Once upon a time, there was a world without remote interpreting platforms, and conference interpreters had a blast. They traveled the world while making a living. They met new and interesting people. They had elite status on several airlines. However, the life of conference interpreters as we know it is destined to change in a big way.
There’s a lot of ongoing discussion about the consequences of remote interpreting for the quality of delivery, working conditions, rates, and internet connections. These are all of utmost importance, but they won’t be the subject of this article. Here, I’m going to shed some light on the FUN FACTOR. It. Will. Be. Gone.
In general, interpreters are social creatures. That’s actually one of the main reasons that they are interpreters and not translators in the first place! Most of the terps I know think translating is deadly boring. We enjoy dressing up, getting out of the house, going to a different venue every week or every day, talking to different people, and traveling, among other activities. Just thinking about spending days on end at home in front of the computer gives us the chills. But these platforms are a reality and so we’ll need to learn how to make the best of it. Right now, they represent a very small percentage of our assignments, but it’s likely they’ll soon become the biggest chunk of our workload.
Remote interpreting (or RI) will become the cheaper alternative in the coming years, meaning more work for us. In what sense? Well, if hiring the entire simultaneous interpreting “bundle” becomes less expensive, that means more assignments. More people will choose to hire professional services, rather than deliver a workshop with the help of a bilingual employee or a willing cousin. On the other hand, RI will probably lead to lower interpreter compensation. What would be a low fee in the US might be a hell of a good one in a lower-income country. So, it’s likely that interpreters from higher-income countries will have to lower their rates in order to keep themselves competitive. We can’t even blame the colleagues, because they won’t be undercutting. It’s really just a matter of exchange rate.
But again, I’m not here to discuss rates or to shoot down these platforms. After all, RI is here to stay, as part of the natural advancement of technology. So, getting back to the FUN FACTOR… Although I’m optimistic by default, the tiny pessimistic part of me insists: The. Fun. Will. Be. Gone.
The best interpreters I know are people who have a lot of knowledge in their language combination and are very studious. But another common denominator that’s often overlooked is their lively personalities. They are good with people, they create rapport, they have that never-ending flame of life burning inside of them. Sad, downbeat people tend to make lousy interpreters. Believe me, I know some of those and listening to their delivery is a wrist-slitting experience. Hence, if the best interpreters are those who enjoy the diverse routine, getting out of the house, meeting new people, and traveling around, what are they going to do when RI becomes 80 to 90% of the workload? My guess is that the combo of lower rates + boring routine will make many of the best professionals slowly transition to something that matches their personality. So as interpreters, I believe there are two questions we should ask ourselves:
“Does my personality fit in the coming remote-interpreting scenario, or will I become miserable working from home most days?”
“If I have to diversify to a different occupation, what would it be with the skills I’ve built through the years?”
Again, I’m not dissing the platforms, but rather describing the inherent consequences of digitalizing something that used to be so humanized. I’ve worked with two platforms and tested a third one, and I thought they were all quite good. They still need some tweaks here and there, but they’re headed in the right direction.
If you have a more optimistic take on the FUN FACTOR subject, I’d love to hear it. I truly want to find out that I’ve gotten it all wrong. Please make me change my mind on this one! However, if you have an RI-platform advocacy standpoint and wish to propose a showdown, then you probably just misinterpreted the article. In which case, I invite you to read it again. And again. Until. You. Get. It.
