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gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - alisdair - 10th April 2010
Dear Dinosaur, I'm slightly confused by your statement
Quote: "The issue with finds-processing etc for temporarily unemployed diggers has been screwed these days by the un-realistic report deadlines set by curators coupled with the equally unrealistic time it often takes to prise reports out of the specialists - I recently had a specialist after 3 years admit that they hadn't got time to do an analysis/publication report!"it seems to me that your curator is incredibly flexible when it comes to report deadlines, 3 years? to get a report out? Are you in academia? Didn't it cross your mind that there may be other equally qualified specialists able to undertake the work?
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - BAJR - 10th April 2010
I ... like you would actually agree with most of that too... (good god... whats going on!!
I would add that (as an ex development control - I did get about a bit!) I would not set unrealistic deadlines, but teh company would be often keen to move on, and leave the previous project in the wake of the lovely new babe that had come onto the horizon. (sorry darling Project, its not you, its me) Where I agree... and here I will see some curators go up in flames... is that a consistency is needed in what is required, when and how.... (actually, the Planning department - for it is they that control the strings in the end - can just over-rule the DC Archaeologist... and say to developer... permission granted... go for it... thus swiping the carpet from beneath the curatorial side, as the planning permission was the only solid block they had to ensure the job was completed to their specs).I hope to see PPS5 being developed into that - but I am not holding out too much hope! Again we see that it is all inter connected... each part relying on the other... Ah... take me back to the good old days, when flares and beards were still seen as sartorial grooviness, and H&S was a type of real ale/Drug. Happier days, but we have made our bed. (well, I have sidestepped it slightly) Welcome to the Temporal Contamination Engineers... get professional, and sort out management structure, workflow and priorities, get strong in the arm and smart in teh head.
I am wandering back to the archaeology of my past (and sounds like even older past of dinosaur) - I do archaeology now, I dig sites, I survey uplands, choose projects with 7 year lifespans... know that every May and Every September I will be doing field archaeology and these months are sacred. that every August I will be part of a field school on an Iron Age Fort (or is it??) Choose Freedom, Choose Life.... Choose Archaeology :face-thinks:
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - kevin wooldridge - 10th April 2010
I would echo Davids last couple of sentences....I think a lot of people will come out this recession still working as archaeologists but maybe not on the same treadmill as before. I have come across a number of people who have actually (in terms of their health and peace of mind) taken advantage of the downturn to restructure their lives in a way that prior to 2008 would have seemed difficult. Options vary from people who have taken a complete sabbatical, those who have given up 'employment' for 'self-employment', other people who have taken the opportunity to re-engage with amateur and community archaeology, people who have decided to be archaeologists on a seasonal basis and find other things to do for the rest of the year, some people who have retired but still retain an interest in projects or subject areas and some people who have decided to travel and some to return to study. In doing so (and a lot of these people are quite experienced) they have freed up job opportunities at the bottom end of the archaeological market, so there is also a knock-on effect of wider benefit. I also know of course many people who have been working harder, quite often for less material gain, but have as a result managed to keep going....
Personally I hope that archaeology will regain a little more humanity and breathing room as a result of recent events, but of course a lot of that requires those of us that have 'survived' in one form or another to learn from the past.... now there's an original thought!!
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - Unitof1 - 10th April 2010
for a long time now I have been trying to get the biggest individual backlog ever-just wondered what the record was
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - Dinosaur - 11th April 2010
Unitof1 - could probably give you a run for your money, although a lot of my backlog seems to be other people's old jobs (they've left and things were left hanging, the developer never came up with any money, development got mothballed etc etc etc) - all of the projects I'm working on actively at the moment come under those headings, will make a nice change to go dig a shiny new hole....
Alisdair - specialists fannying-about just results in grief from the client/curator etc, plus of course eventually the client gets bored with the idea of paying for it. Unfortunately once the PX assessment phase has produced some sort of report all sense of urgency seems to go out of the system, in my experience usually the only real impetus comes from the contractor wanting to get rid of the archive to free some space up - my backlog including finds etc must be taking up several tens of cubic metres of valuable office space, it's a triumph on the rare occasions when any significant lump of it goes away!
BAJR - wanna swap jobs? (except the upland survey bit, prefer making big holes)
- are beards and flares out of fashion? :face-crying:
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - thalinor - 11th April 2010
grindlecat Wrote:and where are the archaeological illustrators going to learn, if theres no decent fieldwork being done anywhere? or decent trainers training people. Top heavy on chiefs and not enough indians, as i've said many times [so many times....] before.......and the other 'jobs'.....? you are silent about them.
a good illustrator is a good illustrator, whatever he/she is drawinfg/recording..........
