Why are so many women still secretaries?

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February 7, 2013

(Photo via Flickr, courtesy of eat more toast)

When I graduated from college in the early 1990s I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. All I knew about my next stage was that it would involve a keyboard. My mother's career advice came down to her insistence that, whatever else I decided, I take a typing course. A girl couldn't go wrong learning how to type. She was a secretary in the 1960s and still tells wonderful stories about the characters she worked for back then, at companies like ad agency J Walter Thompson and the BBC. Then again, back then, few people expected a woman to be anything other than secretary, teacher or nurse. 

I'm thinking about all this again because there's a sudden glut of coverage about secretaries at the moment. In late November the US Census Bureau released its latest 'equal employment opportunity tabulation', and said more women were employed as secretaries than in any other occupation (3.8 million women, to be precise). And that 96 percent of those in administrative positions are women. Oh, and that men in admin positions get on average $5,000 more a year than women. All of which has sparked a round of articles in the last few days along the lines of, 'Why are women still secretaries in this day and age when they're getting more degrees than men?' 

I'm an ex-secretary (that's not me, it's Peggy Olsen from Mad Men). In the early '90s, I took it as a given that I would go into some company at entry level, entry level meaning being someone's assistant. Both my parents supported this idea. Indeed, they encouraged it. In their experience it was what women did to get a foot on the ladder, and I didn't even question the fact that a man was unlikely to enter a company in the same way. So I got a shock when at one job interview (I can't even remember the company) the female interviewer said, 'So what's a clever girl like you doing wanting to be a secretary?' I was gobsmacked. I had no idea how to respond and can only remember muttering something that at the time struck me as clumsy and inadequate. Clearly it was, because I wasn't asked back. (Unlike in the US, by the way, the word 'secretary' was very much alive and well in Britain 20 years ago.) As I had no real career aspirations other than to do something I enjoyed, I ended up working as a secretary/assistant for about six years during my twenties, both in England and the US, hoping I'd land in an industry I liked and 'work my way up', as thousands of other women had before me.

What I loved about the role of assistant was helping people. That, and the appreciation I received from good bosses, were by far and away the pleasantest things about it - and as we all know, (most) women get satisfaction from helping others to a far greater extent than (most) men. I'm also organized and efficient, so the role used my skills to good effect. I don't doubt that these roles can be very satisfying long term (check out this Huff Post Live segment featuring three current and highly educated assistants, including one guy, for some perspective on this, particularly their views that being an assistant allows you to have a sane after-work life and still do challenging work). In my case, though, I reached a stage where I was bored, and wanted to do more than support other people. I wanted to do my own work. What, to me, is concerning about the fact that more women do secretarial work than anything else, is that it suggests we still don't have the confidence to go beyond being helpers, facilitators of other people's lives. I realize the role of an assistant has changed hugely since the '50s and '60s and probably even the late '90s. Taking dictation is long gone. But I can't help wondering if some of today's female assistants are like I used to be: not looking any further because they don't have enough confidence to step out and do other work. One of the main reasons I'm producing The Broad Experience is to encourage women to realize they can do more then many think they're capable of. 

Then there's the flipside of this story: why have men abandoned secretarial roles almost entirely? As with so many stories about women, the other story is as much about masculinity and the way we think about that, as it is about femininity and what is a suitable, or unsuitable, job for a woman. 

Kenyan women

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January 25, 2013

Photo: some of the village ladies who helped make our lunch (and Tony, who wouldn't touch a pot or pan, or be allowed to - see below)

I'm readjusting to US life after spending most of January outside the country, including two fascinating weeks in Kenya. I was part of a 24-person Habitat for Humanity team that met in Nairobi on January 5th and the next day drove in convoy out to the Rift Valley and the small and completely untouristy town of Bomet. It has a population of just over 4,000 people, life is simple (read: many do not have running water or electricity) and we westerners attracted stares, and usually smiles, wherever we went. If you want to read more about my experience of the Habitat build you can do so here. Needless to say, I was particularly interested in the women's lives. In short, women work incredibly hard in Kenya, and what they can pull off on a daily basis without any of the things we rely on (from petty necessities like vegetable peelers to a decent roof over their heads to running water) is awe inspiring. The women in the photo above were helping to prepare our Habitat team lunch, a task I was allowed to take part in on that particular day (note the one guy in the photo is just sitting there. It was made clear to us volunteers that kitchen work is NOT a man's job unless he is a professional chef. But men helping in the kitchen? No way). 

Before I met the other team members I spent a couple of days in Nairobi, where I interviewed two professional women whose stories will appear in the next episode of The Broad Experience. One is an entrepreneur, one a filmmaker who works with some of the adolescents in Nairobi's most notorious slum, Kibera, training them for employment in the film industry. That episode is coming soon.

Interview with Successful Women Talk

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December 11, 2012

Here's an interview I did several weeks ago with Sheila Butler of Successful Women Talk, which just went up. Sheila's site is a great resource for any woman who's already an entrepreneur or thinking of going out on her own. She posts a new interview every week. In this segment we talk about my public radio past, the genesis of The Broad Experience, why it's tough for many women to ask for what they want, and how they can get over that hesitation.