Happy Clients

“I recently formed a science writing company and was (thankfully) overwhelmed with new clients and large projects. During the first few months, I was determined to handle everything myself—the interviews, the transcriptions and, of course, the final articles. But meeting my deadlines meant that I hardly had time for eating, sleeping, bathing, or interacting with my family. My house was in disarray when I finally turned to Sara for help—and now that I’ve worked with her, my only regret is that I waited so long. Her transcription services have completely transformed my workflow. It’s not often that you can trust someone to get every word right, especially when it comes to scientific and medical jargon, but Sara’s meticulous attention to detail has ensured flawless transcripts every time. She consistently meets her deadlines with time to spare. And most importantly, her excellent grasp of grammar and sentence structure reduces the likelihood that an interviewee’s words will be misinterpreted or taken out of context during the writing process. Thanks to Sara, I’m able to devote my full attention to each client. Now that I’ve seen what she can do, I’ll never transcribe another interview myself. Thank goodness for that!”
—Ann Griswold, Sciscripters

“Having Sara Baum transcribe my dictations has been one of the most helpful things to happen to me in the last three decades. Sara wades through my sometimes opaque or too hurried dictations, she flags errors when she thinks they are real, she is immensely organized, and she is sensitive to timing issues.

I dictate everything from thank you notes to first drafts of highly technical, scientific manuscripts, sending them electronically to Sara, and waiting (not very long) for her response in the form of an almost-perfect electronic version of what I dictated. She makes very few mistakes, and her knowledge of spelling, English grammar, and sentence structure has been very helpful.

Over the years, I have invested more than a thousand dollars in voice recognition software, and have come to distrust it. Instead, I recommend Sara Baum– she will make your life better.”
— Dr. Mark A. Ratner, Professor of Chemistry, Northwestern University

“I’m a Chicago-based author and journalist, and like most journalists I never look forward to transcribing my own interviews. On the occasions that I do transcribe them myself, the results aren’t pretty. Fortunately, I found Sara Baum.

When I began work on my last book, The Second City Unscripted: Revolution and Revelation at the World-Famous Comedy Theater (Random House, late 2009), Sara was among the first calls I made. Without her, I’d likely still be pounding out scores of interviews that, when put to paper, amounted to hundreds of thousands of words. Which is to say the book never would have been completed on time.

Thanks to Sara’s speedy typing, meticulous attention to detail, efficient system of shuttling audio files and finished transcripts back and forth and (very important, this) perpetual good cheer, I was able to meet a very tight deadline. As I wrote in the acknowledgements for Unscripted, “When it came to transcription, the bionic Sara Baum brought her A-game… I’d say Sara’s hands should be bronzed, but that would probably make it hard for her to type.”

Sara is also part of Team Thomas for my next book, You Might Remember Me: The Life and Times of Phil Hartman (St. Martin’s Press), which is slated to publish next fall. Again, her work on my behalf has been invaluable. She is, hands down (forgive the pun), a valuable asset to anyone who hires her.”
—Mike Thomas, Author

​”I hired Sara to do some challenging transcription work for a medium-sized focus group I conducted at a community college. The group had eight different speakers, a table filled with noisy papers, food, and drink, and a single stereo microphone of average recording quality. It was a great interview, but i wasn't sure how much we'd be able to capture in the transcription.

I could not have been more impressed with Sara's work. She was incredibly professional and asked all the right questions up front. She clarified key names and terminology ahead of time and sent over an early sample of the first 10 minutes of transcription for me to review. She not only finished the work in a tight time frame but ahead of schedule.
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In the end we had a verbatim transcript which Carnegie's president excerpted for speeches, talks with funders, and a presentation to our board of trustees. For anyone needing professional, high quality transcription, I unequivocally recommend Sara.”
—Jon Dolle, Carnegie Foundation