How to Practice Transcription Skills

When it comes to honing your transcription skills, the best way to become a professional fast is to practice, practice, and practice some more. Follow this guide on how to practice your transcription skills, and you’ll be a primed and polished transcription professional in no time.

GT Boot Camp is the leading online general transcription training program. Learn to be a successful remote general transcriptionist in just 2-4 months! Learn More

Beginner Transcription Practice

Are you just getting started as a transcriptionist? Here are some helpful beginner transcription practice tips:

Increase Typing Speed

Some of your assignments will be time-sensitive and require a quick turnaround. However, the nature of your work as a transcriptionist will require you to complete a high volume of work to increase your income. Therefore, increasing your typing speed should be one of your priorities at the beginning of your transcription journey.

As a beginning transcriptionist, you should aim to enter the field with an average typing speed of at least 40-50 wpm (words per minute). Don't stress about your speed too much, though. Your speed will improve naturally over time. You can also learn to use shortcuts, which will enable you to work quickly even if you aren't a fast typist.

Develop Typing Accuracy

While being able to type somewhat quickly is important, it won’t mean anything if you’re making a lot of mistakes while you type. In fact, you may end up wasting more time correcting your mistakes if your typing speed is high but your accuracy is low.

There are a number of online tools available to help you improve your accuracy. Practice transcribing a diverse set of materials, and be sure to proofread your work and monitor the number of mistakes you make. Over time, you should see fewer mistakes as your accuracy improves.

Improve Spelling & Grammar

While there are many free grammar-checking tools available, they won’t catch all of your mistakes. Mastering grammar and spelling is important not only to improve the quality of your transcripts but also to complete projects more quickly. The good news is that you don't have to memorize grammar rules. There are many online resources you can access as you work. Think of it this way: Every transcript you work on is an open-book test. As you practice, the rules will become second nature to you.

A good place to start with grammar is familiarizing or refreshing your knowledge of grammar basics like the eight parts of speech:

• Nouns
• Pronouns
• Verbs
• Adjectives
• Adverbs
• Prepositions
• Conjunctions
• Interjections

Once you’ve mastered these basics, move on to these topics:

• Sentence Structure
• Verb Tenses
• Subject-Verb Agreement
• Pronoun-Antecedent Agreement
• Subjunctive Mood

Although you don't need to memorize grammar rules, reviewing them will increase your awareness, which will help you become a better transcriptionist over the long run.

Review Punctuation Rules

After you’ve reviewed grammar rules, move onto punctuation. While grammar can be a challenge to keep straight, punctuation is where we get into the real nitty-gritty of language. Here are the things you should brush up on:

• Comma Rules
• Colon and Semicolon Usage
• Parentheses
• Apostrophes
• Ellipses
• Quotation Marks

Proper punctuation in your transcripts will help preserve the speaker’s tone in the audio and provide clarity. These are all important things for your clients, especially if they’ll be publishing the transcripts.

Intermediate Transcription Practice

If you already have some experience under your belt, try these intermediate transcription practice exercises:

Practice Transcribing Different Types of Audio

After improving the basic skills, you’ll want to start listening and transcribing different types of audio. The more diverse your practice, the more prepared you’ll be for any type of job you want to take on. Your transcription practice regimen should include:

• Good quality audio
• Bad quality audio
• Audio with multiple speakers
• Audio with different accents
• Projects with different transcription formats (verbatim, intelligent, edited, etc.)

Practice Specialized Transcription

One thing that will take you from beginner to intermediate level transcription is establishing a specialization. This can be medical, legal, or general transcription. However, you’ll want to take some time to practice and see which specialization best fits your interests and skills.

Once you’ve found the best specialization for your skills and interests, consider enrolling in a transcription course to get instruction, feedback, and support. The main reason you should enroll in a course is that it's hard to see your own mistakes. A course will provide answer keys and feedback so you'll know exactly what skills you need to improve in order to avoid ruining your chances of being hired by a transcription company.

If you decide general transcription is a good choice for you, GT Boot Camp is the leading online general transcription training program. Learn to be a successful remote general transcriptionist in just 2-4 months! Learn More

Advanced Transcription Practice

Ready to kick it up a notch? Try these advanced transcription practice exercises to further hone your skills:

Acquire Transcription Equipment

At this final stage, it’s time to invest in yourself and purchase transcription equipment.

Recommended Transcription Tools for Advanced Professionals:

• Transcription Foot Pedal
• Quality Keyboard with Wrist Support
• Comfortable, Noise-Cancelling Headphones

If you’re teetering on the line between intermediate and expert transcription, investing in the proper tools may be the thing that pushes you to the advanced level. It can take some practice to get used to this equipment, but once you get the hang of it, it can improve your productivity tremendously.

Conclusion

At the start of any endeavor, it will feel like you have a mountain to climb with all the skills you’ll need to develop. It’s okay to feel overwhelmed, but it’s important to keep an eye on your goal and keep working toward it every day! We hope this guide on how to practice transcription skills helps you take your career to the next level.

GT Boot Camp is the leading online general transcription training program. Learn to be a successful remote general transcriptionist in just 2-4 months! Learn More