How Important is a CV for a Translator?

Not long ago, I tried to offer a project to fellow translators in my home town of Jakarta. Needless to say, the response was good. After going through the CVs I received, I was appalled by some of the CVs.

Guys, do you know what CV is and what it is for?

Let me explain it to you in plain English.

When a business is trying to announce its service to the public, it uses various methods: advertisement is one of them.

The same goes with translators. When a translator wants to introduce him/herself to a potential client, what does he/she do? Again, advertise is one of the way. ProZ and TranslatorsCafe and even a blog can be excellent media for that purpose. However, what if you need to be active offering your service to parties or companies, or whatever institutional names suit you, you advertisement is your CV; plain old CV.

A CV is basically a story about your professional and education background. It must be constructed in such a way so that the potential client is interested in contacting you.
Microsoft Word, any version, already provides various templates for that. What MS Word does not provide is what you should put in it.

First of all is of course, your personal and educational details; such as names, address, and all of those small nitty gritty..... Once you pass that point, you need to decide what you put in it.

From my experience, I won't make a single CV for anything. I have several. I customize those in accordance with the purpose of sending it. Since we are talking in term of translation, let's discuss what we need to put in it.

You need to have clear information regarding the language pair. What language(s) do you translate to and from? English to Indonesian? Indonesian to English? Swahili to English? Aramaic to Italian? Point 1. Be Specific.

We need to include all the RELEVANT details afterwards. Since we are talking about translation, any experience you have in translating will be RELEVANT. Forget your experience as a teller of such and such bank or other experience unrelated with translation. Point 2. Relevant Details.

Once you identify that, you need to arrange it in a certain way. You can arrange the experience in chronological order, meaning by time; or in alphabetical order, meaning by the field of translation. Remember, here, the operative word is, again Be Specific. If, let's say you have NDAs (Non-Disclosure Agreement) which prevent you from mentioning specific details of a project, be general; just mention general aspects of it. The experience not restricted by NDAs, please fell free to fill in the details as you see fit.

The third point is Don't Mess Up with the Font. Keep it simple and easy to read. Remember, your CV may not be the only one the client has to read in a day....

So guys, those three points are what you need to remember when making CV:
1. Be Specific,
2. Relevant Details,
3. Don't Mess Up with the Font.

Hope this short article is beneficial for you.

ciao
Arfan Achyar
English<>Indonesian Professional Translator
ESP Teacher

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About me



My name is Arfan Achyar. Abu Fira is my nick. I am an English to Indonesia translator and vice versa. I have been a translator since about 1999. I provide fast, accurate, and high-quality translation. I got into this translation business not because I want to be a translator but more because of the fact that in 1998-1999, during the height of economic crisis in Indonesia, I could not find any job. One of my paternal uncles who happened to know that I was good in English offered me to translate a document, a safety document to be precise, from English to Indonesian; and he was satisfied with the results.

Afterwards, I started offering my services to book publishers around Jakarta, my hometown, which I knew printed and published books translated from English. In the beginning, I had a little luck, but with perseverance, I managed to attract the attention of a book publisher. I translated 5 books for this publisher and one of them was an English bestseller titled Megatrend 2010 by Patricia Aberdene and John Naisbitt. From then on, book-translation orders never cease. And until today, I have worked with several major publishing houses in Indonesia and translated many books for them.

At about the same time as my first effort to attract the attention of book publishing companies, a friend offered me a freelance job as an interpreter. I was required to interpret for the participants of a workshop on labour issues; something that I was not familiar with but I regarded as a challenge. It turned out excellent and the institution organising the event was very satisfied and kept using me whenever there is a need for an interpreter.

For me, translation is an art. It is not merely changing one sentence from one language to the other. Translating means preserving the intended meaning the author wants the reader to understand.

Computer Aided Translation Tools Used

During translation process, to ensure the consistency of terminology and the best translation result, I employ Computer Aided Translation (CAT) Tool I deem suitable for a project. I am proficient in using the following CAT Tools:
- Wordfast
- SDL Trados
- Alchemy Catalyst 9.0 Lite
- OmegaT
- SDLX

Clients

• The World Bank; Jakarta's office.
• Asia Financial Network; Jakarta.
• Lingotek; a translation agency in USA.
• Re-Trans; a translation agency in Germany.
• Nord Traduction; a translation agency in France.
• Translated.net; a translation agency in Italy.
• Transnet; a translation agency in Singapore.
• Knowledgeworks; a translation agency in India.
• Axis Translations; a translation agency in UK.
• N.I.C. (Asia Pacific) Ltd.; a translation agency in Thailand.
• Remdex; an Indonesian labor NGO focusing on labor’s empowerment in Indonesia.
• PLAN Indonesia; a British NGO working on children’s issues such as education, the impact of domestic violence on children, and children empowerment and participation.
• LIPS – Lembaga Informasi Perburuhan Sedane (Sedane Labour Resource Center), Bogor, Indonesia; an Indonesian labor NGO focusing on labor’s empowerment in Indonesia.
• CIFOR - Center For International Forestry Research; an International NGO working on the issues of forestry and people.
• Zahra Publishing House, Jakarta, Indonesia. 
• Dinar Publishing House, Bandung, Indonesia.
• Alvabet Publishing House, Jakarta, Indonesia.
• Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta, Indonesia.
• Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta, Indonesia.
• Gramedia Pustaka Utama, Jakarta, Indonesia; a major publishing house in Jakarta, Indonesia.
• Prenada Media Publishing House, Jakarta, Indonesia.
• Many other personal clients which are too numerous to mention.

List of books which I have translated into Indonesian language (Bahasa Indonesia) so far.

  • 1. 24-hour pharmacist, Suzy Cohen. (In publication process.) Will be published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 2. Balanced Brand, John Foley and Julie Kendrick. Published by Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 3. Business the Bill Gates’ Way, Des Dearlove. Published by Zahra Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 4. Business the Jack Welch's Way, Stuart Crainer. (In publication process.) Will be published by Zahra Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 5. Corporate Sufi, Azim Jamal. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 6. Get Real Get Rich, Farrah Gray. Published by Zahra Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 7. Hizbullah, Party of God; an Islamic Movement Perspective, Edited by Abdar Rahman Koya. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 8. How Toyota Became #1, David Magee. Published by Gramedia Pustaka Utama, Jakarta.
  • 9. Instant Persuasion, Laurie Puhn J.D. Published by Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 10. Kahlil Gibran Reader, Kahlil Gibran. (In publication process.) Will be published by Dinar Publishing House, Bandung.
  • 11. Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D. H. Lawrence. Published by Alvabet Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 12. Letting Go of Your Bananas, Daniel T. Drubin. Published by Hikmah Publishing House.
  • 13. Mafia's Greates Hits, David H. Jacobs. Published by Dastan Books.
  • 14. Making War in the Name of God, Christopher Catherwood. (In publication process). Will be published by Dinar Publishing House, Bandung.
  • 15. Megatrend 2010, Patricia Aberdene and John Naisbitt. Published by Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 16. My Name is Salma, Fadia Faqir. Published by Alvabet Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 17. Nanny 911, Deborah Carrol and Stella Reid, with Karen Moline. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta,
  • 18. One Person, Multiple Career, Marci Alboher. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 19. Ramalan Tentang Muhammad, Abdul Haq Vidyarthi and Abdul Ahad Dawud. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 20. Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves, Naomi Aldort. (In publication process.) Will be published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 21. The Read-Aloud Handbook, Jim Trelease. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 22. The Chinese Tao of Business, George T. Haley. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 23. The Honday Way, Masaaki Sato. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 24. The World is Curved, David M. Smick. (In Publication Process). Will be published by Zahra Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 25. Th!nk, Michael Le Gault. Published by Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 26. What Made jack welch Jack Welch, Stephen H. Baum. (In Publication Process.) Will be published by Zahra, Jakarta.
  • 27. When Friendship Hurts, Jan Yager Ph.D. Published by Transmedia Publishing House, Jakarta.
  • 28. Your Handwriting Can Change Your Life, Vimala Rogers. Published by Hikmah Publishing House, Jakarta.
The list of translated books above is just a small percentage of translation projects I have been entrusted with. There are numerous documents which I simply cannot put in the list due to their sheer quantities.

Availability and How to get hold of me

I am basically connected to the web 24/7 due to the broadband connection I am currently using. However, please observe the time different between your place and Indonesia (GMT+7). My working day starts at 8 in the morning until 8 at night. So, if you are compelled to contact me outside this working hour, I will do my best to return your message the next working day.

I can be easily contacted through the internal message system that ProZ provides; or alternatively, I can be reached at arfan.achyar@gmail.com. If you try to call me from outside Indonesia, you can reach me at +628388023826 or send me a text message to the same number. Otherwise, I can be reached at 02192794960

Final Words

I only provide the best-quality translation for my clients. The list of books which I have so far translated into Bahasa Indonesia should serve as the proof of my translation ability.

I have translated countless documents related with parenting, children rights and protection issues, labor issues, popular psychology, management, transportation, technical document, religious matters, and religious issues to and from English; and many others which are impossible for me to mention every single one of them.

Further information regarding cost and availability and full Curriculum Vitae are available upon request to arfan_achyar@yahoo.com or arfan.achyar@gmail.com

You will not be disappointed...