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| User | Thread poster: Oxana Salazar Should I tell my project manager the truth? |
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Sushan Harshe
India
Local time: 12:25
English to Hindi
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| | You spoiled there basic interest in appointing you as proofreader. | Jun 12, 2009 |
It is strange; you are working for an agency, which would be working for someone. If you leave the serious “fracture” in the job, unknown to them, some day they will get a red marked feedback from the client, about the poor quality of the work they did for them and the PM will get fired by the management. In that situation the translator for poor quality and you for poor proof reading; both would be fired and loose the job. What then?
This is a system and you cannot save someone by hiding his or her fault. Your client is paying you because they want there job to be delivered error free, and you spoiled there basic interest in appointing you as proofreader.
Your mercy towards the fellow professional may put the end user in difficult conditions, and most importantly you too!
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KSL Berlin 
Germany
Local time: 07:55
German to English
| | Listen to Susan | Jun 12, 2009 |
In this case I would question the ethics of simply doing the correction - however good - and sending it back with or without comments.
Before I more or less took editing off my list of services offered because I tired of being asked to salvage crap, I would usually look at the document and if it appeared to be especially awful I would notify the PM. Not because I was interested in whatever higher charges might be applied to the job, but also to give the PM the opportunity to resolve the problem in another way. If that way includes correction work by someone with lower standards or someone who is willing to eat the dog pile left by another, that's OK too. The most important thing I think is to communicate clearly to the PM what your estimate of the situation is before any significant time is spent and costs incurred.
The idea of "protecting" incompetence is... well... I'll say "silly" instead of using the curse words that express my feelings on the matter or the long words that describe the legal and business implications of that. I assume that we are indeed talking about *real* errors like information omitted, meanings changed significantly, etc. and not just a preference of phrasing. Give the colleague an opportunity to learn, but first and foremost protect YOUR client! If you feel bad about it, refuse the opportunity to re-translate it yourself to emphasize that you are not interested in scamming work by unjustified criticism of another professional's work. But if your arguments will hold up in court, don't feel guilty about getting out a large axe and taking off a head or two.
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Jocelyne S
France
Local time: 07:55
  Member
French to English
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Others have already made very good points here.
I would just like to add that your credibility is also on the line. Depending on how you are paid for your job (by the hour or by the word), either you or the client is going to have an unpleasant surprise if the translation is bad.
If you charge by the word, you are going to lose time and money fixing up the translator's mistakes. It's in your best interest when proofreading or editing by the word to know that the translator who came before you knew what s/he was doing. (I prefer to charge by the hour, FWIW.)
If you are charging by the hour, your PM is going to realise that the job took longer than anticipated. If you don't tell the PM why, it's you who is likely to look below par.
In any case, I believe that honesty is always the best solution - and that goes for telling a PM that you found a translator's work sub-standard or absolutely impressive! Remember that you are running a business. Some people are very nice, but are unfortunately not very good translators - pretending that this is not true is no good for the profession as a whole.
Best,
Jocelyne
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Ivana Kahle
Croatia
Local time: 07:55
Member (2007)
German to Croatian
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| | Yes you should! | Jun 12, 2009 |
This is how I would do it:
I would do the proofreading as usual and ad a brief comment about the mistakes - or even make a short list of mistakes, divided in the small ones (misspelled words) and the big ones (the words/s used in translation failed to describe the actual content of the source text word/s).
The rest is up to agency.
If you have to correct a lot of mistakes, the agency might send the translation back to the translator to go through it himself/herself, before sending it (again) to the proofreader.
If the quality of the translation is very poor, the proofreader is actually translating, and not just proofreading the text - some agencies expect the proofreaders to let them know if the quality of the translation is so poor that proofreading actually means translating the text again.
No to mention that this particular text is about a person's health.
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Oxana Salazar
United States
Local time: 01:55
English to Russian
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TOPIC STARTER | | I told my PM | Jun 12, 2009 |
Thank you, everyone, for your valuable advice. It was nice to realize that your opinion in the situation I described coincided with mine.
I did tell my PM in the end and she simply reassigned the job to me. I did not want to do my proofreading pointing at all the mistakes in the translation on the way. I informed my PM about the quality of the given me translation right away and redid the whole thing.
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ViktoriaG
Canada
Local time: 01:55
Member (2005)
English to French
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| | The very point of translation | Jun 12, 2009 |
The main, indispensable point of translation is to ensure that a text is understood in the language of those who read it. If the translation fails to faithfully deliver the original message, then there is no point in translating the text.
I believe there is a moral responsibility, often disregarded by many translators, to ensure that the translation is fit for its purpose. So, if you as a translator are being hired and paid to ensure that the intended message is communicated through the translation, then I think you have the moral obligation to tell the client that the translation is not fit for its purpose. This moral obligation overrides the question whether you should tell on a colleague or not. Your client also expects you to be loyal.
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Fabiana Zardo
Brazil
Local time: 04:55
Member (2009)
English to Portuguese
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I think you did well by telling your PM.
