Secretarial Work, Nurturing, and the Ethic of Service

Still in the Ghetto? Experiences of Secretarial Work in the 21st Century

“…These findings are comparable to those of other studies that have explored the extent to which secretaries undertake personal custodial tasks beyond their formal job descriptions (Kennelly, 2006; Khalid et al ., 2002; Pringle, 1989; Truss, 1993).…”

“…Undertaking personal work for one's boss has been a core feature of secretarial work for some time, and is closely associated with the gender‐typing of the role, reflecting wider gender role norms (Kanter, 1977; Kennelly, 2006; Leung, 2001; Pringle, 1989). In our survey, only 18% of respondents reported never doing any personal work in the course of their day‐to‐day work, while 12% reported doing personal work daily and 13% a few times a week.…”

“…The most recent significant studies focusing on secretarial job content and careers in countries such as the UK, France, Germany and Australia took place 20 or 30 years ago (Kanter, 1977; Pringle, 1989; Silverstone and Towler, 1983; Truss, 1993; Truss et al ., 1995; Vinnicombe, 1980). More recent studies have focused on other aspects of the secretarial role (Leung, 2001; Karlsson, 2011; Kennelly, 2006; Khalid et al ., 2002; Snow et al ., 2003) but have not examined what, if anything, has changed in terms of the content of secretarial work overall and the career prospects of secretaries, in order to address the persistence or otherwise of the ghetto features of the role.…”

“…Secretaries have been referred to as the ‘office wife’, whose role extends beyond the formal boundaries of a job description to include the undertaking of personal and domestic work for her line manager, such as personal correspondence, running errands and providing a sympathetic ear (Benet, 1972; Pringle, 1989; Vinnicombe, 1980). Some have argued that this stereotypical ‘wifely’ role has served to reinforce patriarchal relations between boss and secretary and perpetuate the secretary's inferior status in the employment hierarchy (Kanter, 1977; Kennelly, 2006). The secretary has been described as a status symbol for her boss, whose informal qualifications in terms of her appearance, femininity and interpersonal skills are integral to the successful performance of her role (McNally, 1979; Pringle, 1989).…”

Emotional labor in a gendered occupation : the work of a female funeral director.

“…A common explanation of this phenomenon is that women are moved into certain fields based on beliefs and stereotypes about the nature of women (Charles and Grusky, 2004). The most prominent of these essentialist notions is that women possess an innate skill for interpersonal interaction (Fitzsimmons, 2002), particularly interactions that involve conveying a sense of nurturing (Kennelly, 2006).…”