Job Posting: Assistant Professor of Translation/Spanish

Happy Friday, dear readers! A few days ago, our colleague Adam Wooten sent us this job announcement, and we are happy to share. There aren't that many job openings for full-time tenure-track translation professors in the U.S., and this one is a hybrid, as it's a combined Spanish/translation teaching position. It's at Weber State University in Utah, located north of Salt Lake City.

Please note that we are not involved in the hiring process and cannot answer any questions about the position -- sorry! We are merely posting this job in the hopes that one of our fantastic colleagues is interested in it. Keep us posted if you apply, which you can do here.

A Blind Certified Medical Interpreter's Job Search

More than six years ago, Judy met the unstoppable blind Spanish/English certified medical interpreter Jamey Cook (CMI) and her late seeing eye dog, Abner, at a conference in North Carolina, and a friendship developed. In 2014, Judy wrote a story about Jamey for the ITI Bulletin, which made the cover of the January-February issue (see picture). They've been in touch ever since, and it's been lovely to see that Jamey landed a full-time OPI (over-the-phone interpreting) position a few year ago. Unfortunately, Jamey and her entire OPI department were recently laid off. Now, losing a full-time interpreting position is difficult, especially since there aren't that many in this country, and it's especially difficult for someone like Jamey who has limitations -- which have, of course, barely stopped her. So we thought instead of us posting job openings on our blog, which we frequently do, let's flip this around, profile Jamey and announce it here that she's looking for a job. Our goal is to spread the word about Jamey's job search and hopefully match this talented medical interpreter with an amazing employer. 

Jamey in a nutshell:

• Jamey Cook holds a master's degree in Spanish from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• She's a certified Spanish/English medical interpreter (CMI; certified by the National Board of Certification for Health Care Interpreters). She is one of only a handful blind certified medical interpreters in the country.
• She has more than eight years' experience as a medical interpreter (OPI)
• Jamey resides in North Carolina and is looking for a full-time job from home
• If you are interested in interviewing/hiring Jamey, please either email her at jamey(dot)cook(at)gmail(dot)com or leave a comment and we will put you in touch.

So now it's the interpreter community's turn: is Jamey's dream job out there? Can you help her find it? Let's do this, fellow terps!

Wanted: Presidential Interpreter (German/English)

Judy the White House tourist.

Have you ever wondered what it's like to interpret for the President of the United States, currently Barack Obama? So have we, but we have never gotten anywhere near the White House (other than as tourists). For the record, Dagy has interpreted for two presidents (Austria and Chile), but that's not quite the same as interpreting for POTUS and traveling on Air Force One. Actually, we have no idea if the interpreter would travel on that plane or on another plane, but our imagination is running wild here. A few days ago, we saw a job posting on one of the listservs that we belong to, and it's a job that would put the lucky interpreter at the very top of the international hierarchy of interpreters: full-time German<->English interpreter for POTUS.

There's a pretty detailed description of the job qualifications and requirements here. Please note that the job is open to United States citizens only. Not surprisingly, the candidate must be able to obtain and maintain a Top Security clearance. As you may imagine, we are not involved in this job search at all nor do we have any additional information, but we wanted to share this information with our lovely fellow interpreters. Best of luck and keep us posted if any of you get this highly prestigious job. 

Job Posting (Vietnamese): Las Vegas

While this job is not directly translation-related, it comes from a dear client and it might be of interest either to a beginning translator or a Vietnamese speaker who is looking for a steady entry-level position. Please see the job posting and application information below . Let us know if one of you gets the job!

Image created on Canva.com

Nevada State Government Agency is seeking an Applicant who can speak and read Vietnamese for the position of:

Administrative Analyst I

Education/Experience: High school diploma or equivalent and 2 years of office experience.

Knowledge: General knowledge basic computer functions and Microsoft Office, spreadsheet software, and general office operations. 

Abilities: Ability to speak and read Vietnamese and English. Ability to multi-task; meet deadlines, prioritize and organize work and handle frequent interruptions and effectively compose business correspondences and reports. 

Duties: Assisting in administrative/office work, perform data-entry functions, communicate through email and phone, assist customers, and additional tasks as needed.

Employment Status: Temporary with possibility for full-time employment for the right candidate with Nevada State Government Agency.

Anticipated Start Date: TBD

Salary: Based on education and experience.

