Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Do Secretaries Have a Future?
NYT ^ | 4/26/11 | LYNN PERIL

Posted on 04/28/2011 8:17:26 AM PDT by Borges

THE 1950s and ’60s brought many new things to American offices, including the Xerox machine, word processing and — perhaps less famously — the first National Secretaries Day, in 1952. Secretaries of that era envisioned a rosy future, and many saw their jobs as a ticket to a better life.

In 1961, the trade magazine Today’s Secretary predicted that, 50 years hence, the “secretary of the future” would start her workday at noon and take monthlong vacations thanks to the “electronic computer.” According to another optimistic assessment, secretaries (transported through office hallways “via trackless plastic bubble”) would be in ever-higher demand because of what was vaguely referred to as “business expansion.”

But nearly 60 years later, on the date now promoted as Administrative Professionals Day, we’re living through the end of a recession in which around two million administrative and clerical workers lost their jobs after bosses discovered they could handle their calendars and travel arrangements online and rendered their assistants expendable. Clearly, while the secretary hasn’t joined the office boy and the iceman in the elephant’s graveyard of outmoded occupations, technological advancements haven’t panned out quite the way those midcentury futurists imagined. There are satisfactions to the job, to be sure, but for many secretaries, it remains often taxing, sometimes humiliating and increasingly precarious.

New technologies did make the lives of 20th-century secretaries easier. By the 1920s the typewriter had cemented women’s place in the outer office, and later versions made for faster, less strenuous typing (“Alive After Five!” was the way a 1957 ad put it). The introduction of the Xerox 914 photocopier in 1959 did away with the laborious routine of carbon copies.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Education; Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: secretaries
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-48 next last
To: Borges
The advent of the PC freed this engineer from the tyranny of the secretary.

The reluctant typist, who left out whole sentences and paragraphs and then blamed me for it.

The moody woman who was more interested in gossiping about her boyfriend with other secretaries than provide the assistance she was tasked with.

The petty, lying office obstacle who would run to the boss whenever she was asked to do her job.

In this day and age of political correctness and feminism, the last thing I need is a secretary!

21 posted on 04/28/2011 9:26:05 AM PDT by Redleg Duke ("Madison, Wisconsin is 30 square miles surrounded by reality.", L. S. Dryfus)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: humblegunner

Goodness gracious, I hope so.


22 posted on 04/28/2011 9:35:49 AM PDT by TheOldLady
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]



You Know You Love Free Republic

Click the Pic

Give whatever you can
Or sign up to donate monthly
and a sponsoring FReeper will contribute $10

Lazamataz is fading away!

23 posted on 04/28/2011 9:36:13 AM PDT by TheOldLady
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Borges

A good secretary, administrative assistant, or executive secretary is a potent force multiplier. I suspect those who say they are not necessary have never seen a competent one in action.


24 posted on 04/28/2011 9:36:13 AM PDT by NonValueAdded (What is so remarkable about the LFBC is ... that it is unremarkable. Then why ...?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Borges

When I lived in Francophone Europe, I used to laugh and laugh at the ads for secretaries wanted. They were still allowed (in contrast to the USA) to put up ads like this:

Seeking young, vibrant secretary. Must type x words a minute, have a pretty smile, be between 18 and 25 years old, nice figure, pleasant personality.


25 posted on 04/28/2011 9:41:25 AM PDT by Yaelle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Yaelle

From “One, Two, Three”

Borodenko: When will papers be ready?
C.R. Macnamara: I’ll put my secretary right to work on it.
Mishkin: Your secretary? She’s that blond lady?
C.R. Macnamara: That’s the one.
Peripetchikoff: [after conferring with the others] You will send papers to East Berlin with blond lady in triplicate.
C.R. Macnamara: You want the papers in triplicate, or the blond in triplicate?
Peripetchikoff: See what you can do.


26 posted on 04/28/2011 9:45:32 AM PDT by dfwgator
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 25 | View Replies]

To: Borges

A good secretary is worth as much as anyone else in the office. I’ve only had 3 truly outstanding ones in 20+ years and they measurably increase the productivity of 15-30 people they directly work with and help anyone in the company as asked and sometimes proactively. I’ve had about 5 others who may as well not be there - if the boss learned to use the calendar they wouldn’t have a reason to work.

One thing I’ve noticed is that the good ones like getting things on “secretary’s day”, the great ones love it, and the bad ones are offended (we’re “administrative assistants” so it’s not our day).


27 posted on 04/28/2011 9:53:31 AM PDT by LostPassword
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Suz in AZ

Same thing in law firms. Lawyers billing lawyer hours for faxing, emailing docs, printing and fedex-ing.

There is a structural change in the economy that started when the PC became widespread and it is just now beginning to come to fruition. Many support jobs will be eliminated permanently — people will order their own office supplies, make coffee in their own office or buy it at a kiosk, publish their own books, music, reports, etc.

