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I remember typing pools...

Steve Bridger

I remember my first day at work. The summer of 1981. County Hall. The smell of polished corridors and trolleys laden three-feet high with leaver arch files and buff folders. I opened a door and there it was: The Typing Pool. Page 3 of The Sun were always plastered on the walls of the printing unit whenever I was asked to make errands. We still had a few discussion threads on that topic in the early days here - in 2004!


And I've seen Made in Dagenham, the movie!


I only mention this as the CIPD published a report called Work Audit today, a fascinating look at how the world of work has changed
in Britain since 1952.


I thought we could share our own compelling vignettes of social history comparing changes in the way we work.


What do you reckon?


Steve

Parents

  • I remember my first summer job in 1982 before starting university, when I was an "Assistant Temporary Clerkess" in a council welfare department. My job was to hand write names and addresses on books of vouchers to send to families to claim free school clothing. The technological highlight in that office was getting phones that you could transfer or pick up calls from extension to extension!

    My first "real" job after university was with an Employer's Association and I was responsible for putting together all the background information for wages conferences. This meant re-basing the RPI and Average Earnings Indexes manually and then drawing very carefully a series of coloured graphs indicating wages comparisons across the construction industry and illlustrating as bar charts how the total remuneration was built up by means of basic pay, overtime and various allowances across the various trades. Oh, and the dizzy technological heights in 1985 of having a dictaphone on my desk!

    But how come, with all these amazing improvements in technology, we all seem to be working more hours than ever before at full pelt?

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  • I remember my first summer job in 1982 before starting university, when I was an "Assistant Temporary Clerkess" in a council welfare department. My job was to hand write names and addresses on books of vouchers to send to families to claim free school clothing. The technological highlight in that office was getting phones that you could transfer or pick up calls from extension to extension!

    My first "real" job after university was with an Employer's Association and I was responsible for putting together all the background information for wages conferences. This meant re-basing the RPI and Average Earnings Indexes manually and then drawing very carefully a series of coloured graphs indicating wages comparisons across the construction industry and illlustrating as bar charts how the total remuneration was built up by means of basic pay, overtime and various allowances across the various trades. Oh, and the dizzy technological heights in 1985 of having a dictaphone on my desk!

    But how come, with all these amazing improvements in technology, we all seem to be working more hours than ever before at full pelt?

Children
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