| Pages sur ce sujet: < [1 2] | Poll: How many jobs do you get in an average good week? Auteur du fil: ProZ.com Staff
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Sabine Schlottky wrote:
I do not really get the point of this question and answered "Other" because, as a matter of fact, the number of jobs per week is a rather useless measure, isn't it?
Really, one really big project will mean I don't take any other jobs.
That, to me, would be a good week.
On the other hand, there are weeks where I'll take a dozen little jobs, which entails more administrative hassles for the same volume, like, generating 12 invoices, for instance, which is inconvenient.
Still, I'd rather have a dozen little jobs than no work at all.
| | | | | Thinking big: management metrics | Jun 4, 2010 |
In the question, I understood average week. To me they are only weeks until I have enough stash to retire, while doing my best to enjoy life now and not being too much of a pain in the backside now and later.
I use Translation Office 3000 from AIT and I know precisely how many jobs I did. I admit I like statistics, however pointless they may be. The best ones ever are those of the kind "80% claim that drivers are careless and 80% of the same sample consider themselves careful".
... See more In the question, I understood average week. To me they are only weeks until I have enough stash to retire, while doing my best to enjoy life now and not being too much of a pain in the backside now and later.
I use Translation Office 3000 from AIT and I know precisely how many jobs I did. I admit I like statistics, however pointless they may be. The best ones ever are those of the kind "80% claim that drivers are careless and 80% of the same sample consider themselves careful".
For me and TO3000, a "job" is a service with a deadline that I perform myself (no outsourcing). Jobs range in value from 0 or a handful of euros to a few thou.
I started with TO3000 at Q2 2005.
To date I have delivered 1765 jobs, mostly to agencies, of which 37 F.O.C. (I sometimes do free tests or after-sales/customer-relation service, but register the task as a job to remember to do it).
So in a bit less than 21 quarters, I delivered on average just short of 7 paid jobs per working week, depending on the amount of holiday I want to have. And I replied off the top of my head 7-10, damnit.
It is indeed pretty useless as a indicator to the bottom line and the overall profitability of the business, but it shows other interesting facts if I were a big figure-driven company:
Munching numbers, my average job pays a bit over 130 euros.
I can tell immediately that I do need a higher average job value. EUR100 is often seen as a min fee with large service providers. And I bet many professionals in Web design, copywriting, architecture or DTP do the same.
Further drilling figures, I might spend 10 minutes on average in admin for each job from start (receiving the job/availability enquiry) to finish (deliver politely by email and invoice). At my current hourly rate, admin overhead is about 5% on jobs, which is significant.
So even with tools and aids to speed up admin and repetitive processes, it still eats up 5% of my production time.
One solution: add a management fee of 5% to all my invoices! Then I could fine-tune the idea with min. and max. management fees. And convert a simple invoicing process into an incredibly complex formula, that only I can understand, backed up by server farms to compute the end result. That's what they do in big firms. They look at numbers and try to find ways to make them look better. So I will try out this extra fee, and if the other party doesn't raise any eyebrow, I'll make it a rule. Some do such gymnastics with wordcounts and other things.
Another way to look at it would be not to register small jobs and do them for free. The admin proportion of a small job is high, so not registering them would improve the 5% figure. But it might decrease the bottom line. Damnit. Blue Screen of Death.
Suddenly, I raise my head from my sheet of KPIs, and it all gets clearer. I have to raise my min fee.
Have a good weekend,
Philippe
PS: My preferred wordcount is 20-30k of real text (not bloody catalogues) in areas I am interested in. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Value of the Question | Jun 4, 2010 |
I guess that I disagree with others' view of the question, itself. The fact that so many responded in terms of 'jobs per week' is an indication of how a portion of our industry is being done, at present. Also, the question's wording of 'a good week' is a leading question to indicated for us how some colleagues view their workload.
For myself, I am with the majority who've commented and prefer larger projects and evaluating my production in number of words. But I know others wit... See more I guess that I disagree with others' view of the question, itself. The fact that so many responded in terms of 'jobs per week' is an indication of how a portion of our industry is being done, at present. Also, the question's wording of 'a good week' is a leading question to indicated for us how some colleagues view their workload.
For myself, I am with the majority who've commented and prefer larger projects and evaluating my production in number of words. But I know others with long experience in our favorite art & trade whose task management and marketing strategies resemble something like Tatty's comment. I quote,
"I prefer translations that are less than 5,000 words long. This way I can think just another day to go and it'll be done. It also means that I can accept jobs from more agencies.
BTW, I don't think it is a useless poll."
