| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4] | standardize blue board comments Thread poster: Ronald van der Linden (X)
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Laurent KRAULAND wrote: José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
So many translation e-venues have copied so much from Proz, that payback is fully justified. One of them - whose name I suppose I can't mention here, but Starbucks would make an immediate association - has developed a good solution for this Blue Board problem. However IMHO it's too verbose there. I'm sure the brilliant Proz developers can pick up the concept/criteria and develop them into something more visual, possibly reusing some code from the "Availability" dots. I can agree that colleagues posting ratings at this particular venue tend to get too verbose. But from my point of view, this is because discussions are allowed to go on and on in the form of forum threads, which is good and bad at the same time.
Laurent,
To abide by the local rules, I refrained from mentioning the site I'm suggesting as a benchmark. Their BB-equivalent individual ratings by each translator shows full-length phrases like:
# The outsourcer’s standard payment terms can be described as early payment.
# The outsourcer provided excellent support.
# The outsourcer has reasonable and flexible deadlines.
What I'm suggesting is to use such phrases in full only on the translator's online feedback form/questionnaire, like on Proz's LWA, and get them system-converted into colored circles for display, like the one you probably see on the top of your screen now, beside your name, regarding your current availability - one such circle for each criterion, arranged in columns.
| | | | | Consumer Reports style ratings, perhaps? | Dec 2, 2010 |
Reading Jose Henrique's suggestion immediately made me think of the ratings Consumer Reports magazine publishes, the visual format they use. For each criterion, one of 5 color-coded dots are displayed, full red is the best, half-red-half-white is the next, white is average, half-black is bad and full black is the worst. Very easy to understand. They use it for all the products they rate - of course, the criteria is changing, depending on the nature if the product they rate.
Unfortun... See more Reading Jose Henrique's suggestion immediately made me think of the ratings Consumer Reports magazine publishes, the visual format they use. For each criterion, one of 5 color-coded dots are displayed, full red is the best, half-red-half-white is the next, white is average, half-black is bad and full black is the worst. Very easy to understand. They use it for all the products they rate - of course, the criteria is changing, depending on the nature if the product they rate.
Unfortunately I cannot link a sample here because their online version requires subscription. Aside from subscribing to it, the printed magazine is sold at newsstands, bookstores and supermarkets in the US, and available in libraries, too, so I assume many people know it.
[Edited at 2010-12-02 05:36 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | No short-term changes planned, but some interesting ideas here | Dec 7, 2010 |
Hello all,
To answer Simone's question here, no changes are planned in the short term. There are some good ideas here for making the Blue Board more useful, which will need to be studied to see just what can be implemented and how, without subtracting from the "as-is" usefulness that many have expressed, in this thread and elsewhere.
Jared
| | | | | @Laurent on verbosity | Dec 8, 2010 |
Laurent KRAULAND wrote:
I can agree that colleagues posting ratings at this particular venue tend to get too verbose. But from my point of view, this is because discussions are allowed to go on and on in the form of forum threads, which is good and bad at the same time.
Laurent,
To make my idea clear.
This is verbose:
5) Most definitely (I would be delighted to work again with this outsourcer)
4) Definitely (I would work again with this outsourcer)
3) Maybe (I might work again with this outsourcer)
2) Doubtfully (I would probably not work again with this outsourcer)
1) No way (I would definitely refuse to work again with this outsourcer)
... which is where the translator gives their opinion. IMHO it should remain so.
This is not verbose:
LWA = X
... which is what we see afterwards, on an outsourcer's Blue Board record. Colors in lieu of 'X' would work, too.
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| Not just payment criteria. | Dec 8, 2010 |
I like the idea of being able to give a clearer idea of the outsourcer's general competence.
Have you noticed that the only criterion used for deciding which outsourcers/agencies are “good” on the Blue Board and other lists is their payment policies alone?
An outsourcer gets a 5 immediately if they pay immediately via Paypal, as we would like them all to do. However, any potential clients looking for a “good” translation agency will be seeking other criteria.
For examp... See more I like the idea of being able to give a clearer idea of the outsourcer's general competence.
Have you noticed that the only criterion used for deciding which outsourcers/agencies are “good” on the Blue Board and other lists is their payment policies alone?
An outsourcer gets a 5 immediately if they pay immediately via Paypal, as we would like them all to do. However, any potential clients looking for a “good” translation agency will be seeking other criteria.
For example, I know of some very good outsourcers in as far as the fact that they pay well and quickly, but who do virtually no proofreading! Then again, I know of others who are extremely thorough and professional but who take ages to pay and even use a cheque in the post! So if I’m going to be bluntly honest, neither of these outsourcers should get a ‘5’.
Maybe we should re-think our criteria for awarding points on the Blueboard? ▲ Collapse
| | | | Laurent KRAULAND (X) 
France
Local time: 20:31
French to German
+ ...
| An additional point... | Dec 8, 2010 |
Gary Smith wrote:
(.../...)
Maybe we should re-think our criteria for awarding points on the Blueboard?
Maybe I am wrong (anybody correct me in this case), but isn't there also a marked tendency to think that an outsourcer has to be a translation agency?
@ José: thanks for the clarification
| | | | Simone Linke
Germany
Local time: 20:31
Member (2009)
English to German
+ ...
| Another point | Dec 19, 2010 |
Jared wrote:
Hello all,
To answer Simone's question here, no changes are planned in the short term. There are some good ideas here for making the Blue Board more useful, which will need to be studied to see just what can be implemented and how, without subtracting from the "as-is" usefulness that many have expressed, in this thread and elsewhere.
Jared
A belated thanks for the update, Jared.
Just wanted to bring up another example for why I think the BlueBoard needs some improvements.
One of the agencies I used to work with apparently had some trouble this year. The exact circumstances are hard to tell (for an outsider) but both sides sound somewhat credible (the agency is blaming the translator - the translator is blaming the agency).
The point is, after the agency received two negative BlueBoard entries, they politely requested all their translators to leave positive comments and implied that otherwise the business might suffer (their e-mail read a bit like "if we go bankcrupt because of those bad translators, YOU will not get work from us anymore, so please, go to the BlueBoard and make us look good again" - those were not their exact words, of course).
The result?
The agency has received more than 30 positive BB entries within 2 days or so, none of which goes into any true details, but most of them are very general praise and, of course, include a rating of 5.
To me, this makes the BlueBoard even more useless, now that I know that agencies can simply send all their translators there to "hide" negative entries.
Luckily, I know about such cases and am now especially careful when reading BB entries - but how many translators here at Proz really understand the BlueBoard?
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