Hineni - Here I am

A couple of months ago, Talia Zur Baruch introduced me to the Hebrew word “Hineni” during LocLearn Upswkill School's Brand Identity workshop. I just loved its powerful meaning. It’s one of those words that can’t be directly translated, “Here I am” would be the closest you can get. It has a religious origin but, as I understood it, it evolved to meaning a state of readiness, availability and faith.

I found myself thinking about it a lot over the last weeks, wondering when I’d be able to say “Here I am, ready to work again”.

But before we get there, let’s go back a few months. In August 2024, I left Latinlingua, a company that was my second home for 8 years, where I went from Translator to Project Manager, then Account Manager and finally General Manager. Oh, it was a ride! And one I’m deeply grateful for. I needed a break though. I wanted to rest and focus only on me and on my family for a while.?

I was not sure when I’d start thinking about work again, but I knew I had to take time to reflect and refocus before anything, and so I did. It came naturally, not sure exactly when. It could have been while I was swimming at the beach in Rio de Janeiro or trekking mountains close to home in Mendoza (yes, I’m enjoying this sabbatical summer fully!). The first question I asked myself was: do I want to stay in the Localization industry or do something entirely different?

I have pivoted before: from International Journalism to producing TV shows for children, then to subtitling, which led me to Localization. So I could potentially do it again. But then I started thinking about what I enjoyed the most from the localization industry for the last 10 years and the list was long… I’ll go over the Top 3 here:

• It’s collaborative. I know, I know, the market is very competitive of course, but in my experience fierce competition is mostly seen between big companies. Smaller companies and internal teams from different levels tend to collaborate and exchange knowledge, either at conferences, webinars or direct interactions.
• It’s international and cross-cultural by nature. You can start your morning brainstorming with a co-worker from Europe, have lunch with a colleague based in Argentina and end the day talking to a client from Asia. The challenge is not only juggling time zones of course, but learning about cultural differences and how to surf them. You become a different type of polyglot, and I just love it.
• It’s remote-ready. Way before 2020, most of the Localization workforce was already remote-based (hello, freelance translators!). Even if there are companies that still prefer to hire on-site for several reasons, the industry in general is very open to remote working, which means people are used to its challenges and have created processes to streamline work and interactions. Some companies have even gone beyond and do not make a difference when promoting people: you can lead a global team while based in a small town in South America.? At this point in my life, I’m fully committed to living in Mendoza, Argentina, so being able to work remotely is definitely something I treasure –though a few trips per year wouldn’t hurt ;)

So long story short (well, not so short, there are more than 500 words already, but who's counting)... I decided that the Localization industry is the place to be. Now I had to reflect about what I wanted to do in particular and, to use a soccer analogy, which team I would like to play for and at which position. But that’s a story for another time! ??

If you got to the end of this article, thank you for reading it! I would love to turn this into a conversation. Do you agree that the Localization industry is the place to be? What would you say to someone planning a comeback into the industry at this point??