Administrative Assistant's Update

MARCH 2016 2 E D I TO R ' S N OT E George Pearson Typing may lead to many things Whether you consider yourself an administrative (or executive) assistant or secretary, you may perhaps identify with some of the experiences described in "Why I Always Wanted to Be a Secretary," which recently appeared in the Sunday Review section of the New York Times. The writer, Bryn Greenwood, became fascinated with a manual typewriter gathering dust in the storage room of a Kansas law firm where her grandmother worked as a secretary. There, as a child, Ms. Greenwood sat in the back room and read library books "while my grandmother answered phones, took dictation and typed letters. She would not have looked out of place on the set of 'Mad Men': poised, perfectly coifed, lipsticked and imperturbable. The quintessential secretary." Hooked by words on the page When Ms. Greenwood started to peck away tentatively, her grandmother encouraged her. "From there," says Ms. Greenwood, "I was hooked. Not just on the mechanical pleasures of keys striking paper and leaving a mark, but on what it all was for: the words on the page." After awhile her aunt gave her real letters to type, letters that, when perfect, went to the lawyer for his signature. "Even then, it was clear to me that without a secretary, the lawyer wouldn't have been able to do much lawyering if he had also needed to type briefs, answer the phone and make his own coffee. 'Typing was necessary to writing' "The other thing I understood was that this was how books were made. I'd seen photos of Ernest Hemingway and Pearl Buck at work on their nov - els, and I knew if I was going to be a writer, I would need to be able to type. In my mind, typing was necessary to writing, and secretaries were the foremost experts in typing." Ms. Greenwood went on to major in creative writing – and she spent 20 years as a secretary/administrative assistant. She has published three novels and a number of short fiction pieces. She is a fulltime university teacher and administrator. Along the way, she says, "I've had every aspect of my appearance critiqued by supervisors, from my hair being 'too curly' to a boss who told me to 'never wear that dress again,' because it reminded him of his mother. I've never seen a polo- and khaki-clad male administrative assistant policed on his appearance." Many people "who utterly rely on secretaries still consider the work 'demeaning,'" she says. To her a secretary is "the bedrock of any office — something people choose to overlook until she is unexpectedly out sick and chaos reigns." The dignity they deserve Today, she says, "even after 20 years of working as a secretary, I am less of one than my grandmother was. I abandoned pantyhose and heels, and I never achieved 120 w.p.m. (as her grandmother did). I've also been pro - moted into management — a career move once impossible for a woman. I supervise a handful of secretaries and, be they male or female, I do my best to ensure they're treated with the dignity they deserve." If you would like to read the entire piece, it should come up when you search on the original headline: Why I Always Wanted to Be a Secretary. It's a charming personal story, with snapshots of a profession that has seen many changes – or not. Administrative Assistant's Update is published once a month by Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. Director, Carswell Media: Karen Lorimer Publisher: John Hobel Editor: George Pearson george@adminupdate.ca Associate Editor: Jennifer Lewington jennifer@adminupdate.ca EDITORIAL OFFICE (519) 271-6000 Administrative Assistant's Update Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. 1 Corporate Plaza, 2075 Kennedy Road Toronto, ON M1T 3V4 CUSTOMER SERVICE (416) 609-3800 (800) 387-5164 FAX (416) 298-5082 (877) 750-9041 carswell.customerrelations@ thomsonreuters.com Contents copyright. All rights reserved. © 2016 Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. Contents may not be reproduced without written permission. Brief extracts may be made with due acknowledgement. Annual subscription: $189. Publications Mail Registration No. 40065782 GST# 897176350 UPDATE Administrative Assistant's Join a professional organization. Earn certification and network with admin colleagues outside your organization. Association of Administrative Assistants is a Canadian organi - zation. Link: www.aaa.ca International Association of Administrative Professionals is a U.S.-based organization with many Canadian members. www.iaap-hq.org

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