Location: Las Vegas

How to Apply: Email: ahigginbotham@nvcosmobd.nv.gov

Jobs: Language Specialist at Netflix

Source: www.netflix.com

Just in time for the weekend, we wanted to share a job posting that a friend recently sent to us. We have no other information about this particular job nor are we getting paid to post it, but Netflix sure does sound like a great company to work for. The job is located in Silicon Valley. 

We are copying and pasting from the company website's posting here:

Language Specialist

Los Gatos, California

Join the team responsible for localization at Netflix. We are looking for experienced linguists with the ability to translate
 and customize marketing, UI and content materials for the target market.

We are looking for highly motivated individuals with the right mix of technical, organizational and communication
skills to provide localization for the Netflix experience in the following languages: Arabic, Vietnamese, Japanese,
Korean, Polish, Spanish, and Hungarian. 

Native fluency, localization experience and creative writing in one or more of the above languages are essential.
Knowledge or prior experience in the film/entertainment industry is definitely a plus.

Specific responsibilities will include:

- Ownership of linguistic quality

- Creating and maintaining glossaries and style guides

- Working with CAT tools, approving translations and maintaining memories

- Working with external vendors 

- Representing linguistic and cultural nuances in cross-functional meetings

- Hands-on translation and editing tasks

- Planning and executing linguistic QA tasks on multiple devices and platforms

- Originating, monitoring and resolving linguistic bugs as necessary

Required Experience/Skills:

- Degree in Applied Linguistics, Translation and/or equivalent experience

- Native fluency in one of the languages mentioned above

- Knowledge of the movie/entertainment industry in the specific locale

- Mac and PC proficient

- Experience with translation & terminology tools 

- Basic knowledge of Content Management Systems and web localization tools

Have a look at this link to apply. Looks like the company has made it very easy to apply online, as you can apply via LinkedIn. We like!

Job Posting: Full-Time Localization Specialists

As most readers know, full-time in-house positions in our industry are quite rare. Judy is one of the dying breed of translators who actually had an in-house position for many years, but prefers to work for herself. 

However, there is much to say for the stability and regular income of an in-house position, and these jobs can also really help hone your translation skills, as you can really focus on translation without having to spend time on other things (marketing, accounting, etc.). That said, there were a lot of meetings that Judy used to have to go to, and not all were productive. But we digress. One of the challenges with the requirements for these positions is that employers mostly want highly experienced linguists, and chances are that these highly experienced linguists already work for themselves (statistically and anecdotally). And it's pretty darn hard to convince established self-employed linguists to go to an office every day and sit in a cubicle, even if the job is very cool. Which leaves the less experienced linguists, who tend to be younger and more interested in a steady job so they can start building their careers. But of course they don't tend to have much experience, creating quite a dilemma. There's no easy solution to this, but this is an issue that Judy ran into frequently when trying to recruit linguists with experience for her in-house team years ago: she just couldn't get experienced people to apply. Now, on to the job posting, we promise!

We just saw these positions announced on one of the listservs of the American Translator Association, where a lovely colleague posted it for all to see. We wanted to share it with all readers here, but want to emphasize that we do not know the company nor do we have any additional information.

There are several jobs for localization specialists, and they are all located in Bellevue, Washington (gorgeous Seattle, basically). Motiga is a company that produced games, which sounds quite fun to us, even though the only game we were ever allowed to play as kids was Pacman at the arcade.

Localization Specialist, German

Localization Specialist, Spanish

Localization Specialist, French

We had a look at Motiga's website and got the impression that it would be a great place to work, but as we said, we don't know anyone there (nor is anyone paying us to post this). For further information, please click on the link above. Best of luck! We'd love to hear if one of our readers gets one of these positions.

Getting Conference Interpreting Work

A few days ago, we received a message from a lovely colleague here in the US who is also a fellow legal interpreter. However, he is under the (correct) impression that conference interpreting is a more glamorous field, and asked us how to get into conference interpreting. As is so often the case, the answer is a bit long, so we thought we'd answer his very good question here for the benefit of all readers. For ease of reading, we will list our (useful) advice in bullet-style format. Please note that this advice is based on the US market for conference interpreting, as our colleague resides here.

First things first. Let's talk logistics and details:

 We have never met an interpreter who doesn't love conference interpreting work. It's (sometimes) glamorous, exciting, and a nice change of pace for medical and legal interpreters. We do know quite a few full-time conference interpreters who are not medical/legal interpreters as well, but they are mostly in Europe and tend to work with the European Union. Here in the US, we know few freelancers who can make a living just doing conference interpreting work, but there certainly exceptions (in-house at the State Department, United Nations, etc.)

