that I won't be talking about my present rates like that 10 years from now.

I've been pretty busy. 2009 was fairly slow. I earned about 10% less than my average, although I also took a lot of time off (about two months total). But right around the beginning of 2010, my work started to pick up, even more than average years. 2010 isn't over yet, but I'm looking to earn as much or more than my average.

I had the opportunity to attend Project Tokyo in September, and I heard a lot of similar stories: 2009 was slow, but 2010 has been very busy. My impression is that a lot of companies sat on their translation work during 2009, but started sending it out in 2010 after their skittishness wore off.

Most of the translators I've talked to about this have been working between Japanese and English. If you work with another language pair, how has 2010 been to you? And if you work between Japanese and English, do my experiences match yours?

Earlier in my career, I tried to stick to the style and terminology of the reference translations as much as possible. I figured that since the client had accepted those translations in the past, that was what it wanted. Even if the translation was very bad, I'd just plug my nose and send that pile off.

That turned out to be a bad idea. If I passed the trial, I would then need to translate 10 or more times the volume of the trial using that same painfully bad style.

After a few years, I started ignoring these "reference" translations, and doing what I thought was the best translation. I might look at references to get a feel for terminology, but I'll also diverge from the terminology in the reference if I think it's wrong.

I figured that even if the client didn't agree with me on translation style, at least this way I could look forward to passing the trial with anticipation instead of dread. I work almost exclusively for Japanese companies, and I've also found that I don't want to work for clients that prefer brain-dead chokuyaku. We're both better off if those types of clients find translators who write English just like in their middle-school English textbooks.

It also turns out to be a lot easier and less stressful to do what you consider to be your best work, rather than second-guessing your translation, wondering if this is what the client wants.

To my surprise, I found that after I took the policy of ignoring reference translations, I started passing a lot more trials. But when I thought about it, it made sense: the client was looking for a new translator because they weren't happy with their current provider. In retrospect, it seems like a pretty bad idea to copy the work of the guys who just got fired.

So, back to the trial from a few weeks ago. The prior translations were very bad, and since I'm knowledgeable about the subject matter (software specifications), I ignored them completely and did what I considered to be a good translation. Fortunately, the client not only liked the trial: they were thrilled with it, and although they were originally planning to place a 10-page job, that has turned into a 30-page job, with a promise of more work to come.

And the best thing is that I can use my own judgment to produce the best translation possible.

They recently contacted me about taking part of a big job, and agreed to my usual rates, so I accepted.

Big, BIG mistake.

Firstly, they sent me the file, saying it was about 3 pages. Then they immediately sent me three other files, saying they were higher priority, so I put the first file on the back burner and did the high-priority ones.

Then I open up the "3-page" file and found that it had a lot more than three pages. I called them in a panic, because the translation was due the next day.

Me: This file has a lot more text than 3 pages. Is this the right file, or do you just need part of it done?

Agency: Whoops, sorry. I left off a "0″ from the count. It's actually 30 pages.

Me: Holy crap, this job is due tomorrow and it's 10 times what you told me. But actually, the file has way more than even 30 pages.

Agency: Well yeah, actually it's 90 pages, but 60 pages worth are repetitions, so we just count the new stuff.

Me: ::boggle:: … Leaving aside how hard it makes it to schedule my time when you give me a word count 30 times lower than actual, I suppose that this means that you don't plan to pay anything for the repetitions that I translate.

Agency: Of course, since it's just a search and replace…

Me ::double boggle:: … Oh and by the way, I notice that you've done some sort of search and replace from your glossary, inserting English words into the middle of the Japanese text (and incidentally corrupting the file due to something wrong with the tool you used). I suppose that you don't plan to pay for the Japanese words that were replaced?

Agency: No, of course not, since we only pay for translation, and those words are already translated for you.

There's no way I'm going to do 90 pages in a day, no matter how much of it is "just search and replace" and helpfully interspersed with horrible translations from a glossary with sometimes comical results, but I agreed to do one third of the job because I made the commitment. But I am truly flabbergasted that a reputable translation agency could think that this is a normal way to deal with translators. Needless to say, this is the last job I will do for this agency.

My friends asked me if I was going to take the call. I pulled out the phone, and saw it was from a translation agency, so I put it on "manner" mode (vibration mode), and said, "No, I just put it on manner mode. Actually, I wish this translation agency would learn some manners."

