Top 10: Weird and Wonderful Job Titles

19th August 2018

#Jobs

Here at Adaptive Globalization we spend our days and weeks searching for perfect candidates and it leads us to look in some of the dark corners of the job-seekers section of the internet. As we trawl through many webpages, job boards and speak with a lot of our clients and candidates, we come across some fantastic job titles – from Mischief Maker to Wizard of Lightbulb moments, I recently discovered that there’s a market for an Emoji Translator – what a job that would be, especially as Adweek reported in 2017 that more than 60 million emojis are used daily on Facebook, with a further 5 billion (plus!) on its Messenger platform. In the localization industry, it’s important we’re across every single language, even emojis! So, after a few laughs in the office, we thought we’d share our top 10 picks of the weird and wonderful we’ve discovered across a range of industries and have translated them for you… do you fancy doing any of these? Wizard of Light Bulb Moments – Marketing Director Emoji Translator – Not sure where to begin… Mischief Maker – Content Creator Chief Evangelist – Brand Ambassador Sales Ninja – Sales Executive Disruptor in Chief – Head of Daily Business Operations Problem Wrangler – Counsellor Talent Delivery Specialist – Recruitment Consultant Digital Overlord – Website Manager Great Service Agent – Receptionist I’m sure all of you have seen some weird and wonderful job titles in your time, why not share with us your favourite ones? Better still, find out if we can get you a new job with an even better title. Get in touch at alex.ross-scott@adaptiveglobalization.com, or check out what we've got on offer over at our jobs section.

The Translation Agency Industry’s Top-Earning Career Paths

13th July 2018

Adaptive’s recruiters are often asked by candidates how they can build their careers to raise their market value and earnings. Here we share our map of the paths which lead to some of the top-paying roles in the global language services industry. First things first - you don’t have to be a salesperson to make big bucks. Often when Adaptive is approached by candidates looking to up their earnings in the language services industry, there’s an expectation that only the high-flying BDMs and C-suite management are making top money. After all, BDMs are on commission plans and signing big customer deals can be very lucrative. And it’s true – top BDMs and sales managers can be making as much as anyone on this list. But salespeople not the only ones with strong pay packages in the language industry. In fact, we’ve left sales out of our list below to offer alternate options to translation and localization industry professionals looking to build their careers. So here we go - four routes to top-paying roles if cold calling isn’t your thing: 1. Business Unit Leadership e.g. VP Life Sciences, VP Engineering Broad-ranging VP titles usually signify a role that is a mix of client relations, operations and specific expertise in a particular area. Professionals in these positions are in charge of ‘business units’ which operate like mini-companies within the larger organization, focused on one specific area – such as services to the Life Sciences market or engineering services. This means the VP’s responsibility is wide, often covering a separate profit and loss account for their unit. VPs leading these areas can come from a variety of backgrounds, but have often worked their way up an internal hierarchy where their increasing experience makes them more and more valuable. They head up hiring, account management and ensure that their company’s service offering continues to be competitive and evolve with the market. Career Entry Point: Project Manager, Account Manager, BDM Key Skill: ability to combine rounded business skills with deep subject-matter expertise Average Salary Range: $100,000 - $160,000 + bonus 2. Internal Technology Management e.g. CTO, VP of Technology At the highest level, technology managers need to be more than just experts in localization workflows, and lead areas such as networking, security, compliance, training, technology change management, data recovery and more. Their focus is on the role technology plays in helping the company reach strategic goals and impacting overall P&L. Localization career paths typically go from specialist to generalist with candidates building a base in CAT tools, internal and client workflows and then rounding out generalist IT competencies to continue progressing. Career Entry Point: CAT Tools Specialist, Localization Technology Manager, Localization Engineer Average Salary Range: $120,000 - $180,000 + bonus Key skill: ability to visualize and implement technology changes which make high-value improvements to the global organization 3. Operations & General Management e.g. VP Operations, General Manager A great goal for Project Managers! Many of the industry’s top-paid professionals in operations (production) leadership started ‘in the trenches’ as PMs. Growth in this career channel comes from deep first-hand knowledge of internal workflows, aptitude for working directly with key customers and versatile operational skills – organization, planning, financial management and personnel leadership. As operations candidates move up the career ladder, they broaden their generalist business skills and combine them with their expert knowledge of localization processes to eventually step up and take overall responsibility. Career Entry Point: Project Manager, QA Manager Salary range: $120,000 - $150,000 + bonus Key skill: ability to design and maintain efficient teams and workflows to deliver reliably and profitably for customers 4. Client Solutions Development e.g. VP Client Solutions, Global Solutions Manager A specialist team within most LSPs, solutions professionals focus on bridging the gap between sales, production and IT. Their focus is building creative solutions for prospective and existing customers, which involves customizing, integrating and potentially selecting new tools to bring together clients’ existing technology systems and those used by the LSP. Many client solutions experts get their start in engineering and are well versed in CAT tools, but also work to develop strong client relationship skills throughout their careers. Often professionals in this space work on the client side for at least a few years, building inside knowledge from the buyer perspective. At the top of the tree, global managers for solutions teams build some of the most advanced workflows in commercial localization. Career Entry Point: Localization Engineer, CAT Tools Specialist, Project Manager, Account Manager Salary range: $130,000 - $150,000 + bonus Key skill: ability to think creatively to create unique technology-based workflow solutions * * * Adaptive Globalization recruits within the translation, localization and language technology sectors from entry-level to VP+. Feel free to get in touch to discuss hiring or career development – ray.green@adaptiveglobalization.com You can check out Adaptive Globalization’s vacancies for PMs, Account Managers, Loc Engineers, BDMs and more in our job listings here.

