Too dependent on one client?

Wednesday, 23 February 2011

A few weeks ago was the ITI Japanese Network’s AGM, attended by 40 or so of my friends/colleagues/peers. We had a great day as ever, and during the evening’s shinnenkai (New Year Party), I was yakking to a highly respected and esteemed member of our group, who seemed genuinely surprised, even horrified, when I mentioned that around 50% of my income has come from a single client over the past 5 years. Are other translators similarly indebted to one company? Surely I can’t be the only translator in this position.

I generally translate between 50,000 and 70,000 words per month for the company in question, who are happy to pay me a more than acceptable rate, always pay on time (usually early), provide a great deal of feedback and generally make things as convenient as possible for me. In short, a near-perfect client. My point of view is that I would be crazy to do less work from such a client simply in order to make myself less dependent on one income source.

I am aware that if this particular source of work were to dry up at some point, I would suddenly find myself with a lot more free time, but I have an ever-growing list of potential clients that I could market myself to in such an eventuality, I do have to turn down work from other valued clients, who nearly always come back, and I can’t deny that the huge amount of work I have done for my No. 1 client has enabled me to significantly improve as a translator and increase in self-confidence.

Personally, I’m hoping for a number of reasons that the status quo continues for some time yet. If not, so be it. I hope I’d be able to cope with a period of readjustment. It could be an opportunity to reacquaint myself with past clients who’ve gone quiet, and I seem to receive a good number of enquiries from my listing in the ITI directory (a good reason to become an MITI folks).

Anyway, comments, thoughts and opinions welcome as always.

An unusual view of the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima