Allyson Sigman is a freelance Japanese/English conference interpreter based in the American Midwest. She owns Echo Japanese Interpreting and 株式会社エコーグローバル. She is also a terrific advocate for linguists looking to break into this field, presenting at multiple conferences (including “Katakana or Kanji? Using Loan Words in Japanese Interpreting” at ATA66 in Boston) and running the アリアメ・トーク YouTube channel where she covers interesting cultural and linguistic topics.
Getting Started in translation
audra lincoln (AL): Would you share how you got started in translation and interpreting in general?
Allyson Sigman (AS): Of course. I graduated with a TESOL degree in the middle of the last economic downturn, around 2009. I didn’t have good career prospects as an English teacher; however, I had a JLPT N2 at the time, so I had professional level proficiency in Japanese. I also learned through my boyfriend at the time—now husband—that Columbus, Ohio had a lot of Japanese businesses. He said “You know, you’re not finding a good teaching job. Come out here. You can just use your Japanese skills and one of these companies will probably hire you.” He was absolutely right.
It was 2010 that I finally made the move [to Ohio]. Within two weeks, I had a great job with a Japanese company that had zero expectations of my interpreting skill. They just wanted a bilingual in the role who they could teach and train. I was technically an office administrator/interpreter. I got rudimentary training in how to interpret and I felt like I was doing a terrible job at it, but I liked it. So, I joined the Japan Association of Translators because I found out that they had a mailing list where you could ask questions of sempai in the industry. I started reading all the books on interpreting and translation because I just wanted to understand how it worked.
Impacts of T/I research
AL: Do you find that the lessons, information, and techniques in those books are still applicable today?
AS: Of course! The amount of research that has been done into how to equate one language to another, and how to so that verbally, is so vast. There’s research on cognitive load; there’s research on glossary building and preparation for an assignment. And all of it, for the most part, is very useful. Maybe I am more nerdy about this than most people, but I think that this is one field where the research is actually applicable in practice.
Technology in interpreting
AL: How can this research prepare future generations of interpreters; especially as technology and client demands keep changing what is expected of an interpreter?
AS: I think that there’s a lot of room now for research into how different translations of messages impact the person who’s listening to them. We’re coming into an AI-filled field: where people are talking about the potential for simultaneous interpreting done by an AI engine. There have been several test runs of that. It [has] never been successful. But I think the main thing that they’re seeing is that humans communicate with humans really well.
Even if the terminology isn’t 100% accurate, or some information is omitted, the human interpreting is still hitting the audience where they are. And that makes it more valuable. That value [of human interpreting] could be expressed in terms like: whether or not the person listening is more likely to click and buy something, or, are they more likely to follow this person on social media? Regardless of what next step you want your audience to take, are you more likely to get that result out of someone listening to another human? Or someone listening to a chatbot?
I think we’re heading to a time with more of a fusion [between humans and AI systems]. I will say AI has very much changed the way I prepare for an assignment. Especially when it’s a field [I am] not familiar with at all, AI is great! I can say, “Get me an overview of ‘X’ field.” Usually on the foundational points, it’s pretty accurate. The issues are when you start asking for equivalent terms. Let’s say you’re reading a Japanese article, and you ask for an English equivalent for a term. Sometimes, what [AI] comes up with has zero Google hits. Obviously, that’s not a term anyone’s using, but [AI] decided to provide one because you asked it for one.
AL: So AI will give you the exact term you’re looking up and if you are not being critical about where the information is coming from, you end up with a false equivalence.
AS: Exactly. And what I worry about is the next generation, the people who have not come up doing their own research. They may not have the tools to vet the results that they find in an AI engine.
Transition to freelance
AL: Moving on, you currently work as a freelance conference interpreter. Please tell me about how you arrived here.
AS: From 2010 to 2017, I worked for two different Japanese companies here in the Columbus area. Both were in manufacturing, and I just got tired of manufacturing. I wanted to expand beyond that. I wanted to interpret other, new and interesting topics. So in 2017, I decided to go freelance. I had my first job and then nothing else for a long time.
I started building my company, setting up my website, and all that stuff. But I didn’t officially leave my full-time job until January 2018. I’ve been freelance ever since. My first client was the company I left, because they couldn’t find someone right away. So they hired me as contractor.
AL: That seems like a good way to jump start your freelance career.
AS: I also trained my replacement. So that was nice because I got to tell her, “Okay, here’s where all the glossaries are. Here’s the terms you have to be careful of because they don’t use the standard Japanese translation for this English,” etc.
AL: When you worked in-house, you would do interpreting and translating. As a freelancer, you are just interpreting. Is that correct?
AS: Correct. So, when I was in-house, I left the office administrator job because I wanted to do more interpreting. I already had the sense that I liked it better than translation, so I went to a job that was about 70/30 interpreting heavy. I worked at [that job] for almost 6 years. They were great company; it was like a family environment. But I just couldn’t handle any more automotive after a while.
The nice thing about working in-house is that you get to build a specialization. When you just come out of an interpreting program, you don’t have a specialization; you’ve done a little bit of everything. Having worked in-house, I have this automotive background. I also had a bunch of accounting terminology rolling around in my head because I had to do shareholders meetings and such. I also had some other random things, like labor negotiations, that I could build into specializations. When I became a freelancer, it helped me to have so much experience as an in-house interpreter.
However, most people didn’t see it that way. Most agencies and other conference interpreters didn’t see in-house as experience. They saw me as a brand-new interpreter because freelance interpreting is just a different ball game. You’re constantly trying to adapt to a new topic and so it took a while to get my colleagues’ respect, to get consistent clients, and to get my name out there. All that was very effort-laden work.
Making a name for yourself
AL: I imagine that is a crucial part to building the relationships that get you called into a booth and getting clients. What type of activities did you do to gain your colleagues respect?
AS: That’s a good question. I think establishing a relationship with the interpreters who are near you, who are going to recommend you for work that they can’t take, is so crucial. I knew one interpreter in my area, and I was able to meet others through ATA. It’s a slow process [because] they have to be willing to jump in a booth with you, which is hard. At first, I got a lot of “Hey, I can’t take this job. Do you want it?” Those were solo jobs. So, when they recommended me for something and the client didn’t come back to them and say, “That person was terrible.” Essentially, no news was good news. No negative feedback about my interpreting meant that they could work with me.
Also just presenting yourself as a professional is key. I did a lot of work on my website, my basic forms—quotes, invoice, a rate sheet, that kind of stuff that’s going to be out there, the basic information that you have to present to everybody—I wanted to make sure it was very clear. I even did a career consultation with Junko Bradley, who I think everyone knows from EJ expert. She listened to my interpreting, looked at my resume, and said, “Oh, I see the problem. Your resume is formatted like you’re applying for a regular job, not like you’re a professional with the portfolio.” It was very helpful to understand that you’re not listing who employed you, you’re focusing on what skills and experience you deliver to the person who’s going to be hiring you as an interpreter that will walk into their company for one day and then walk out. They want to know what you are bringing to that experience.
AL: As in what clients you’ve worked with and listing those names on your website?
AS: The problem is that when you start out [freelancing], you don’t have that [experience]. So, you have to say “through my experience as an in-house interpreter, I worked on this accounting system” or “I worked in training seminars with you know ten people in three languages” or something like that. It tells a client not just your employer and your job title, but what kind of experience you have that would be relevant to them.
AL: Because a client is shopping for an interpreter who can provide specific skills and experience, not just where you’ve interpreted.
AS: Yes. And speaking of people’s websites, that reminded me that virtually everyone I talked to said that you need a domain name on your email. Not a Gmail account or something like that. And they were right. A lot of companies, especially bigger direct clients, want to see that you are an entity, not just person. So having that domain name in your email is really important.
Job satisfaction & returning to in-house
AL: So you’ve made this big switch and it sounds like it was right up your alley. Do you think you’d ever switch back from freelance to in-house?
AS: I’ve definitely thought about it. There are a lot of benefits to being freelance. ‘I work less and make more money’ is the short version. The downside is that I end up traveling a lot—like a lot. The other downside is that it’s very hard to run a business. I think that’s something that most people don’t think about when they go freelance. You’re really representing a company. You have to sell your company. You have to sell your skills. People want a response from you all the time, right away. You have to market. It’s a lot of work running a company and having the type of interpreting services that makes someone confident choosing you over a big-name agency.
That’s probably the most difficult thing. But the work is still interesting and challenging. So, the only thing that has made me think about going back to in-house is insurance. It was nice having benefits and paid time off. The second thing is that I do not get as much interpreting practice, because I just don’t work all the time and it’s hard to make the time to practice. But when I was in-house, I was doing it every day. So, one thing that [might] make me go in-house is trying to acquire a new specialization and there happened to be a position at a company where I could build that. For example, medical is not my strong suit at all. I did actually apply for a pharmaceutical company because I thought that it might give me that medical-edge. But it just didn’t work out.
