I planned to write this post in 3 days time, but I’ve underestimated the power of Twitter again. I’ll start with a background story.
For some time now, apart from translating, I have also been working with some translators (hi!) to help them establish their freelance businesses. It involved working on their branding, marketing and websites. I know this and that on PR and selling, but I had to get a team to deal with websites. I knew quite a lot on that anyway, but I wanted to work with professionals.
My dad, my brother and my uncle all work in the IT. So is my best friend’s father. We’ve been playing with the idea even before I became a translator (it started somewhere in high school), but we never got the right angle and never thought of taking it further. And here it comes: the opportunity was there and we grabbed it. We’ve quickly had a cosy network of dedicated and passionate web people to do websites “from time to time”, whenever any of my dear freelancing friends decides to have one.
It was the most recent project when someone actually asked: “Why don’t we do it for real?” And that’s how I got a company: Websites for Translators (heartily recommended, go and visit the website).
My point here (apart from advertising!) is to prove that just because we are translators, it doesn’t mean that we can’t do anything else. We are talented, and we learn a lot while we translate. If we only want to, we can make use of our long forgotten talents.
Why would you want to do it?
- For money: Just to have another source of income is good enough!
- For others: Can you do something to help a case you support?
- For your development: Do you feel stuck with what you’re doing now? Would a change boost your motivation?
How to do it?
If you would like to start off with something else than what you’re doing now, dig out all your talents and assess them. Decide which of them you would like to use. Then either simply start doing something about that step by step, or find people who are as enthusiastic about the idea as you are and start building a bigger boat with them. Things just start happening then.
Homework
Apart from visiting the website, liking its Facebook page (Websites for Translators) and following it on Twitter (@wwwforxl8), dig your talents out!
Marta Stelmaszak
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2 Comments
Wouldn’t mind working with you guys, actually. Been thinking about adding occasional webdesign to my practice if only to avoid forgetting things through disuse.
You should get in touch with Meg