 Hello there, I'm So I'm back again from another meeting and in my suit and so I decided to do another video I don't know why I do that actually I actually I kind of do I fit I felt bad usually because I'm if I'm working from home and just in a t-shirt or whatever and I'm doing these videos and I Feel like I should look a bit better for you guys, but so now you get me in a suit again. Anyway, I Today though, I want to talk to you about something else Something that's been going on with me and and that I wanted to share with you And I know I've had this request a couple times before and so I thought it might be interesting to get into it as some of You know I my background is as a translator Italian to English translator But what I've have been doing more so recently is kind of trying to expand from that and become more of an agency and More of a project manager where I work with other translators for an end client and I'm able to offer all that and so you know along those lines I do have an agency and And that's what I've been trying to do and trying to build it up I don't talk about that much because I feel a lot more insecure about it because I'm still figuring it out as I go along and So I don't want to you know start giving out advice and find out that it's wrong or that I have no clue What I'm talking about or you know, this that and the other but I also thought that maybe It will be interesting to do. Maybe it'll be interesting to share My journey along you know as I go along with you and to share things that I learned as I learned them Even at the risk of maybe them being wrong At least you can see my thought process and and what I go through because I know I imagine quite a few of you or I know quite a few of you Are getting into freelance saying freelance translation well for very various different reasons Some of you want to do it because you want to be location-dependent and you want to be able to work from home Or maybe you want to be able to spend more time with family or something along those lines but you know other ones like me maybe at some point will be thinking we'll wait is there any way I can expand this and you know, maybe try to do a little bit more and And yeah, you know so for what happened for me was I got contacted by you know long-term client and they said Okay, can you do this translation? I do Italian to English and they asked okay Can you do this? We need this translated into German and French as well? I think and you know Is there any way you can do this and I know other translators in different languages and so I was like yeah I could probably do that and they're like, okay Look, can you figure it all out and we'll just pay you and do it through you So I was like, okay And so I contacted these other translators and I got a price quote from them and so then I quoted my price and so yeah Actually, I had been asked to do this once before and I and I quoted the price to the client and then lost money on it so this time I made sure there was enough of a margin to make sure I didn't lose money and Anyway, you know got it got it done I paid these these people and then and and then got paid by the client in the meantime I got back some translations in French and German and I got really paranoid about Are these done correctly? Are they not done correctly? Why is this like that? But at other places I see this that and you know this that and the other I think I bothered those translators with so many questions. I'm surprised. They still work with me I mean, I still work with them and and it seems fine but I felt really bad because you know, I was just really insecure really paranoid about everything that could go wrong and So I just wanted to now talk about What I think you should do if you're just starting out with this if maybe you're a freelancer Yeah, and you know my point of view is freelance translator But actually this works with any type of freelancer and you kind of want to see if you can become More of an agency or see if you can you know kind of get into project management Quote-unquote where you're dealing with other freelancers other freelance translators and so you can offer that and and You know because that's what happened with me. I got my gears turning I was thinking if I can do this, you know, I offer this in three languages instead of one I was like, what if I do this in like 23 different languages and then I can make some money off each language And that's how I earn a living blah blah blah blah You know, obviously it's not that I had that much of a margin on each language and it was a lot of work And so I want but I still wanted to figure out a way to make this work. So anyway This is this will be my first lesson to anyone who asks me How do I get into this? How do I if this is an avenue that I want to pursue? how do I start with this and So here's what I would say I would I would say, okay, if you want to start Hiring freelancers, let's say, you know for your business and if you want to start sharing what you do or delegating What you do to other freelancers so you can you know grow your business as an agency or something like that What I would start with is start with What you do best if you are say a Portuguese to English translator You want to hire a Portuguese to English translator? And I know this might seem it might sound really stupid and I seem completely counterproductive Well, you're like, okay I need a freelancer for all the other languages, you know or freelancer to design my website or to do market research or to You know literally everything else besides what I do best and why would I hire someone to do exactly what I do best? I mean that makes no sense Bear with me. This is why you want to do it because First of all, if you hire someone your Portuguese to English translator and you're hiring another Portuguese to English translator It will take you longer than if you did the translation yourself I can guarantee you this you'll also make less money because you're gonna have to pay that other translator and you'll be able to you know, take a bit of a margin maybe but it won't be that much and And so it'll take you longer it'll you'll make less money and it'll also be a lot harder for you because You will You know, you'll be very paranoid about about the quality that comes out you'll be looking over everything with a fine-tooth comb even more so than when you do the translation yourself and You know, you'll also be a lot tighter with time because usually if the client gives you two days Suddenly you need the translator to do it in one day so you can look over it for a day or something like that Anyway, you're gonna have that time margin there and anyway, it'll be more stressful as well So why the hell would you do it, right? Well, here's why because Things can go wrong and they will go wrong and if you are the person hiring Chances are whatever goes wrong is on you It's your fault. Basically. I mean you can you can lay the blame wherever you want But if you're the person hiring you're the one that has to deal with it And so the best way to deal with all these issues is if you hire someone To do something, you know already if your Portuguese to English translator and you hire another Portuguese to English translator At least, you know how the translation should be done the pitfalls and the problems that can arise the