I am 'silent' about the other type of jobs as I have very little experience of them and do not feel able to comment on them. I have 'some' experience of archaeological illustration (read into that what you will) and therefore commented. I think you missed my point though... that I disagree that archaeological illustration doesnt need archaeological skills. It Does. I do agree that the prospective archaeological illustrator needs fieldwork experience. *sigh* although to be honest these days a digger with a multitude of skills (inc geophysics, survey, data entry and finds) is more desirable than a straight digger. There are simply not enough fieldwork jobs for pure excavators. A range of talents and skills are necessary- although being able to dig is fact becoming one of those rare skills which is v depressing.
As to the 'spurious' academic posts... to a certain extent I agree especially with some of the bursaries. They do seem to be a bit fatuous although I expect they are more to do with the IfA's drive to introduce a more formal CPD into the profession. It is all well and good to have such opportunities but future experience is dependent on the work being available. And I for one would not be happy to see a job won by a recent graduate of such a scheme getting a job I could do standing on my head! I do think that there are a lack of viable opportunties for those who have been in the profession for over seven years. The problem is that alot of the bursaries are lower paid than some more experienced staff are used to.
The issue of lack of fieldwork being advertised is perhaps masking the truth. Companies are asking those staff they laid off and know rather than take a risk with advertising (See hosties comment below). Also because some folks (quite rightly) are not willing to travel too far (costs and such) there is more of desire to employ staff lcoal to an area of work. For example if a company advertised for staff and had jobs in Nottingham, Gloucester and Lincoln- they are more likely to give consideration to those folks who live locally.
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - Dinosaur - 11th April 2010
Recent experience (and talking to people in other units locally) suggests that most recruitment is currently done by telling the existing workforce there are jobs coming up, then they text/facebook people they know, and, hey presto, a workforce turns up! Much easier than advertising, plus people tend to recommend people who are not going to show them up, so it by-passes a lot of the pitfalls of 'blind' recruitment, at least someone knows the new recruitee and can vouch for them - I've seen some dreadfully fictitious CVs over the years....
Getting over-qualified doesn't do you any favours if you're planning on digging, anyone who's got anything more than a basic degree can look like they've been trying to avoid the real world for as long as possible and are only reduced to digging as a last resort once they've run out of educational options and aren't going to enjoy playing in mud in the freezing cold......unfortunate, and probably often grossly unfair, but the world's like that :face-crying:
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - BAJR - 11th April 2010
Can't beat a good advert though... helps people to know what is on offer..
but then I am biased.. on the other side, it is a safety net the other way. Dodgy CVs will hopefully become a thing of the past, when real skills are used to access ability and employability. A skills Passport if you will. Signed off and duely accredited - with a portfolio to go with it. A CV to me was a list of sites that I had worked on... no more... We need a slightly more tuned system for fieldstaff. (as you say...)
The other method has the downside of creating cliques and closed shops, so it is swings and round-a-bouts. Once again we return to the benefits of Unionisation and stability, training and professional attitudes.
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - grindlecat - 11th April 2010
oh, ok...how foolish of me. here's me, thinking that after 5 years at college and 12 years field experience, here and abroad, having managed €400 million projects and multiple teams of diggers, having trained illustrators, diggers and post ex people, to be dis-satisfied with having to live IN A FEKN TENT!, taking home less than ?240 a week, after tax, having to pay the scum-sucking idle fekers in an office for poxy, rat-ridden accomodation, to be laid off at 2 days notice, to be treated like a leper because i have the temerity to complain about this!
fine....'professional standards'...when i get treated like a highly skilled professional by any poxy company in this country, maybe, just maybe, i might decide to work for them....Good Grief!
Know what i'm doing tonight? im off poaching pheasent, as i need some meat protien...and theres a big cock pheasant at the end of my filed whose been taunting me all bloody winter...and i shall have 'im and cook him, if it kills me...he may be too wiley for me, but i shall bide me time and its amazing what you can get with a bow and arrow and a lot of patience...either that or its one of the ducks off the pond....
good luck to all of you...and in 5 years time, when you're all as pissed off and bitter as i am about this 'profession', i shall show you how to hunt for yourselves, because you sure as hell wont have a pension to fall back on or any thing from any company you ever made money for......
gosh...isn't it getting better all the time.....not - Austin Ainsworth - 11th April 2010
Dinosaur Wrote:Recent experience (and talking to people in other units locally) suggests that most recruitment is currently done by telling the existing workforce there are jobs coming up, then they text/facebook people they know, and, hey presto, a workforce turns up! Much easier than advertising, plus people tend to recommend people who are not going to show them up, so it by-passes a lot of the pitfalls of 'blind' recruitment, at least someone knows the new recruitee and can vouch for them - I've seen some dreadfully fictitious CVs over the years....
That also means that the company avoids the pitfalls of employing somebody who may expose the problems of working for a company .