Sit down with Head of Client Services at Avantpage Translations

11th July 2018

#Project Manager

Joanna Oseman is the Head of Client Services at Avantpage Translations and has been with the company since 2016 where she started as a Project Manager. Since then she has moved into an Account Manager role and now is the Head of Client Services for the company - Shelby Crane, Recruitment Consultant at Adaptive Globalization in New York, caught up with Joanna to just to see what every day life is like at Adantpage, and how she managed to branch out within language service industry. Here's what we found out: SC: How did you get into the localization industry? JO: When I moved to the US after living for several years in France, I wanted to keep the language going and so I looked for work as a translator. I started with volunteer work, and eventually built a freelance career translating from French to English for a few core clients. After years of doing that I expanded to working with a team to offer other languages, creating my own small company and wearing all of the hats that this entails. I found that I loved the project and client management aspects that came along with this, but was ready to work with a larger company and move away from the solitary life of working for myself. I joined Avantpage as a Project Manager at first, moving to Account Manager shortly afterwards before heading our Client Services department. SC: In your role, what is your day-to-day like? JO: Pretty non-stop and very rarely the day I thought it was going to be! A mix of fielding client inquiries, answering new sales requests, checking in with my team and our Operations colleagues, planning for upcoming projects and contracts, etc. All of our teams work closely together, so there are a lot of meetings. We’re also working to become a more data driven company, and so I have several long term projects underway that have to do with tracking and measuring various information and processes throughout our company. Face to face client meetings are definitely my favourite part of the job, so I also spend time scheduling and preparing presentations and business reviews. SC: What makes Avantpage Translations an exciting place to work? JO: The fast paced environment leaves no room for feeling bored or wondering what to do next - I can’t remember ever experiencing that feeling here. And we really have a great team of fun and passionate people. Everyone here works with Avantpage because they care about the industry and about the LEP communities that we serve, so we’re constantly brainstorming and working to power through our workloads together. Our team is pretty spread out (Davis, CA; Reno, NV; Mexico City, Mexico and Warsaw, Poland) but despite the distances, we work really closely together. It’s an interesting way to get to know people from other places and cultures and we’re a close-knit group! SC: What’s your vision for the industry in the next few years? JO: Obviously there’s a lot of automation heading our way, which is really interesting to be part of. We always have this top of mind when looking at the optimization of our processes, but also in terms of what Project Management will look like down the road. PMs are already taking on more roles than they had five or ten years ago, and I’m sure this will continue to evolve. At Avantpage we also stay very aware of immigration trends and how this will affect what we do. Because we work in highly-regulated fields (healthcare and elections), we see the demand for our work increasing as the needs of LEP populations in the US develop. SC: What advice would you give to people who are interested in what you do? JO: My best advice is to get as much experience as you can in all aspects of the industry that interest you, in order to figure out your best fit. I’ve worked in several different areas, from translation to project management and vendor recruiting - all of that led me to the role that I have now and continues to inform decisions that contribute to the overall success of our client partnerships. SC: Avantpage has recently gone through a rebranding. Can you tell us a bit more this? JO: This process kicked off to mark Avantpage’s 20th anniversary in 2016 and was an opportunity to take a step back and look at who we are and why we do what we do. We did a lot of story-telling and the entire process was a collaboration between our various teams. During the rebrand we identified our three core values: rigor, empathy, and opportunity. Working from this basis, we wanted to use the occasion to take a stand for what we really believe in at Avantpage - helping our clients to empower immigrant communities through language access. Our Head of Marketing, Sabra Rubinstein, coordinated all aspects of the re-brand, which involved a complete revamp of our website, social media, and outreach/marketing materials. We’re all super excited about it and we’ve been getting great feedback from our partners and clients. SC: What is the best advice you've ever received? JO: I have a couple of colleagues in particular at Avantpage who give me so much daily advice that I couldn’t pick one piece as being the best - it’s one of my favourite things about our team here. A practical bit of wisdom that I always try to follow is to be wary of making rash decisions, especially when feeling fired up or emotional. I have a tendency to be impulsive, but with business as well as life decisions, I am careful now to take a bit more time - to let something sit overnight, talk it through with others, and look at things from all angles. It’s definitely a balancing act as I’m constantly working on projects where acting quickly is key, but taking a deep breath first is never a bad thing! You can reach out to Shelby, or Joanna, on their respective LinkedIn profiles. Check out some similar roles to Joanna's, Adaptive Globalization is always looking for top candidates across many aspects in the Localization industry - see our jobs, here.

