Karen Tkaczyk, Director of Sales for Life Sciences at Vistatec, shares her career journey, reflecting on her childhood passion for science and languages and the major career shifts she experienced after earning a Ph.D. in chemistry. Starting her career as a chemist, Karen made a pivotal decision in 2005 to establish her own life sciences translation business. She discusses the motivations behind this move, delves into her transition to a sales leadership role at a language service provider in 2021, and shares what has helped her shape her career.
Background and early career
For as long as she could remember, Karen Tkaczyk was torn between two loves: science and languages. As a schoolgirl growing up in Scotland, she displayed a natural curiosity about other languages, other cultures, and the world around her.
From a young age, Karen dreamed of living a multilingual, multicultural life that somehow combined her two passions. As university approached, Karen ultimately decided to study chemistry, her favorite of the sciences. But unable to shake her love of languages, she added French studies to her degree, which enabled her to spend a work-study year in France.
It was in France that Karen first found work in a pharmaceutical company and discovered that she was fascinated by the downstream practical applications of chemistry. It was also during this time that she met the Frenchman who is now her husband of more than 25 years.
A few years later, armed with a Ph.D. in chemistry, Karen joined her husband in Ireland and started working for a large pharmaceutical company. A temporary contract meant a quick move to a second large pharma company. The experience at both was great, but both she and her husband, a software developer, were ready for a new adventure. They soon set their sights on the US. Once the visas came through, they moved there in 1999.
The move to the US led to the first of many career shifts for Karen. The couple settled near Lake Tahoe in Nevada, a natural wonder but not exactly a hotbed for biotech or big pharma. So, she took a position in a contract manufacturer of cosmetics and medical devices, broadening her understanding of the life sciences industry.
Soon after, Karen had her first child, and the next year she chose to take a career break. This, Karen admits, was one of the hardest things she’s ever done—but is something that she does not regret.
Navigating a career transition from chemistry to translation
After having three children in four years, Karen started looking to get back to work. But she had no great desire to work outside the home.
As she weighed her options regarding self-employment, she stumbled upon the existence of freelance translators and interpreters in a career guidance book. It was a ‘Eureka!’ moment. Karen was bilingual in English and French, had subject matter expertise in chemistry, and was a pretty good writer in her native English. Those three elements came together and marked the beginning of a new career path: freelance translator.
Pursuing translation turned out to be the right move. In applying to jobs with language service providers, her credentials as a Ph.D. chemist elevated her to the top of the pile for all their chemical, pharmaceutical and cosmetics accounts. To this day, Karen credits her subject matter expertise as the secret to her fast—and continued—success. Thanks to her prior work experience, she had an intimate understanding of the industry’s ins and outs and could easily transfer her knowledge and expertise to her translation work.
“I’ve always said to linguists, you need a specialization. It can be anything you love, but you need to have strong expertise in that niche. And then find the clients who need you in that niche,” she advises. Among translators, Karen’s specialization was unusually narrow; in terms of life sciences, however, she was in fact broadening and growing her knowledge base, as over the long course of her career she translated millions of words covering the entire domain.
Alongside that subject-matter expertise, she does describe some basic skills she thinks were foundational and would apply broadly—being responsive, doing what we say we’ll do, and dealing with the important before it becomes urgent. And as with all successful translators, being a lifelong learner made seeing those new files and learning from their content every day, week and month fun!
Freelancing, family, and work-life balance
Karen’s career as a freelance linguist took off faster than she could ever imagine. She turned freelance in 2005 and, within four months, was turning down work. What came later is borne of being an extravert in a solitary profession: She became a prolific public speaker, conducting much training for technical translators.
One significant benefit of freelancing is that it provided her with the flexibility to balance work and family life: she could be there for her children while still having the option to take on large or lucrative jobs when they arose. She was open to following life’s seasons, its natural phases. “Be open to your career changing along with those phases,” she advises. “Be open to having high-growth phases when you can work hard and fast and achieve a great deal. Also, be accepting of other times when slow and steady is fine, when you’re not looking for change or radical growth.”
Indeed, careers have phases, like life, and rarely follow a linear path. But if we look closely, we’ll often find a common thread that links those phases over time. For Karen, that thread is science and languages.
Career growth and current role
As she approached the empty-nest phase in her life, which happened to coincide with the pandemic, Karen knew she was ready for a change once again. So, after spending 16 years as a freelance translator, she began thinking about taking an in-house role.