Then I looked down at the phone, and saw that I had actually taken the call instead of putting it on manner mode, and the agency had heard everything I'd just said. Oops!

I thought about apologizing, but then I thought that what I had said was exactly right, although perhaps not delivered in the best way. So I just hung up and went on with my evening.

When I got back home at around midnight, I checked my email before going to bed. There was a job request from the agency that had called me. I emailed back saying that I could take the job, and within five minutes had a response thanking me. I guess the agency was really desperate to place that job! I think it still doesn't warrant calling someone at 10pm, though.

I very much doubt if the person from that agency reads this blog, but if you do, sorry for the manner remark. But you really shouldn't be calling translators at night. Email is fine any time.

Of course, you always want to do the best possible job on the trial translation or first job; otherwise, you won't get any more work. But there's a line between putting a bit of extra spit and polish on your first couple of jobs, and creating the impression that your top translators will always be handling the client's work when you intended from the start to farm it off to your scrubs.

This is why when you buy translations through an agency, and you don't have access to the translators, you can never be sure of what you're getting. Clients need to check the quality of each translation, and look for downward trends.

Some agency customers appear to be cottoning on to the bait and switch, because lately I've been seeing more of them demand access to their translators. I wrote before about how I recently went with an agency to visit an end client that demanded access to the translator.

Then a couple of weeks ago, I started a contract with another agency whose end client demanded the CV of each translator on the project, and a guarantee that only the translators who team-translated the trial would do the translations for the contract.

The bid probably ended up higher than if the agency planned on swapping in scrubs down the road, but the end client is happy, because it gets the assurance that the same translators who sent in the winning trial are the ones who'll be doing the actual translations.

I think that the more agency-using translation buyers become aware of the old bait and switch, the more they'll demand direct access to translators, or at least guarantees of who'll be doing their translations.

Although my talk was in Japanese, the students emceed the presentation in both English and Japanese, and I was impressed by their English ability.

I spoke for a little over an hour, followed by questions from the students. They also gave me a lovely bouquet of flowers! The kids' questions were really smart, and showed that they're interested in the translation profession. Below are two of their questions, and my answers.

What do you like best about being a translator?

My favorite things about being a translator are probably:

• Freedom: I get to work at home, live in Okinawa, and set my own schedule
• Learning: I'm always learning new things, and get paid to study things that I am interested in

How much money can a translator make?

There is a wide range of income for freelance translators. Some translators can barely earn a living, and need to get side jobs. The very top paid translators can earn over 10,000,000 yen (US $100,000) per year.

The back story

The end client had been burned a couple of times by horrible translations. So they contracted with this new agency, on the condition that they could meet the translator and verify his/her ability. The agency didn't have anyone suitable, so they found me through an introduction. Dealing with a translator directly was out of the question, because the end client has a strict bidding process that requires huge capitalization and credit rating just to bid.

The meeting

I met two nice people from the translation agency, and then we drove down to the client's office together. This was my first time meeting them, so although they had my CV, and we had exchanged emails, they wanted to know some more about me. One of their first questions was, "Do you read kanji?" The end clients would probably want to show us some documents, and if I couldn't read them it might not come off well.

I was flabbergasted. I asked the leader of their team, "Can you be a translator and not be able to read the language you translate?" Apparently, you can: this PM's other native English speaker (NES) is an interpreter who also translates. But she doesn't read Japanese well, and instead has her partner dictate her documents; she then "translates" from the voice recording.

I answered that yes, I could read kanji, and kind of shrugged it off until we got to the meeting. There, when the documentation lead brought out the documents that I was supposed to translate, he asked me the same question: "Can you read kanji?" I bemusedly told him yes, and we went on with our discussion, but it left me thinking. Are native English-speaking translators really so thin on the ground that our very existence is questioned?

The null hypothesis here would be that my spoken Japanese is so bad that they doubted my ability to actually read the language. This can be discarded, however: my spoken Japanese isn't at the native level, but it's good enough for these purposes.

It's possible that these two groups' small sample size allowed skewed results to be magnified. I don't know about the end-client's experience with native English-speaking translators, but as I wrote above, the agency's other NES doesn't read Japanese.

Part of it might also be my looks: I'm a big white guy, and I know that I tend to give off a vibe of being big, strong, and not too bright. People often tell me that they're shocked when I first open my mouth and Japanese comes out. So maybe that helped boost the incredulity factor.