Getting conference interpreting assignments can be hard. They require a lot of legwork. Don't expect to get a conference interpreting assignment every week as a freelancer in the US. We know very few people who get that many assignments. And every interpreter we know would like to have more conference interpreting assignments, including us.

You don't get paid to prepare for the assignment, and you need to factor that into your price quote. You thus shouldn't accept to interpret at the annual meeting of the American Association of Ventriloquists unless you know something about the field. 

Conference interpreting is limited to mostly larger cities. Not all conferences are large and not all conferences happen in Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Chicago or Las Vegas, but as a general rule, you have a better shot at being a conference interpreter if you live in a larger city. Most conference organizers are usually not willing to fly in interpreters from Boise to Omaha when there are perfectly good interpreters in Omaha, which makes sense.

Conferences are planned a long time out -- we know because one of us lives in the conference capital of America, Las Vegas. That said, we have yet to encounter one single hotel in Las Vegas that has permanent interpreting booths installed and most hotels rarely work with booths and equipment, so it's oftentimes a struggle to get this all organized. And yes, we've shown up to events with no booths at all. That's not the case in most of Europe, where even small hotels will have conference facilities with interpreter capabilities, which is nice.

Now, how do you get these assignments? Let's start with a few basics.

• Many conference interpreting assignments come through agencies. We don't work with agencies at all on the translation side, but will take occasional conference interpreting assignments if the terms work for us. The good part here is that these LSPs are relatively easy to find, and you can contact those in your area who specialize in conference interpreting. Perhaps you can take the project manager to lunch and let him/her know that you are really interested after you pass the initial screening and traditional CV review.
• Other conference interpreting assignments come from tourism bureaus, convention centers, individual hotels, and destination management companies. Market your services to them. Get out in the community and talk to the decision-makers.
• Team  up with a good equipment provider who can take care of the A/V and all the equipment so you can recommend someone you trust to the client. It's usually best to let the client deal directly with the equipment vendor, unless you want to act as project manager/agency.
• Find a top-notch booth partner. Conference interpreters always work in pairs, so nothing is more essential than a superstar booth partner. You might have to kiss a few frogs before you find your ideal partner. Remember that you will be sharing a small space for extended periods of time, so make sure you choose wisely.
• Request documents ahead of time. Many conference organizers struggle to get the presenter's PowerPoints or even the outline, but trust us: you do need some material to prepare properly. If nothing can be found, you should still spend several hours compiling vocabulary based on the client's website and general company information that's available to the public. We usually include a disclaimer in our price quotes that we cannot guarantee our usual quality if we do not receive pertinent materials XYZ days before the event. Sometimes we still don't get any materials, but the show must go on.
• Finally, the best way to get conference interpreting clients is to do a great job at any interpreting you do in any field and to let clients know what you are also interested in conference interpreting assignments. Get the word out.

This brief list is not meant to be exhaustive by any stretch of the imagination. We merely wanted to get the conversation started and would love to hear from conference interpreter colleagues (and anyone else!). Please do share what you know by leaving a comment below. Happy conference interpreting!

European Union Looking for Translators

Happy Friday, dear readers! Today's quick post is to let you know about an employment opportunity with the European Union that just landed in our inbox. The mighty European Union, the largest employer of interpreters and translators on the planet, is looking for German, Spanish, Greek and Swedish translators. From the posting, it's  not entirely clear to us if these positions are in-house in Brussels or if they are freelance positions, but surely the European Union will be able to answer all your questions. Please have a look at the following link for more information and to apply.  

While Dagy is an accredited freelancer conference interpreter with the European Union, we don't have any first-hand knowledge of the selection process for translators, but we'd love it if colleagues who translate for the EU would be willing to share their experiences by leaving a comment. 

Best of luck and keep us posted!

Job Posting: Senior Power Systems Strategist

If you have ICS engineering credentials, you're not already in Idaho, and you want a change, can you picture yourself in Idaho? Or maybe you know someone qualified, and would be happier if they were in Idaho?

Either way, there's an opening at Idaho National Labs (INL) and if you could help fill it, one way or another, I'll be happy to give you contact information and mail you the full position description upon request.

Photo credit: VisitIdaho.org