AL: So you could acquire a specialization by going back in-house for a year or two years to build skills that you can then repurposes in your freelance work.
AS: Yeah, but it’s so hard. I would be giving up so much time and money. I work a lot, but it’s not a full-time job, honestly. It could be, but I’m working the right amount for my situation.
AL: It sounds like your job satisfaction is rather high.
AS: Oh my gosh, I love what I do. My job is how I de-stress. The reason why I went into interpreting specifically, instead of translation, is partially because I’m much better with my ears than with my eyes, I guess. I just am a better listener and speaker than a reader and writer. And the other part of it is [that] I’m a perfectionist. So, I would look at the translation on my screen and I would say, “Okay so I have three resources that say ‘this’ and three resources that say ‘that’ and I think it should be ‘this’.” But I didn’t really know if that sounded correct. I would just go back and forth, not sure what the “correct” translation is.
In interpreting, you just have to spit it out. You have to say something and hope that it communicates [the meaning] accurately in both languages. You don’t have time to be unsure. So, I even make mistakes in my English, when working from Japanese, because I’m too reliant on the Japanese. Then I hear what I said in English and think “Oh, man. No one would actually say that. But I think it got the meaning across though.” So it makes me put my perfectionist nature on the back burner.
I also like sharing people’s passions. Even when you’re talking about ball bearings, you know that some engineer was super passionate about the design and the perfect consistency of the surface of this ball bearing. Even if it is of no interest for you, you can share that passion with them. You can represent their passion for that ball bearing. That’s why it’s a super satisfying career.
AL: So there were big benefits and not insignificant drawbacks, but it sounds like you probably wouldn’t make that switch back.
AS: Yeah, the biggest drawback is definitely that of running a company. It’s a lot harder than I think most people anticipate it will be. Also, doing the networking, building relationships, getting your name out there so that, when they think “interpreter, Ohio,” they think of you. That is very difficult.
I will say that being one of the few non-native Japanese speakers to make a name for myself in this field is also relevant. It makes me a little bit more memorable. The same thing happens with Mandarin interpreters. There’s a lot who grew up speaking Mandarin, but not as many who learned it as a second language, who go on to be a conference interpreter. It gives you a different appeal, I guess. It also gets you rejected for job sometimes but that’s neither here nor there, you know. Not every interpreter’s right for every job.
I wouldn’t call it discrimination necessarily, but more like what-voice-you-want-Siri-to-have. I completely understand if the default Siri voice is not for you and you want a different one. Yes, there are mistakes I’m going to make in Japanese, and there is a tone to my voice that is different. But there are a lot of things that I can pick up, like the cultural nuance in the English, and reflect extremely accurately that another interpreter might have missed. So, I think we both have advantages. It’s just a matter of what tool works best in that situation.
Advice for new freelancers
AL: So in certain situations, it makes sense to have one “voice” instead of the other. Are there any other general ideas or concrete steps—budgeting your time to make this happen, quit your job first and then freelance, or try to build your freelance before you quit—that you can offer?
AS: That’s a very good question. I will start with my privilege here and say that I have a husband who has a full-time job. So, I had a bit of a safety net in the sense that we were not going to lose our house if I didn’t get work. But it was good to have some savings ahead of making the switch, and it was good to have a plan that says “Okay we’re both going to be on [my husband’s] insurance.” If [there is no plan], there’s a lot more to figure out. So I want to be clear that my situation was that of a married US citizen with one child. That’s when I went freelance.
That being said, a lot of the preparation that I did I did while I was at my full-time job and I think that was great. I started putting my LinkedIn profile together. I started putting my website together all while I was on the clock at my other job, because there wasn’t that much to do.
It was nice to have the security. You also have to think about how to afford what used to be benefits in-house but are now self-funded expenses. That includes covering your sick time, paying for insurance (health or otherwise), covering the availability that you provide because you don’t have a full-time job—meaning that you are available when they need you and possibly turning down other clients. You have to have fundamental accounting skills to account for all of that. All of that can be prepared in advance.