Happy ending

Despite the initial doubts of both the agency and the end client as to my kanji-reading abilities, the meeting went well. I'm now working on an interesting project with good feedback from the client. I'm hoping that I can change some minds about NES translators and their abilities. I kind of feel like I'm trying to prove the existence of Big Foot. Which in my case isn't too far from the truth.

1. Offer to raise rates without being asked

Of course, everybody likes to make more money, but more than that, offering to raise rates without being asked shows that you value the translator's work, and want to build a lasting relationship.

The amount doesn't have to be large, either. One of the main agencies I work with recently offered to raise my rate by 0.875 yen/source character (which works out to about $0.02/translated word). At a time when a lot of agencies are asking translators to lower their rates, this gesture raised my estimation of the agency greatly. Since then, I've taken extra pains to ensure that I'm available for them.

2. Give useful feedback

From the translator's viewpoint, one of the greatest values that an agency can add is feedback. Agencies are presumably proofing and correcting translations before sending them to the end client, and it's very helpful for the translator to see any edits that have been made. This is both to prevent disaster due to the agency's "incorrections," and so the translator can learn and improve. It relieves two sources of translator stress: "Do they hate my translation?" and "Are translation monstrosities being published in my name?"

Giving feedback shows a number of things. It shows that you are interested in producing the best translations possible. It shows that you view your translator as an investment, rather than a resource to be used and discarded. And it shows that you value your translator enough for the minuscule effort that giving feedback requires.

One of the worst things an agency can do is actively hide feedback from the translator. For several years, I translated all the speeches for a certain executive through an agency. I assume the end client liked my work, because they always asked for me specifically. I also never got any negative feedback. It wasn't until about two years after starting, when I saw one of my translations in print, that I realized that they had been changing several of my terms to their in-house preferences. When I asked the agency about this, they told me that they had received the glossary from the client after the first couple of jobs, but were just correcting my translations before sending them off, without telling me.

Agencies, please don't do this. Give your translator the best feedback possible. If you've got a good translator, she'll thank you for it.

3. Give direct access to end clients

This is a big trust issue. Translation agencies guard their client lists jealously, because that's one of their main assets (and I agree that cultivating clients takes a lot of effort). Some agencies also want to shield their clients from the fact that their $100K translation is being done by a motley crew of oddball translators.

But when I can get direct access to the end client through my agency, it shows that they really trust me, both not to steal their clients, and not to create a horrible impression. I've found that after I've visited a client, or even talked with them on the phone, they tend to second guess my translations less. This is probably because it's easier to trust someone's judgment after you've met them.

Speaking directly with a client can also eliminate a lot of miscommunication, because information doesn't get mangled passing through an agency coordinator, who may not know the technology involved.

4. Shield translators from frivolous customer demands

This goes hand in hand with direct access to customers. Customers can be very needy, and good translation agencies shield their translators from this. The agency might compile five or six separate change requests into a single request, or handle trivial requests themselves (like "make the font bluer").

I remember one job in particular, where my translation wound up in the middle of a corporate turf war. Three or four different departments sent back mutually contradicting edits to my translation, many of which were horrible (some of the editors obviously had only the most tenuous grasp of English).

The agency compiled all these corrections into a single edited document, with color coding to show who had changed what. They also held the client to two rounds of these edits, saying that they'd charge for any more. These actions by the agency went a long way toward preserving my sanity on that job.

5. Handle the "annoying extras" themselves

As a translator, I do best when I'm translating. Every non-translation task I need to do is less time I can spend translating, meaning I'm less happy and earning less money. That's why even if I can charge for it, I don't like doing things like creating charts and graphs, laying out images, or handling various formatting tweaks.

Even if you pay translators extra for these things, it's probably not their core competency and they're almost certainly not earning as much as they could doing straight translation.

That's why I love it when agencies take care of these things for me, so that I can concentrate on translating. One agency actually OCR's files they get from the end-client as TIFF images, and sends me pristine Word files to translate. Another agency extracts FrameMaker files into RTF for me to translate.

When these time-wasters are taken care of, I can work for a lower rate and still earn more than when dealing with pesky layout and format issues, and still be happier and saner at the end of the day. To me, it just makes economic sense that you'd pay a cheaper DTP person to handle these things better than the translator can, and let your more expensive translator concentrate on what she does best. I really enjoy working with translation agencies that get this point.