problems and translations that might happen You know that there's a very common mistake that can happen with Portuguese to English or whatever they are and so you know to look out for them So all that's taken care of and you don't have to worry about that. You'll have plenty to worry about but at least it lets you not have to worry about that section about the translation itself and you worry only about the project management part the delegation part the hiring part and that's what you want to concentrate on now because plenty of things can go wrong and will go wrong and Once again, most of them will be your fault. I don't want to sound mean but you know not so much even your fault But your responsibility you're gonna have to deal with it and figure this out So in an ideal situation, this is what I would wish upon someone if they want to start off the best way to do it and The easiest way to do it really in the long term is to if your Portuguese to English translator Hire your next Portuguese to English translation hire someone else to do it and in fact have them do it a couple times if they're good if you want to keep on and then Find another completely new Portuguese to English translator and hire them to do a job a couple times Because at this point then if you then want to branch off and start doing other languages like say then Spanish to English or Italian to English or French to English then suddenly at least you have quite a bit of experience with the project management side and the things that can happen and A lot of things can go wrong. Look, you know, maybe someone gives you back a translation That's complete crap. Then what do you do? You know, at least there in a pinch You can do the translation yourself because that's your that's what you do Or maybe they you know that they do a good job, but it takes them too long and you're right down to the wire You know at that point what do you do? Do you hire them again? Because you know, maybe you just need to a lot more time and figure it out or maybe they're just bad with deadlines in general You how what do you do then? What do you what do you need to do? Or maybe they do a good job and they're on time But you find out that you lost money on it because because you were project managing that you couldn't work on something else And then or maybe you you're not sure about what they do and so you want to have another editor look over it This is where you can save by the way because if you you can be the editor yourself if you know the language But you know or maybe anyway, so many things can happen and go wrong That it's just a lot better if you're hiring someone doing something that you know best And if you hire this person to do these translations in your translation combination so in your area of expertise and And they do it a couple times Maybe you hire someone else so you get used to a different set of problems and that issues that might arise and then And you have that set then you can branch off and you can start hiring other people And and that's the way to do it just to build up gradually Because if you hire someone off the bat to do a Japanese English translation You because this is another thing I did I hired someone someone asked me. Oh, can you do Japanese English? I'm like sure I can do that I'll figure it out and I found luckily I found a very good Japanese English translator I didn't and that's the thing he did the translation send it back to me. I'm like, okay Sorry, it was English to Japanese. Yeah, so, you know, he sends me back this thing in Japanese I'm like I have no idea how to check this So obviously I hire an editor the editor writes back with corrections and then I'm like, okay So do I just do these corrections or what so I wrote back to the editor and I'm like, okay I saw your corrections are these like bad mistakes or are they more recommendations to make it sound better or you know what what what is it and Luckily most of them were recommendations. She said, oh, no, it sounds good It's just a couple things here and there and then I was like, okay, I guess that's fine But I still wasn't sure so I sent him back to the original translator and I said look this other editor said that it was very good And she just recommended here here and here. What do you say and he wrote back and he's like it sounds good Just one thing I don't think I don't agree with right here and you're still there I'm like, well, do I take his recommendation the other persons? I don't know. I don't know and Anyway, so save yourself all that stuff because it really it gives you a headache because if these are languages You don't know what are you going to do with them? And likewise if you're hiring to do completely different things to hire to make a website or to do this that and the other You don't know the issues that can arise and so at least you want to know the project management issues that can arise You need to be used to hiring people to hiring people to do a job and to expect them, you know to be able to Tell them what you expect to be able to receive it to be able to judge what they do and people to get back to them In case their problems and issues that's all the project management side And I keep calling in project management because I for lack of a better word But you see what I mean not with the work itself, but with the managing itself And you need to get past that and the best way to get past that is to hire someone in your area of expertise Doing something that you know how to do you will lose money at the beginning I mean you won't be making much money You'll it'll take you more time than if you did it yourself, but it's an investment and you can use this investment later So if you are thinking of branching out, that's precisely what I would do I would find someone who does exactly what you do and that's the best way to judge them on it and So yeah That's my advice for my first step in terms of delegating or you know setting up an agency or if you want to expand or something along those lines Let me know if you find this useful if you want more advice like this if you want me to talk more from the like the agency's point of view and and about my journey that I'm going through there because It's very interesting. I should say you know But it is a bit different from what I usually talk about and from what I consider to be more my area of expertise so Anyway, let me know what you think about it Or yeah, if you have or if you disagree with what I said or anything along those lines I'm happy to hear about it. Just let me know in the comments below Otherwise, I'll talk to you in the next video actually before I sign off. I wanted to say there is the conference the a it annual conference going on in Atlanta on April 21st, so if you aren't Atlanta for the Atlanta Association of interpreters and translators They're having their annual conference. I plan on being there So if you're gonna be there if you know someone's gonna be there, feel free to let me know it'll be good to catch up and Otherwise, that's it. Let me know if you find this interesting if you find this topic interesting by giving me a thumbs up because then I can tell what works and what doesn't and Don't forget to subscribe if you want more videos about freelancing freelance translation stuff like that Otherwise, I'll talk to you next time. Thanks. Bye