This does not help my friend in her quest to become either a mother or a clinical psychologist.
That's one of the crappy things about being female, I think. Even if you're a male with a baby face, you can grow a beard and people understand, "Oh, okay, he's at least hit puberty." Short getting gray highlights, I don't see a similar solution for a woman.
My cousin (a year older than me) once went to her daughter's elementary school to pick up an order from a fundraiser. The woman who was handing out orders gave my cousin a simpering smile and said, "Sorry, honey, but your mom needs to come and get your sister's order," and she had a helluva time convincing them that she was "mom!"
I wonder if it's that no one really understands what a "research analyst" does, and their minds edit it to "secretary?"
In an era where every "menial" job title gets edited to some kind of engineer, I could understand this if I didn't work for the State. But State jobs (in Maryland anyway) only come with a limited number of titles that are then numerically defined as to how far one has progressed in that particular title, and each title (and numerical designation) has pre-determined job duties and requirements. So secretaries are "Office Secretary X" and it's a matter of office etiquette that one is very careful to call a person by that proper, official title because it often designates who answers to whom. So it's not like a normal office where a boss wants to make a secretary's job look nicer so calls it a "research analyst," but the person is still responsible for answering the phones, making copies, and keeping the coffeepot filled.
A Research Analyst for the State of Maryland does statistical analyses and interprets research and requires a bachelor's degree with at least nine credits in stats and research methodology. This is true of every Research Analyst in the State of Maryland, and every Research Analyst makes the same amount of money too. But having such a rigid system (though a pain in the ass when debating the finer points of whether So-and-So is an Office Secretary 2 or 3) does mean that there's really no way for a person to say, "Oh, 'research analyst' must be a 2007 way of saying 'secretary.'"
And that is why I did not hesitate to throw my weight around on my job at The TV House from Day One.
Yeah, being buddies with the now Assistant Executive Director has certainly kept me from being abused to a great deal. Everyone had in their minds when I started at the new office that I would fill in for the Office Secretary when she was out, and that notion was corrected right away without me having to say a word. I am careful in setting boundaries. I do not mind helping people; I do mind doing for people. (I had to be careful to remember the "for" in that last part there! :^P) So if someone comes in and needs copies and the OS isn't there ... sure, I'm happy to show them how to use the copier. No, I am not going to do it for them. It's not my job, and I'm not going to do menial work for people with the same educational background as me just because I'm young and female. Somehow I doubt that if Bobby was sitting at my desk (and he's the same age as me) that they would expect that of him.
I've been abused plenty in jobs in the past. In fact, part of the reason that my job now is becoming so overwhelming is that I am too helpful to the Warrant Officers ... but it's usually a matter of doing something for them or expecting that it won't get done at all. If I'm suffering from a 100% increase in the warrants we receive from when I started there four years ago, and all I do is the background research, then I know they're overwhelmed doing the full investigations and driving all over Maryland to check addresses.
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rosecarmine
(no subject)
Date: 2007-12-27 01:21 am (UTC)That's one of the crappy things about being female, I think. Even if you're a male with a baby face, you can grow a beard and people understand, "Oh, okay, he's at least hit puberty." Short getting gray highlights, I don't see a similar solution for a woman.
My cousin (a year older than me) once went to her daughter's elementary school to pick up an order from a fundraiser. The woman who was handing out orders gave my cousin a simpering smile and said, "Sorry, honey, but your mom needs to come and get your sister's order," and she had a helluva time convincing them that she was "mom!"
I wonder if it's that no one really understands what a "research analyst" does, and their minds edit it to "secretary?"
In an era where every "menial" job title gets edited to some kind of engineer, I could understand this if I didn't work for the State. But State jobs (in Maryland anyway) only come with a limited number of titles that are then numerically defined as to how far one has progressed in that particular title, and each title (and numerical designation) has pre-determined job duties and requirements. So secretaries are "Office Secretary X" and it's a matter of office etiquette that one is very careful to call a person by that proper, official title because it often designates who answers to whom. So it's not like a normal office where a boss wants to make a secretary's job look nicer so calls it a "research analyst," but the person is still responsible for answering the phones, making copies, and keeping the coffeepot filled.
A Research Analyst for the State of Maryland does statistical analyses and interprets research and requires a bachelor's degree with at least nine credits in stats and research methodology. This is true of every Research Analyst in the State of Maryland, and every Research Analyst makes the same amount of money too. But having such a rigid system (though a pain in the ass when debating the finer points of whether So-and-So is an Office Secretary 2 or 3) does mean that there's really no way for a person to say, "Oh, 'research analyst' must be a 2007 way of saying 'secretary.'"
And that is why I did not hesitate to throw my weight around on my job at The TV House from Day One.
Yeah, being buddies with the now Assistant Executive Director has certainly kept me from being abused to a great deal. Everyone had in their minds when I started at the new office that I would fill in for the Office Secretary when she was out, and that notion was corrected right away without me having to say a word. I am careful in setting boundaries. I do not mind helping people; I do mind doing for people. (I had to be careful to remember the "for" in that last part there! :^P) So if someone comes in and needs copies and the OS isn't there ... sure, I'm happy to show them how to use the copier. No, I am not going to do it for them. It's not my job, and I'm not going to do menial work for people with the same educational background as me just because I'm young and female. Somehow I doubt that if Bobby was sitting at my desk (and he's the same age as me) that they would expect that of him.
I've been abused plenty in jobs in the past. In fact, part of the reason that my job now is becoming so overwhelming is that I am too helpful to the Warrant Officers ... but it's usually a matter of doing something for them or expecting that it won't get done at all. If I'm suffering from a 100% increase in the warrants we receive from when I started there four years ago, and all I do is the background research, then I know they're overwhelmed doing the full investigations and driving all over Maryland to check addresses.