3rd April 2009, 10:20 AM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by shavedmonkey
seems to me that Dr Pete has some points...
What contractors charge is indeed between them and the client. That the work is being done to the required standard is the concern of the curators. If three shaved monkeys can do the jobs of 3 POs, then the curator can't justifiably do anything, and it suggests that either the monkeys are underpaid, or the POs are overqualified and either will in time leave for better things (bananas in my experience). If, however, the monkeys stuff the job up, the curator has every right to kick off. It's a business risk, and the contract manager's choice.
The charge out rate is indeed nothing to do with the curator (although they could perhaps subtly improve it by having stricter standards in some cases). I would have thought that had a perfectly legitimate reason to be concerned if they are either told in advance or find out on site that someone lacking the correct experience is running a site or doing something else beyond their means. Whether they can actually do it or not is almost irrelevant, everyone's got to prove themselves at some point by pushing their level of experience, but the curator could quite justifiably be very unimpressed. Equally, someone who is supposedly experienced and capable could still totally balls something up. The point is that archaeology being a finite resource and the fact that you can't put it back once you've dug it up means that they need to be assured it will be done properly before the fieldwork starts. The easy way in which curators can do this, rather than reading everyone's CVs, is to know that when a project says it is being run by a PO/supervisor it actually is. The interchangability (is that a word?)of staff is often another example of how people get exploited - doing work above their level and not getting paid accordingly.
Seeing it as a business risk seems a little short sighted, plus what kind of business would get excited about the additional profit made using a supervisor rather than a PO?!
Dragons Den pitch: instead of making no money per day using a PO we would project a profit of ?10 per day using a supervisor!!!