5 ms·

The article mentions that other universities order from outside suppliers, who presumably can also do custom orders. It sounds like an incredulous claim to say

by roel_v 10y ago

The article mentions that other universities order from outside suppliers, who presumably can also do custom orders. It sounds like an incredulous claim to say that nobody in the universities that are listed in the article as not having their own glassblower any more does anything new at all. An on-site glassblower sounds like (although this is the first time I've heard of such a thing, it's probably specific to chemistry) a perk that is (very) nice to have, but just doesn't fit in today's cost structures. 50 years ago, it was normal for every 'professional' to have a secretary, who would plan meetings, send letters, make coffee etc. Today, how many non-CxO level people have personal secretaries? Having all these support jobs on-site was how it was done but today most places don't even have local IT support (with IT being what replaced most of these support jobs in the first place). The article mentions there are 50-ish ppl a year graduating the one institute in the whole of the US that teaches glass blowing. That means the demand just isn't there. I mean, there is probably 'demand' in the sense that there is plenty of 'demand' for Ferrari's at $10k / piece, but there is no real demand at proper prices. In other words, if people lament the loss of such jobs but don't want to pay what it costs to replace them, is there really 'demand' or just nostalgia?

TeMPOraL 10y ago
> An on-site glassblower sounds like (although this is the first time I've heard of such a thing, it's probably specific to chemistry) a perk that is (very) nice to have, but just doesn't fit in today's cost structures. Generally, doing new things doesn't fit in today's cost structures. If you're doing stuff that's actually pushing the frontiers of anything, your cost structures will also look different to everyone else's. But there are lots of benefits to have such specialists in-house, primary being that they a) know your specific needs, and b) might actually be invested in your overall goals - as opposed to third parties that often couldn't care less. > 50 years ago, it was normal for every 'professional' to have a secretary, who would plan meetings, send letters, make coffee etc. Today, how many non-CxO level people have personal secretaries? Having all these support jobs on-site was how it was done but today most places don't even have local IT support (with IT being what replaced most of these support jobs in the first place). I think secretaries were replaced by computers. I don't know of many professors with personal secretaries, but I also haven't heard of anyone outsourcing these kind of duties to a specialized "secretary-consulting" company. As for IT support, the IT infrastructure in universities generally sucks and tends to go downhill - but that's a longer discussion, and I generally would attribute this to infrastructure being something that has easy-to-count costs and harder-to-count benefits, which makes it an obvious target for various beancounters. > That means the demand just isn't there. That's probably true. One university doing novel research does not by itself a market demand make. That's why they should have spent the time and money to have the guy train his replacement on-site.
- sidek 10y ago
  Most professors in the Harvard Physics department still have secretaries.
- jdmichal 10y ago
  > I think secretaries were replaced by computers. Specifically, I think they were replaced by good asynchronous communication mediums. That medium used to be paper, which is slow; the fast alternative was synchronous phone calls. (Interestingly, telegraphs were generally asynchronous.) Then the fax and answering machines came and made it a little better. Then computers came, and now I don't need a secretary to call someone else's secretary to make an appointment, I just send a request in Outlook after finding a clear spot on their calendar.
- engi_nerd 10y ago
  > If you're doing stuff that's actually pushing the frontiers of anything, your cost structures will also look different to everyone else's. One of the great failures of modern management theory is the failure to recognize that activities involving new things, things that either haven't been tried before, or doing something old in a new way, is itself an unrepeatable process. Testing airplanes is a very different activity to manufacturing airplanes, and yet I'm forced to attend innumerable training courses on how Lean/Six Sigma methods can improve my work. There's some merit in this material, but because my employer is forced to be ISO-9001 compliant, it's all forced down my throat without thought given to its appropriateness.
Bromskloss 10y ago
> it's probably specific to chemistry Plasma physics too, for making vacuum vessels with various types of electrodes and coils embedded. > 50 years ago, it was normal for every 'professional' to have a secretary I've been wondering what change happened that could motivate this. I mean, if it was rational to have a secretary then, and it is rational not to have one now, some circumstance must have changed. Are planning meetings, sending letters, and making coffee that much easier now that they motivate it? Or a are we making a mistake by not hiring secretaries now? Or was it a mistake to have them?
- vkou 10y ago
  50 years ago, professionals couldn't be bothered to learn how to reach 60 WPM on a typewriter, e-mail didn't exist, and searching for information was a manual process.
- dalke 10y ago
  I've wondered the same thing. I think the cost difference might be an important factor. Secretaries were generally paid a lot less than managers. This was also tied into status. Outside of the military, typing was often seen as women's work, and below the status of a manager. There was also a much bigger need for typists back then, as much more correspondence was done through the mail. For example, you might write a draft on a typewriter, add hand-written notes with corrections, then retype to get the corrected version to send to your customer. Computers reduce that overhead. One of the organizers of a scientific meeting I regularly attend says it's harder now to organize the meeting than when he started. It used to be that a company included a general service component to one's job, which could be used to help organize a conference, or review papers. Now, the organizer said, companies want employees to be more focused on the bottom line. But at best those are hints. They don't answer your questions.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- URSpider94 10y ago
  Things that have changed, off the top of my head: -- Typing and distributing paper reports used to be a big part of the workday. You needed someone who could not only type an error-free 70+ words per minute, but also who knew how to format documents properly (headers, footers, page numbers, envelopes, etc), and who could take care of the reproduction, packaging and mailing. -- Setting up meetings would require phoning around to other people, or more likely, their secretaries. -- Travel arrangements would need to be taken care of manually by calling a travel agent, collecting paper tickets in advance, etc. -- From the "supply" side, institutionalized gender discrimination meant that there was a steady supply of cheap labor that didn't have a lot of other alternatives, career-wise. Computers killed the typing pool. The WWW and email killed the need for dedicated support staff for all but the highest-value employees. (Greater) equality in the workplace means that women have other career options, putting upward pressure on compensation for executive assistants.

