this post has brightened up an otherwise dull morning.  Thank you all very much! :OP

In 1981, as a graduate entrant civil servant, I had to resign my post before getting married and then apply for reinstatement in my new capacity as a married woman. It was simply a paper shuffling exercise by that time, but that first year at work was also the one where my boss gave me a lift home from the Christmas lunch and then asked me where his Christmas kiss was - and I decided that it was easier to comply than fight and be regarded as a 'difficult' member of staff. 

As Crown employees at that time we were not within the scope of employment legislation and even when I left and went into the accountancy profession in the mid-'80s I remember a partner there telling me that in his view 'Employment law applies to people working in factories not professions like ours'. 

I am so thankful not to have been born sooner - with age and gender discrimination outlawed, even if not removed, and smoking banned - it must be the best time yet to be a woman in her 50s in employment.

1979 - salary review letter templates were hand-cranked from a stencil on a Roneo machine. After about 100 copies the stencil usually jammed and you had to fight the machine to remove it, whist striving to keep indelible printer's ink off your clothes. Rinse and repeat for 400 staff….. My fantastic secretary at the time, then aligned the letters in her typewriter to add individual details (name, department, old salary, new salary etc.) At the end of each day telexes were sent to our remote locations is Dubai, Saudi, Oman etc. Replies were collected the next morning from the telex room. Communications were short, precise and targeted and didn't have every man and his dog on copy.

1980-81 - our first word processor ! printing was SOOOOO loud that we called in the maintenance department to make a special housing for the printer with foam and felt inside it  - it was the only way to cut down on the noise to a level permitting us to work

Ah, the good old days when Ruby the tea lady came round at pm with a bun and a cuppa for everyone and knew exactly how much sugar people took - for an office of 150 people that took some doing! 

When I was at West Herts College back in 97/98 one Saturday afternoon I was in the resource centre finishing off an IPD assignment, I went and had a nosey in at the back the college library and found a whole section of People Management (IPM back then) from the late 60's and early 70's, one copy from about 1968 had an advert for a Personnel Manager for BOAC (British Overseas  Airways Corporation - they later merged with the BEA (British European Airways) to form British Airways) the salary was advertised at £300 pa.

Often wonder if that collection has survived.

I remember kids at school going on about Spectrum ZX80 and ZX81 computers, all seemed very technical and didn't have any interest for me too much at the time. I left School in 1983 and ended up in Construction for a few years. In 1988 I joined the local police as a Special Constable, they still smoked in the police station in them days and I remember on one occasion someone set fire to a watepaper bin by being careless (wasn't me - never smoked!). It was the first time I used a computer as well (UNI2000) black screen with green type.

In the enquiry office was this strange grey box with a glass front with a needle behind that moved every second and made a distinct clicking noise, this was the UK Early Warning Monitor which was connected to RAF Fylingdales, in the event of a three minute warning this would have triggered the air raid sirens across the town that were on the top of telephone poles (every town and city across the UK had these) from what I remember it was still in use in 1991 when I left. I remember they introduced new computerised systems such as E-FIT (1991) which had its own dedicated computer terminal. As for reports they were done on a typewriter with a carbon sheet.

As far as full time work went I started working for Royal Mail in 1989, the sorting office was opened up at just after Midnight (Monday morning and stayed manned till Saturday lunch time) in those days I was up at 4.30am in the morning to start at 5.00am six days a week, we weren't allowed to start deliveries till 6.45am and did two a day, due to work flows Tuesday was a very light and easy day, Thursday was heavy.

The office I worked in serviced two mail trains a night, so when I worked nights I would go down to the railway station to load and unload mail for our area (this no longer happens).

We heard about the first Gulf War as it happened on the radio in the small hours. The night shifts disappeared a good few years after I left in 1994 and the office has recently been sold, totally different job now so they tell me one delivery a day and mail volumes are way down compared to early 90's. They stiopped smoking in the office about 1990 and a designated area became available.

In 1995 I inquired about a course at Stoke on Trent College, when I was being shown around we went passed a classroom which had banks of typewriters as they still taught typing the old fashioned way.

My first office job was in 1997 working at the head office of a big retail company (merger between two had recently occurred before I started). They were busing employees up from London everyday, 1500 people worked there, a lot were temps, there were a mixture of PC's running Windows 3.1x and dumb terminals linked to a mainframe. I did come across a company still using Windows 3.1 in 2003!