Reaching out to the interpreters in your area and setting up meetings with them; saying “Hey, I’m going freelance I would love to sit down with you and talk about any advice you have for being in this area.” It’s not price fixing or divvying up clients. You are a competitor to them, but you are also a colleague to them. They may say “Hey, these are my clients don’t touch them.” And maybe you will and maybe you won’t—because you are a competitor—but you have to maintain that good relationship if you have other freelancers in your area.
Now if you don’t have other freelancers in your area, you have to consider how to reach people from other parts of the world that will bring you work. You have to figure out: How can I prove myself to these people? Can I work with them online in some capacity? Can we do practice sessions together? How can I build the kind of relationship with them that will make them want to refer me?
Then you also have to decide what kind of jobs you’re going to take. Are you going to stick in the world that you’re used to? Are you going to try to expand? Are you going to do community work. Because there may be community work in your area, but not conference work, in your area.
There’s a lot of planning that can totally be done in advance, before you actually make the call and say “I’m leaving my full-time job.”
AL: So there is a lot of marketing yourself. If your name’s not out there, if you’re not doing the work, you’re not getting the work.
AS: Yeah and on a similar note, I took the Know Your Worth class from Julia Poger. I had been freelancing for seven or eight years and I had had some difficult price negotiations. Consistent with ATA rules, she doesn’t say “this is how much you should charge,” but she gives techniques to negotiate. She helps you understand what all you’re providing. When I go into an interpreting job, I’m not just going in there for an hour of a meeting. I’m bringing all of my experience, all of my knowledge that I have accumulated over 15 years. Plus, I’m presenting myself as a business that they can trust. Plus, I’m representing them in a professional way. Plus, I’m billing them. I made my own travel reservations. I am covering my own insurance. There’s a lot of things that go into our value to this client. I think we underestimate that, especially coming from the in-house perspective. We don’t really think about how deep the services we are offering really go.
AL: I agree. Like with in-house insurance, you don’t realize how much your company subsidizes your insurance because you’re so focused on the increases they decide to pass along to you.
AS: And they’re able to pay that because they have such a large group of people who they are insuring at one time. If you are an individual on the private market. Your insurance is more than what you paid as one employee of a large company.
AL: You have mentioned some of the professional services that you have to offer, including accounting activities. Do you have any tips for what type of software to use for accounting things? It sounds like you prefer to do it yourself.
AS: So there are two different things that we’re talking about when we talk about accounting. One is bookkeeping: what did I spend money on, what category did that go to, and what revenue did I bring in. The second is, how much do I need to pay in taxes? That part absolutely goes to a professional CPA because the American tax code is way too complicated for me. But the everyday things, like paying for a subscription, I manage on my own. I also do my own quoting and billing.
I recently switched from QuickBooks to FreshBooks. I like it a lot because it has some customer-facing capabilities. I can send out a quote and the client can accept it on FreshBooks. Then, I have proof of an agreement. It’s possible that, by the time this article comes out, QuickBooks will have that function. But I found it on FreshBooks. Also, I like that FreshBooks is easy to use. All of those FreshBooks or QuickBooks types of sites will let you give your accountant permission to view your financial performance, so they can get the information they need about your tax stuff.
I also use a free version of Misoca and that’s for writing quotes and invoices in a Japanese format. I did not like the translated version of my US quote because it was the wrong format for Japan. So I got a separate piece of software to run quotes for Japanese clients.
AL: So you can’t just translate a document from one language to the other and assume it will match what your client expects from that document. It seems like that would apply also to working with an interpreter versus someone who just knows a second language, too—that having that training means you’re not just changing the words, but formatting the words to facilitate meaningful communication.
AS: I do. I think that training and experience makes a lot of difference. You see new interpreters, and seasoned ones who didn’t go through any type of training, cling to X =Y translations. Meaning, ‘this is the translation of X. and it doesn’t matter what else you say.’ I had a colleague tell me, “I don’t have to know what a word means to translate it. I just need to know the words A and B in Japanese and English.” And I felt like, “No, you need to know 1. where it falls in the sentence, and 2. how it’s used naturally by a speaker of that language, to know if B is the right term at all.”
So yeah, I think that it’s very tricky. I don’t want to say that there’s bad interpretation. But there is a lot of interpretation that does not do the original justice or misrepresents the original because of lack of understanding of the target language and lack of understanding of fundamental interpreting techniques.
AL: Allyson, thank you so much for sharing your experience and advice on switching from in-house to freelance.
AS: You’re very welcome.
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