What translators can teach everyone about working from home during the Covid 19 pandemic
The Covid 19 pandemic took us all by surprise. We were not ready for the shutdown of our way of life as we knew it, for hunkering down at home, without the possibility of seeing friends and family, with our children home from school, our places of work closed, and even worse, asking us to work remotely. Fortunately, for me as a translator, some things remained the same. The main one: working from home.
I’ve been a translator for over 15 years, and of those, only 4 were spent at an IT company, in-house, managing a Localization department. I was fresh out of college and with my recently-obtained ATA-certification, I was eager to show my bosses half-way across the world, in India, that they had made a good choice hiring me to spearhead translations in Uruguay. I had already been working remotely for translation companies, and I thought why not create the same system for them, hiring freelancers to work from home on a per-project basis? The company loved my idea, and so I became a project manager for a mix of remote and in-house translators. Not too bad for my first real job! Now fast forward to 2020. I’m still comfortably working from home, while a large part of the world is just now realizing that there is an alternative to endless commutes in traffic, which might work just as well for certain white-collar jobs. Now that is a discovery.
Working from home, as much as it may seem daunting right now for those who are used to wearing something other than pajamas to work, has many benefits. As a disclaimer, I will also say that, if you are a working parent during the pandemic, and you not only have to work from home for the first time, but also do it while your kid (or kids) yell at each other while hanging from your neck, or dance to Let it Go full blast for the 12th time in a row (true story), you are my hero. It’s one thing to work from home, as in “go to a cafe and get a latte and a muffin while listening to some Fiona Apple” while the kids are in school, and then there’s Covid 19 working from home trying to drink yesterday’s cold coffee, in your pajamas (which you’ve worn for three days in a row because who has the time or energy to do laundry) . What’s happening right now is not normal and should not be used as a measure to rate how great working from home is.
But, coming back to its benefits (during normal times), one of them is flexibility. Usually, you make your own hours. You decide when to work (unless you have meetings to attend to). That instantly makes working from home much more compatible with family life. You can pick up your kids from school, take them to activities, and even work in the lobby of your kid’s ballet lessons (done that!). Or, you can travel and work, which we will hopefully be able to do again once this is over.
Another benefit of working from home, is that it saves you the commute. This not only has a positive impact on your ability to spend time with your family, but it has a more global impact: it decreases pollution, because the more people work from home, the less cars we have on the road. I have been increasingly conscious about the environment, trying to reduce our waste, recycle, minimize the use of plastic, make compost, and this added benefit is absolutely not lost on me. Everyone has heard how the pandemic has considerably decreased the world’s carbon emissions. Some of the world’s most polluted countries, such as China, have seen a drop in air pollution levels, and it is my hope that many, many people continue working remotely to further achieve carbon savings and decelerate global warming. We only have 10 years to do it!
Finally, working from home tends to naturally make us less prone to spending, either on clothes, food (but certainly not lattes!), just because we are home more and can fix things around the house or be more conscious about what we spend our money on. At least that’s what happens for me when I shop online. I shop around more to find better prices and compare. I know for some people it might be the opposite! But, overall, it can lead to better money management.
It can also give you the possibility of being a freelancer, or adding another gig to your steady job, working for more than one company, which would, in turn, increase your earning potential.
I believe working from home may be the future for a lot of us, at least for the next couple of years, so we might as well enjoy it!
Stay tuned for my next post on suggestions to make it easier to work at home with kids. And some delicious latte recipes!
Paola