About the concern with the translator, I'm sorry, but if your work is bad, you'll lose job. Simple as that, natural selection.
The only thing is that the translator needs a nice feedback. It's not fair to say: Your translation sucks, see you!
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María Eugenia Wachtendorff
Chile
Local time: 03:55
English to Spanish
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| | We are expected to tell | Jun 16, 2009 |
Agencies have translations proofread in order to make sure they are providing quality services.
As a matter of fact, most purchase orders contain instructions for reviewers to grade the translation and/or provide written feedback. Terminology, grammar and overall fluency are their main concerns.
Happy translating, dear all!
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Marlene Blanshay
Canada
Local time: 01:55
Member (2009)
French to English
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| | bad writing etc | Nov 15, 2009 |
I just got a project like that. I don't think my client translated it...it was her client and whoever wrote it, writes badly and then translates badly. Plus they are obviously not an english speaker. So there were some really horrid passages which had me wondering, who writes this dreck!
I thought of maybe asking for the original french document so I could see what the hell they were trying to say. Sometimes, they supply it as reference. Otherwise,I'll just put in comments and highlights with suggested translations and questions. As it is, it's going to take me about an hour longer to decipher some of it. But it's their money.
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Jenny Forbes
United Kingdom
Local time: 06:55
Member (2006)
French to English
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| | It's the proofreader's job to point out mistakes | Nov 15, 2009 |
As all have said, it's quite simple. It's the proofreader's job to point out mistakes - that's what he/she is being paid to do.
Particularly in the case of a serious omission in a medical document, it's essential to point it out. There's no need to to be rude, of course. So I think you did the right thing in telling the PM about the problem.
Jenny
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jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 01:55
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
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| | WHat are the facts? | Nov 15, 2009 |
Oxana Salazar wrote:
It was really important to translate the document (a Doctor's letter) correctly as it was talking about how significant and necessary it was for a client to carry a medicine with her while traveling. The translated letter failed to communicate this vitally important message.
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"the translated letter failed to communicate this vitally important message" can mean that only one sentence was mis-translated. That doesn't justify your statement that the translation was very poor.
If on the other hand, you have to re-write eveything, of course you should tell the PM, because you are doing a translator's job with the proofreader's fee.
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Rudolf Vedo CT
United States
Local time: 00:55
Member (2008)
Croatian to English
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| | Both gravity and number of errors | Nov 15, 2009 |
jyuan_us wrote:
"the translated letter failed to communicate this vitally important message" can mean that only one sentence was mis-translated. That doesn't justify your statement that the translation was very poor. |
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Jyuan -
A single grave error can make a poor translation by itself. One can't just look at the number of errors alone, but must mentally assign each error a point value based on severity. E.g., an error of "oppositeness" (such as omitting a negation in a critical sentence) = major error; obvious typo=minor error. It's the total "points" that matter, not the number of errors.
[Edited at 2009-11-15 19:43 GMT]
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Rudolf Vedo CT
United States
Local time: 00:55
Member (2008)
Croatian to English
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| | Tracked changes speak for themselves | Nov 15, 2009 |
and since they are the normal mode of returning edited files, I rarely bother with comments unless asked, or if I need to justify exceeding my editing norms.
Here's a thought, though - if we feel compelled to comment on any poor translation - even if we think the PM will figure it out anyway - shouldn't we be consistent and also point out those we think are exceptionally good?
I wonder how many of us have ever done that.
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jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 01:55
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
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| | Actually I made my observation based on my experience | Nov 16, 2009 |
Rudolf Vedo CT wrote:
jyuan_us wrote:
"the translated letter failed to communicate this vitally important message" can mean that only one sentence was mis-translated. That doesn't justify your statement that the translation was very poor. |
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Jyuan -
A single grave error can make a poor translation by itself. One can't just look at the number of errors alone, but must mentally assign each error a point value based on severity. E.g., an error of "oppositeness" (such as omitting a negation in a critical sentence) = major error; obvious typo=minor error. It's the total "points" that matter, not the number of errors.
[Edited at 2009-11-15 19:43 GMT] |
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I once reviewed a 2000 word job, which had an "unforgivable" or awful mistake. The guy translated "patent" ,which means "open" in the context, into CHinese as "patient". Many people's immediate respose would be that the translation must be poor in quality. However, overall, the whole piece is by far one of the best translations I had ever reviewed. When the agency asked me to rate the quality, I didn't hesitate but gave him a 5 (on a 1-5 scale, with 5 as the best).
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jyuan_us
United States
Local time: 01:55
Member (2005)
English to Chinese
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Rudolf Vedo CT wrote:
and since they are the normal mode of returning edited files, I rarely bother with comments unless asked, or if I need to justify exceeding my editing norms.
Here's a thought, though - if we feel compelled to comment on any poor translation - even if we think the PM will figure it out anyway - shouldn't we be consistent and also point out those we think are exceptionally good?
I wonder how many of us have ever done that.
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