Five Lesser-Known Conference Picks for LSP BDMs

15th June 2018

#BDM

Along with industry calendar staples, here are some off-the-beaten-path conference options for translation and localization sales professionals For some it's one of the top perks of the job - company-paid travel opportunities to hang out in some of the world's top cities while enjoying good food and drink along the way. For others, it's a dreaded few days of airport security, taxis, hotel rooms and living out of a suitcase. Whatever your take on the travel aspect, there are few better prospecting opportunities than conferences, with hundreds of potential customers gathered together with the explicit purpose of finding ideas and partners to drive their businesses forward. On the localization circuit, there are some established events. LocWorld, TAUS, ATC and the fast-growing Slatorcon among them. To dot the 'i's and cross the 't's, the guys at Nimdzi Insights have made a pretty comprehensive schedule here. But when it comes to sending sales reps outside of the loc bubble, many companies struggle for direction. With industry-specific conferences and trade events, results can be hit and miss. Those targeting the gaming space swear by GDC, whilst those with their sights on the LifeSci space favor events such as DIA. On a more general footing, here are a few conferences Adaptive's loc agency customers have attended with good reviews: 1) Brand2Global Billed "a world leader in promoting education and training in the fields of Global Branding, Global Marketing, Global Digital Media, and Localization", Brand2Global’s conferences feature speakers and attendees who head up global marketing for major brands. 2017’s speaker list included representatives from Microsoft, HubSpot, GoPro, Gatorade and Citrix. 2) SaaStr “The world’s largest community for B2B’ software”. Held over 3 days and attended by 15,000+, the SaaStr conference brings together leaders and learners in the world of software-as-a-service, a favourite IT niche with localization BDMs looking to get in at ground-level with the next company poised for explosive growth. 2019’s lineup is already assembled and features luminaries from Box, Pinterest and Slack, along with plenty of VC and PE experts. 3) TechCrunch Disrupt “Before there were tech conferences, there was Disrupt.” Hackathons, ‘Startup Alley’… Disrupt is all about early-phase businesses and bringing together investors and innovators for discussion and collaboration. For BDMs looking to engage early with high-growth companies at a low level of localization maturity, this can be a great base and afford some valuable networking. 4) WebSummit The accolades for this event are seemingly infinite: Inc. magazine calls it “the largest tech conference in the world”, Forbes “the best tech conference on the planet”. Attendees top 70,000 and speaker numbers run past 1,000. An all-star featured speaker lineup includes C-level representatives from Booking.com, Twitter, eBay, Nestlé and Tommy Hilfiger. The sheer scale of the event means any brave loc participants need to plan carefully to find relevant sessions to focus on, but there’s no event with more tech heavyweights in one place at one time. 5) Dmexco The self-styled “global business and innovation platform of the digital economy”, dmexco focuses on digital commerce, marketing and transformation. Heavily attended by digital services companies for a while, increasing numbers of language service providers are adding this event to their conference calendar also. Past speakers include Jack Dorsey (CEO, Twitter), Sheryl Sandberg (COO, Facebook) and Sir Martin Sorrell (Founder, WPP). You can check out Adaptive Globalization’s current BDM vacancies in our job listings here.