After a period of chaos, new jobs will begin to emerge. IF — big IF — the guvmint stays out of the way.


28 posted on 04/28/2011 9:56:37 AM PDT by fightinJAG (I am sick of people adding their comments to titles in the title box. Thank you.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Suz in AZ

Same thing in law firms. Lawyers billing lawyer hours for faxing, emailing docs, printing and fedex-ing.

There is a structural change in the economy that started when the PC became widespread and it is just now beginning to come to fruition. Many support jobs will be eliminated permanently — people will order their own office supplies, make coffee in their own office or buy it at a kiosk, publish their own books, music, reports, etc.

After a period of chaos, new jobs will begin to emerge. IF — big IF — the guvmint stays out of the way.


29 posted on 04/28/2011 9:57:39 AM PDT by fightinJAG (I am sick of people adding their comments to titles in the title box. Thank you.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: dfwgator
...C.R. Macnamara: You want the papers in triplicate, or the blond in triplicate?...

"One, Two, Three" is a great Billy Wilder and James Cagney movie. One of my all time comedy favorites.

30 posted on 04/28/2011 10:02:11 AM PDT by Jeff F
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: dfwgator

Or Monkey Business:

Boss: Please find someone to type this.

Secretary (Marilyn Monroe): Oh can’t I try it myself this time?

Boss: Sorry it’s too important.


31 posted on 04/28/2011 10:03:02 AM PDT by Borges
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: Jeff F

Ingeborg: Here’s your mail, here’s your Wall Street Journal, and here’s my resignation.
C.R. MacNamara: Resignation? What are you talking about?
Ingeborg: You do not work me overtime anymore, you do not take advantage of me on weekends, you have lost all interest in the... umlaut. So obviously, my services are no longer required here.


32 posted on 04/28/2011 10:04:07 AM PDT by dfwgator
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 30 | View Replies]

To: Borges

But here’s the Number One All-Time Movie Secretary. Ulla from the original version of “The Producers”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1f72TK0P3A&feature=related


33 posted on 04/28/2011 10:08:54 AM PDT by dfwgator
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 31 | View Replies]

To: catman67

Boy, I never had a secretary that looked even a little bit like that. They all looked like my mom. And as I got promotions, they all seemed to age, right along with my mom.


34 posted on 04/28/2011 10:13:30 AM PDT by Vermont Lt (How long before the Mall becomes Tahifir Sq?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: Borges
According to another optimistic assessment, secretaries (transported through office hallways "via trackless plastic bubble") would be in ever-higher demand because of what was vaguely referred to as "business expansion."

Oh, is that what they're calling it these days?

35 posted on 04/28/2011 10:31:11 AM PDT by Bel Riose
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Borges
I don’t have a problem getting coffee and/or water for our guests,” wrote Tamara Klopfenstein, a clerk and receptionist, in an e-mail to her two male bosses in 2007. But she wasn’t willing to “serve and wait on you by making and serving you coffee.” She would be “happy to sit down and talk” about the matter, but she never got the chance. Nine minutes after hitting send, she was fired.

Ms. Klopfenstein is either fictional (to make a stupid point), or stupid. It is very common for bosses today to use the coffee issue as an illustration of their sense of fairness and respect. "We all chip in around here" sort of thing. It's an empty gesture, but a gesture nonetheless.

However, even with the alphabet soup of employment regulations restricting businesses from doing what they choose, there is still no law against requiring the production and service of coffee as part of your job. I can guarantee you if an executive (never mind a secretary) emailed a CEO and said "I'm perfectly willing to do 80% of what you expect of me", that executive would be out on her ass in less than 9 minutes.

36 posted on 04/28/2011 10:47:48 AM PDT by Mr. Bird
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Bruce Campbells Chin

You are right but that is exactly why it is a problem of note. I see more mistakes these days - even in legal docs - than EVER before. I am a former paralegal. Hubby and I had some legal business and I had to call the attorney about many typos and other grammatical errors. The attorneys are NOT secretaries, even though they think they are that. You can’t be everything!


37 posted on 04/28/2011 11:01:20 AM PDT by Paved Paradise
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]

To: dfwgator

LOL.


38 posted on 04/28/2011 11:02:39 AM PDT by Paved Paradise
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: Mr. Bird
"...Ms. Klopfenstein is either fictional (to make a stupid point),..."

She exists! Not only do law firms use her as a case study, she even has a LinkedIn account.

39 posted on 04/28/2011 11:05:19 AM PDT by I Buried My Guns (Novare Res!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 36 | View Replies]

To: Paved Paradise

Peripetchikoff, played by the great Leon Askin, was my favorite character in the movie.

Did you know that Askin, probably better known as ‘General Burkhalter’ in Hogan’s Heroes, lived to the ripe old age of 98? The fat guy actually wound up outliving Jack Lalanne.


40 posted on 04/28/2011 11:06:48 AM PDT by dfwgator
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 38 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-48 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson