First and foremost, I’d like to wish you all a happy, successful 2016. Times are hard for many across the globe and I’m sure this is no exception for some translator and interpreter colleagues, especially those living in or working for countries still suffering the effects of the great recession.

Machine translation (MT) is also increasingly impacting on our businesses, and certainly not always in a positive way. While many have embraced PEMT (post-editing of machine translation), I hope out of choice rather than necessity (it’s certainly not something I want to do), others, like myself, shy away from MT altogether. Whatever our feelings about MT, however, it is an area we need to keep an eye on and decide how to deal with. A guest post in the pipeline should help us to do just that.

Many posts on my blog address the challenges our profession faces and how we can improve our situation by getting better at our craft, working smarter and healthier, and gaining clients that appreciate us more and pay better for our services. I’ve also compiled a list of articles and a page of links, tips and resources that I think newcomers to our profession will find particularly useful, although more experienced colleagues should find them of interest too. These lists will grow as I come across other helpful blog posts and suggestions are always welcome.

In 2015 I finally got around to joining the ITI and taking the exam to become a qualified member of the association. I’ve already benefited from the sense of community, the support everyone provides each other, and the events I managed to attend last year. And despite not yet gaining more clients as a result of being listed in the ITI directory (I’ve only been contacted for jobs I don’t/won’t do so far), I’m still firmly convinced that everyone should belong to at least one translation and/or interpreting association (I’m also a member of the MET, which organises one of the best conferences on the circuit, and the IAPTI, which is not afraid to speak out against the injustices that affect us).

I was even a speaker on social media at one of the ITI events. Given that it was a nerve-wracking experience (which I’m not sure I want to repeat!) and I ended up forgetting some of the points I wanted to make, I started writing a mini-series on LinkedIn to share my thoughts. It’s grown beyond my original expectations because once I started delving deeper into this platform, I found there are actually quite a lot of aspects to cover and I’ve produced five posts so far. After an extremely busy December, my plans for the blog for January are to write the last two (or maybe three!) instalments to finish the series off. I’m a big fan of LinkedIn and feel that we haven’t unlocked it’s full potential yet. Here’s a link to part one if you’d like to read my tips.

I’d like to thank you all for visiting this blog. Since I moved from Blogger to WordPress at the end of May 2015 there has been a total of 13,822 visitors from 144 countries all over the world.

I know many come here for the Useful Links & Resources for Translators & Interpreters. Originally compiled for my own use, I thought I may as well as share them with you all and the page has now become the most popular on my blog. Since it was first published, I’ve added your suggestions and improved the layout to (hopefully) make the links you need easier to find. Do check them out if you haven’t already.

Since I’m rather addicted to blogging still, I’ll be frequenting my virtual home often in 2016 and hosting some guests as well. Many of them will be writing their first ever blog post for the ongoing MA review series. I will continue to add European MA courses to this page and hope that anyone contemplating further education will find the details and reviews help them make an informed choice. Although I never did a translation MA myself, I believe that studying one of these courses is an excellent way to gain a head start in an increasingly competitive profession.

Wishing you all the best for 2016!

Image by Bruno /Germany from Pixabay 

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