At the old days...

I did get sent home for wearing a divided skirt and told I looked much better in the little tight green one.

Being told off when the boss asked me where I had misfiled the clients records and I responded honestly by saying it was on your desk.   The senior Secretary sternly told me you must always just agree and say you found it misfiled - WHY I still ask myself.

pre-fax machines everything was always 'in the post'. 

I can recall the first computer at work and we put up a sign for new recruits to ask for the anti-radiation visor - which was in fact a cricket helmet and we all used to snigger at the new recruit when they sat inputting data wearing a cricket hat.  We now have policies to protect unsuspecting new recruits - anti bullying!

Typing speadsheets on the manual typewriter onto A3 paper and trying not to cut a large slit through the sheet when using the underline to produce a table.

Typing limited company accounts without the use of typex as it was not allowed - pre photocopier.  I was a much much better typist than I am now!

When the police contacted our boss to evacuate the building as there was a bomb threat in the Allied Irish Bank below being asked to put the stamps on the post before evacuating and pop it in the post box while I was outside.   And I did - try asking me something like that now!

All while sitting in a haze of thick smoke...

Loving the tales on this thread!

My first job (about 6 weeks one summer back in 198*cough*) was at a kitchen goods distributor. I had to cut down 12ft aluminium planks into shorter 1ft segments in order to make hotplates for Indian/Chinese restaurants. This involved a very fast revolving metal cutting wheel and a cracked plastic safety guard (goggles were provided, not that they were particularly good).

When I look back at this I'm mortified at the non-existent safety briefing I had before starting the task. It consisted of some bloke in a classic beige foreman's long jacket saying "push this button, pull that lever, turn this dial and don't put your hand in there, mate, it's nasty".

I too remember life before email, internet and PCs.  My first few jobs were using an electronic typewriter, with tippex and carbon paper! But the one that sticks in my mind the most was working for a telecoms company in the late 80's.

I had the go to the off licence every week and buy a bottle of sherry with petty cash and then at 3pm precisely every day I would have to go to the manager's office, pour him a glass and he would sit all alone sipping it accompanied by a huge cigar for the next 30 minutes during which time he was not to be disturbed. Looking back now, I find this a bit creepy but at the time I was 17 and thought maybe this was the way all managers spent their afternoons!

Hahaha - I love this thread.

 

I always remember typing employment contracts on pre carbonated paper in triplicate - pink for file, green for payroll, white for employee..... :) 

Another sign of change at work is the disappearance of on-site social clubs.

Typical day at the insurance company in the week in 1988 was:

• Arrive 8.00am and clock on using the "flex" clock that counted up your minutes you were in the office for

• Do all my difficult work that required complex number crunching and focus

• Work till 12pm and clock off

• Go to on-site social club and have 2-3 pints of lager (reasonably priced at 80p a pint) whilst playing "5p min bet / 50p max raise" poker for 1-2 hours lunch break (due to flexi-time, it was open 12pm - 2.30pm and 4.30pm - 11pm)

• Go back to work, feeling relaxed and smelling of alcohol, and clock back on

• Do my easier / boring work and the daily filing / house keeping

• Clock off, go back to the social club at 4.30pm - 5pm for a "swift one before going home" and play the fruit machine

• Leave at 6.30pm (ish)

Absolutely no way this would be tolerated at work these days but back then, it was pretty normal behaviour. The transition to university undergraduate life was quite easy after that introduction to employment - just earnt slightly less!

A bit like my last full time trip to sea.....

0400 - 0800 morning watch on the bridge

0900 - 1100 morning admin, supervise deck crew and ship maintenance

1100 - 1230 pre-lunch drinks with skipper (top 50% of bottle of rum)

1330 - 1515  afternoon siesta

1600 - 2000 evening watch on the bridge

2015 - 2230 drinks with skipper (bottom 50% of bottle of rum)

zeds til 0345, and start all over again!

My 2 years of this daily routine in the Caribbean was great preparation for the next 4 years as an undergraduate mature student at Swansea. Great parties!  And not a social club in sight...... And then I grew up!

I was a graduate trainee for a very well known high street retailer in the early 1990s. They sent HR down from HO to tell me that I wasn't allowed to wear a trouser suit, I had to wear a skirt. I was the only woman in a room of 25+ managers and was asked to make the coffee. I dodged the request by saying that I was drinking water but they could feel free to help themselves to the kettle. Happy days indeed.....