| Pages in topic: < [1 2] | How to win jobs from ProZ Thread poster: Silvia Barra (X)
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Silvia Barra (X) 
Italy
Local time: 22:27
English to Italian
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TOPIC STARTER | My first ProZ job... | Nov 3, 2008 |
And I just won my first ProZ job, surely thanks to your kind suggestions! Thank you!!!
| | | | | Get that idea out of your head! | Nov 3, 2008 |
Silvia Barra wrote:
I know very well how difficult is living in Italy and more than once I had thought leaving Italy or working as a cleaning lady, it's not a joke!
Congratulations on the success of your project bid; I hope all goes well in its execution.
Once again, if you did in fact learn something in your university studies and you have a good understanding of the sciences, your long-term prospects as a translator are good. They'll get better faster if you drop the starving student mentality and show some confidence in your skills. If you leave Italy for a while to take a job (not a bad idea), then try for one that is appropriate for your education or which in other ways will give you valuable experience that will benefit you as a translator.
| | | | Arnaud HERVE
France
Local time: 22:27
English to French
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| Part-time job | Nov 3, 2008 |
Silvia, I will be harsh but I think it could be helpful. I feel entitled to say this below because I work part-time outside of translation.
You are now in danger of being happy because you get small jobs every now and then on Proz.
Winning one job is like a glass of water in the desert, it feels great, but your doctor can tell you it will not be enough to survive on the long term. What you must do is realize your goals on a year basis. And when I mean goals I mean money... See more Silvia, I will be harsh but I think it could be helpful. I feel entitled to say this below because I work part-time outside of translation.
You are now in danger of being happy because you get small jobs every now and then on Proz.
Winning one job is like a glass of water in the desert, it feels great, but your doctor can tell you it will not be enough to survive on the long term. What you must do is realize your goals on a year basis. And when I mean goals I mean money in your pocket. Not agencies being happy with your work and calling you by your first name.
When I began, I made those two mistakes:
- I hadn't realized what it really is to lose half of my income in taxes. I knew what it was intellectually, but I had not fully realized it in real life. For example, working a whole afternoon knowing I was earning nothing... So, what I can say is it is not enough to earn a little, you must really earn a lot to keep something in the end.
- As a young inexperienced man I had planned my life and expenses as if everything was to be steady. But there are always unexpected expenses in real life: new tyres for your car, a tooth to repair, the computer goes down... I know try to earn at least 500€/month for "unexpected", just in case.
Overall, I think translators in Western Europe, with high taxes and high prices, can survive economically only if they upgrade their services to more demanding and better paid translations. Such as legal, medical, financial...
It turns out it was a good solution for me to accept a part-time job.
[Edited at 2008-11-03 14:29] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | what about the lower membership status`s, does that work too? | Nov 3, 2008 |
Siegfried Armbruster wrote:
Hi Silvia,
it takes patience to get jobs via Proz. I would suggest a 4 step approach:
a) join Proz as a member, this gets you up in the Proz ranking
b) get involved and answer Kudoz questions, this not only gets you up in the Proz ranking, people will also start to regognize you
c) improve your Proz profile, there are various ways how it can be made more appealing
d) increase your rates. You rates are in my opinions much too low for a "serious" translator and others might have the same impression.
Don't forget, the jobs you see on the jobs page are only a fraction of the Jobs that are channeled through Proz. For most jobs, outsources will contact translators directly via Proz or after searching the Proz directory.
Siegfried
and how to make profile appealing, which various ways do you think of? I have some free website presentations? what do you think Sigfried?
mfG
Hubert Germany
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