It's useful to know how others approach our work. I may even learn something that I can use, myself, but it's always good to have a broad overview. ▲ Collapse
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Tatty wrote:
I prefer translations that are less than 5,000 words long. This way I can think just another day to go and it'll be done. It also means that I can accept jobs from more agencies.
BTW, I don't think it is a useless poll.
I don't think it's a useless poll either.
There is only so much anyone can translate in terms of volume, but whereas I worked for 12 different clients this week, I will only be working for 5 next week as I'm already booked to capacity (save for one or two short "filler" jobs that I may still take on if my current workload progresses quicker than I've estimated).
Taking into consideration I have around 15 "very regular" clients, that means I'll be turning down jobs from up to 10 of them, whereas this week I only had to turn down 2 of them.
So, although I'll make as much next week as this week, if not more, it's not a "good week" for me in the sense I'll be forced to turn down valued clients.
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| Other value in the Question | Jun 4, 2010 |
My thanks to Philipe for a sample of the sort of evaluations that we can do on our production and the bottom line.
Other value in the question, itself, lies in the terms with which others respond to it. "A client..." vs. 'the client ..." and a hypothetical number of words that are subconciously being considered as representative by the person responding. My own business assessments are not anywhere nearly as well-developed as Philipe's are, but I try to stop playing among the wo... See more My thanks to Philipe for a sample of the sort of evaluations that we can do on our production and the bottom line.
Other value in the question, itself, lies in the terms with which others respond to it. "A client..." vs. 'the client ..." and a hypothetical number of words that are subconciously being considered as representative by the person responding. My own business assessments are not anywhere nearly as well-developed as Philipe's are, but I try to stop playing among the words long enough to operate responsibly from time to time.  ▲ Collapse
| | | | | not useless, just not clear | Jun 4, 2010 |
Richard Boulter wrote:
I guess that I disagree with others' view of the question, itself. The fact that so many responded in terms of 'jobs per week' is an indication of how a portion of our industry is being done, at present. Also, the question's wording of 'a good week' is a leading question to indicated for us how some colleagues view their workload.
For myself, I am with the majority who've commented and prefer larger projects and evaluating my production in number of words. But I know others with long experience in our favorite art & trade whose task management and marketing strategies resemble something like Tatty's comment. I quote,
"I prefer translations that are less than 5,000 words long. This way I can think just another day to go and it'll be done. It also means that I can accept jobs from more agencies.
BTW, I don't think it is a useless poll."
It's useful to know how others approach our work. I may even learn something that I can use, myself, but it's always good to have a broad overview.
It is not useless, just measuring the workload useing the number of jobs does not provide the information, so it is confusing:
I take into account the number of jobs received with FUTURE deadlines to say if it is a good week, in termes of incoming jobs, but the number of words or pages gives a better idea of the workload.
| | | | Interlangue (X)
Angola
Local time: 19:55
anglais vers français
+ ...
... a "week" is too short a time span for that kind of statistics. I prefer a yearly basis.
In 2005, the total number of jobs invoiced for the year was over 600 (six hundred), and only about one hundred in 2009, yet the total turnover is comparable, except in 2004, when the number of words translated was about 30% higher than in 2003 (and so was the number of jobs), but with the enlargement of the EU, my major client at that time (who paid high prices) had nothing in store for my la... See more ... a "week" is too short a time span for that kind of statistics. I prefer a yearly basis.
In 2005, the total number of jobs invoiced for the year was over 600 (six hundred), and only about one hundred in 2009, yet the total turnover is comparable, except in 2004, when the number of words translated was about 30% higher than in 2003 (and so was the number of jobs), but with the enlargement of the EU, my major client at that time (who paid high prices) had nothing in store for my language pair and I was glad I could fall back on the agencies I had been letting down so much.
As long as the yearly turnover is comparable, the number of jobs does not seem so very important to me. The exchange rate of different currencies matters more!
My favourite job length is the type you can finish in one week, but I will not turn down 100,000 words if I get decent deadlines!
Nowadays, I tend to accept "shorties" only when they are related to the topic I am working on and customers know they may forget me for "quickies", especially if they send them in the afternoon and want them the same day. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Marlene Blanshay 
Canada
Local time: 13:55
Membre (2009)
français vers anglais
+ ...
sometimes I work on 3 small jobs per week; of course there are sometimes the longer projects that take up most of your time for several days. And there are times when i get more OFFERS than I accept, due to lack of hours in the day!
| | | | | Pages sur ce sujet: < [1 2] | To report site rules violations or get help, contact a site moderator: You can also contact site staff by submitting a support request » Poll: How many jobs do you get in an average good week? | Anycount & Translation Office 3000 | Translation Office 3000
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