Page 54 - Translation Journal July 2015
P. 54
Fire Ant & Worker Bee
By: Chris Durban
Fire Ant & Worker Bee Q&As, written by Chris Durban, is a column with practical tips for practicing translators. This column has been a
featured section of the Translation Journal for over 15 years. To read more about Chris Durban please see the side bar to the right.
Chris is currently participating in a special MBA program with Seth Godin. The following Q&As have been plucked from the TJ archives.
Q:
Dear Fire Ant & Worker Bee, Starting Out & Counting
When you go to meetings with clients at their request, do you invoice your time?
A:
Dear Counting,
Whoa. Face time with clients is always good—it’s how you build trust and discuss ways to make your working relationship more
efficient. It consolidates your ties. If the people you’re meeting work in open-plan offices, it may even give you a chance to meet new
users of your services within that company (and/or remind the accounts person over near the window that you’ve got a few invoices
outstanding, could they check on that please).
So the answer is no—client meetings are an investment in marketing, quality control and continuing education, and as such not
billable.
Speaking of non-billables, some translators we know get nervous and/or uptight whenever genuine freebies come up. They fail to
realize how very rewarding flexibility can be in certain strategic situations. Just as it would be foolish to, say, produce a test piece for
free for a lowballer, it is absurd to nickel-and-dime a good client (or even prospect) to death.
In fact, being generous with good clients (and being recognized as being generous) is usually win/win. It makes you one of the team,
allows you to leverage the resulting goodwill in a variety of situations, and smoothes the way for these valued customers to deal quickly
and efficiently with large invoices at other times.
Seth Godin wrote an excellent blogpost on this very issue recently.
54 | Translation Journal - July 2015
By: Chris Durban
Fire Ant & Worker Bee Q&As, written by Chris Durban, is a column with practical tips for practicing translators. This column has been a
featured section of the Translation Journal for over 15 years. To read more about Chris Durban please see the side bar to the right.
Chris is currently participating in a special MBA program with Seth Godin. The following Q&As have been plucked from the TJ archives.
Q:
Dear Fire Ant & Worker Bee, Starting Out & Counting
When you go to meetings with clients at their request, do you invoice your time?
A:
Dear Counting,
Whoa. Face time with clients is always good—it’s how you build trust and discuss ways to make your working relationship more
efficient. It consolidates your ties. If the people you’re meeting work in open-plan offices, it may even give you a chance to meet new
users of your services within that company (and/or remind the accounts person over near the window that you’ve got a few invoices
outstanding, could they check on that please).
So the answer is no—client meetings are an investment in marketing, quality control and continuing education, and as such not
billable.
Speaking of non-billables, some translators we know get nervous and/or uptight whenever genuine freebies come up. They fail to
realize how very rewarding flexibility can be in certain strategic situations. Just as it would be foolish to, say, produce a test piece for
free for a lowballer, it is absurd to nickel-and-dime a good client (or even prospect) to death.
In fact, being generous with good clients (and being recognized as being generous) is usually win/win. It makes you one of the team,
allows you to leverage the resulting goodwill in a variety of situations, and smoothes the way for these valued customers to deal quickly
and efficiently with large invoices at other times.
Seth Godin wrote an excellent blogpost on this very issue recently.
54 | Translation Journal - July 2015