by roel_v 10y ago

TeMPOraL 10y ago

> An on-site glassblower sounds like (although this is the first time I've heard of such a thing, it's probably specific to chemistry) a perk that is (very) nice to have, but just doesn't fit in today's cost structures. Generally, doing new things doesn't fit in today's cost structures. If you're doing stuff that's actually pushing the frontiers of anything, your cost structures will also look different to everyone else's. But there are lots of benefits to have such specialists in-house, primary being that they a) know your specific needs, and b) might actually be invested in your overall goals - as opposed to third parties that often couldn't care less. > 50 years ago, it was normal for every 'professional' to have a secretary, who would plan meetings, send letters, make coffee etc. Today, how many non-CxO level people have personal secretaries? Having all these support jobs on-site was how it was done but today most places don't even have local IT support (with IT being what replaced most of these support jobs in the first place). I think secretaries were replaced by computers. I don't know of many professors with personal secretaries, but I also haven't heard of anyone outsourcing these kind of duties to a specialized "secretary-consulting" company. As for IT support, the IT infrastructure in universities generally sucks and tends to go downhill - but that's a longer discussion, and I generally would attribute this to infrastructure being something that has easy-to-count costs and harder-to-count benefits, which makes it an obvious target for various beancounters. > That means the demand just isn't there. That's probably true. One university doing novel research does not by itself a market demand make. That's why they should have spent the time and money to have the guy train his replacement on-site.

sidek 10y ago
Most professors in the Harvard Physics department still have secretaries.
jdmichal 10y ago
> I think secretaries were replaced by computers. Specifically, I think they were replaced by good asynchronous communication mediums. That medium used to be paper, which is slow; the fast alternative was synchronous phone calls. (Interestingly, telegraphs were generally asynchronous.) Then the fax and answering machines came and made it a little better. Then computers came, and now I don't need a secretary to call someone else's secretary to make an appointment, I just send a request in Outlook after finding a clear spot on their calendar.
engi_nerd 10y ago
> If you're doing stuff that's actually pushing the frontiers of anything, your cost structures will also look different to everyone else's. One of the great failures of modern management theory is the failure to recognize that activities involving new things, things that either haven't been tried before, or doing something old in a new way, is itself an unrepeatable process. Testing airplanes is a very different activity to manufacturing airplanes, and yet I'm forced to attend innumerable training courses on how Lean/Six Sigma methods can improve my work. There's some merit in this material, but because my employer is forced to be ISO-9001 compliant, it's all forced down my throat without thought given to its appropriateness.

Bromskloss 10y ago

> it's probably specific to chemistry Plasma physics too, for making vacuum vessels with various types of electrodes and coils embedded. > 50 years ago, it was normal for every 'professional' to have a secretary I've been wondering what change happened that could motivate this. I mean, if it was rational to have a secretary then, and it is rational not to have one now, some circumstance must have changed. Are planning meetings, sending letters, and making coffee that much easier now that they motivate it? Or a are we making a mistake by not hiring secretaries now? Or was it a mistake to have them?

vkou 10y ago
50 years ago, professionals couldn't be bothered to learn how to reach 60 WPM on a typewriter, e-mail didn't exist, and searching for information was a manual process.
dalke 10y ago
I've wondered the same thing. I think the cost difference might be an important factor. Secretaries were generally paid a lot less than managers. This was also tied into status. Outside of the military, typing was often seen as women's work, and below the status of a manager. There was also a much bigger need for typists back then, as much more correspondence was done through the mail. For example, you might write a draft on a typewriter, add hand-written notes with corrections, then retype to get the corrected version to send to your customer. Computers reduce that overhead. One of the organizers of a scientific meeting I regularly attend says it's harder now to organize the meeting than when he started. It used to be that a company included a general service component to one's job, which could be used to help organize a conference, or review papers. Now, the organizer said, companies want employees to be more focused on the bottom line. But at best those are hints. They don't answer your questions.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
URSpider94 10y ago
Things that have changed, off the top of my head: -- Typing and distributing paper reports used to be a big part of the workday. You needed someone who could not only type an error-free 70+ words per minute, but also who knew how to format documents properly (headers, footers, page numbers, envelopes, etc), and who could take care of the reproduction, packaging and mailing. -- Setting up meetings would require phoning around to other people, or more likely, their secretaries. -- Travel arrangements would need to be taken care of manually by calling a travel agent, collecting paper tickets in advance, etc. -- From the "supply" side, institutionalized gender discrimination meant that there was a steady supply of cheap labor that didn't have a lot of other alternatives, career-wise. Computers killed the typing pool. The WWW and email killed the need for dedicated support staff for all but the highest-value employees. (Greater) equality in the workplace means that women have other career options, putting upward pressure on compensation for executive assistants.