The equation put forward by various stakeholders of the translation industry looks simple: Thanks to the increasingly sophisticated tools, productivity is on the rise, and even though rates have reached a cap and started to decline recently, translators’ income continues to increase. Integrating new technology lets you keep your competitive advantage – otherwise, if you do not move forward, you will fall behind. With the ever growing volume of the translation industry and new niches (such as MT post-editing) opening up, career prospects have never been brighter for those who adapt.
In this interactive session we will try to challenge this deceptive picture. We will focus on the financial and other consequences of letting the tail wag the dog, i.e., allowing technology to redefine such core concepts as quality and the required skill set of translators. We will seek an answer to the question of when your negotiation position is strengthened by the adoption of a certain technology and when it is weakened.