In 2021, Karen had her first job interviews since 1999. The job search was not initially successful. She ‘didn’t check the boxes.’ One recruiter told her that a language quality assurance role is all she would be qualified for in LSPs. An HR leader in a large LSP said they couldn’t move her to the final round for an account manager role because there was no evidence of managing similar multi-million-dollar accounts. Never mind her years of building and successfully running a small business, which by that time was serving both LSPs and life sciences end clients (mainly mid-size French companies). That experience produced some interesting lessons as she went into creating a second version of her résumé and tackling more applications. Karen shared a skills list with her closest colleague-friends, who were able to add to it and give her insights about her skills that she took for granted and didn’t see about herself. And it wasn’t long before she found a company that looked for character and understood the life skills she had, valuing those over a job description’s checklist. The initial introduction came through her network, she notes.
Karen landed a position with an LSP as a role with account management and business development responsibilities. In August 2023, Karen moved to Vistatec as Director of Sales, Life Sciences. The company had built a strong Life Sciences business unit and was looking for an SME to help grow it. The fit was perfect: because Karen understands both the technology and the subject matter, she’s able to speak the same language as her customers.
As Director of Sales, Karen’s primary responsibility at Vistatec is bringing on new clients. She also serves as a subject matter expert or thought leader, offering insight on life sciences industry trends and resulting business strategy.
A large part of her job is to build networks and grow relationships. This means not only attending events and trade shows but also being present online, which starts with LinkedIn.
On professional associations, networking, and volunteering
Building a network is, in fact, the most important advice Karen would give to those just starting in the translation industry. Not only has it led to jobs for her over the years, both freelance and full-time, it brings a sense of community. While face-to-face is best, we all know that online efforts are the norm nowadays. In her early years, that included places like ProZ.com, where she demonstrated her expertise and built a network. On LinkedIn, this can take many forms: commenting on other people’s posts, resharing their content, reaching out to those you admire, saying hello, and connecting with them. It means having a personal presence and showing people who you are, and over time, it paints an authentic picture of who you are as a person to work with.
Professional associations are also crucial for forming our network and learning and growing at different times in our careers. For Karen, professional associations such as the American Chemical Society (ACS), the American Translators Association (ATA), and the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (ITI) were crucial in terms of professional and personal growth and support. To help strengthen her teamwork and leadership skills, Karen actively volunteered with these organizations when she was a freelance translator. And after the initial years, much of Karen’s work came from word-of-mouth referrals. That period as a freelancer culminated in 5 years on the board of the American Translators Association.
In 2021, she joined Women in Localization and immediately went on to become part of the Colorado chapter’s leadership team. At first, her goals were finding peer support and growing her network, and soon she started to mentor. “Without associations like ours, I don’t know where I’d be,” admits Karen. “How would I have met people? I’ve heard it said that it’s as if you’ve just met your next ‘old friend.’ You meet kindred spirits. It’s a very powerful part of life when people that you’re working with can become very close friends and be part of your core trusted network.”
Coming full circle
Looking back on her life and career so far, Karen says that she is very thankful for having carved out a career that meant she was able to be there for her children and still have the intellectual and professional satisfaction that comes from being open to learning from every project.
Karen Tkaczyk’s career shows no sign of slowing down. Indeed, now that those children are away from home, she can work in a role that calls for frequent travel. When discussing her goals for the future, Karen shares that she is happy in her current role and assumes that any change would come because she wasn’t adding value anymore where she was. She always wants to continue to grow and learn in whatever she’s doing and to inspire others and help them grow and learn as well. Her advice to her 20-year-old self? “Careers have phases. I would tell my 20-year-old self not to fear change and career breaks, to continue to work really hard at the things you love, and to have confidence that you can make ways to tie those apparently disparate threads together.”
And tying those threads together is exactly what she has done over the arc of her career. Like most people, Karen has encountered bumps and doubts along the way, but she has no regrets about her organic career path. “Who could have planned this career?” she asks. “This is an unusual thing for an organic chemist to end up doing—to be a salesperson for a localization company. But if you’re true to what you love and you’re always doing something that you love that suits your situation at that time, I think that serves people well.”
Indeed, throughout her life, Karen Tkaczyk stayed true to what she loved, following her passions and turning them into a thriving career. “As I look back on that schoolgirl who loved both science and languages, it’s a beautiful thing to see that I’ve actually managed to combine them.”
Inspired by Karen’s story? Read about other amazing women in localization here.