3rd June 2009, 05:13 PM
This is all very gratifying. As one of the authors of the CoC I am delighted that it is being used and discussed. Mr 1man1desk is absolutely spot-on in his understanding of the purpose and use of the CoC and I woudl be delighted if he woudl contact me. Those of you too miserly to buy a copy of the CoC and GN will probbaly find copies in their local technical university library. All other professions publish their CoCs and no-one thinks twice about buying a copy - you have only to do it once. For the record, I attended all-day meetings in London, once a month for c. 3 years - unpaid. I'll leave you all to work out how much it cost me personally.
It's only shortcoming is that it assumes (as did the non-archaeologists on the CCSJC) that professional archaeologists have a working understanding of contract law - and few do - and that we had appropropriate pricing and 'valuation' mechanisms - which we don't. See my articles in TA about Measured Work etc. It would benfit from us drawing up compatible CoC's for sub-contracting (all specialists are sub-contractors)and a range of 'valuation' mechanisms for the different types of work we undertake.
For those of you thinking about revision of it, I'll relate a quick exchange that took place at the final meeting of the CoC Working Group that illustrates the enormous gulf in professional understanding between archaeologists and the big boys in suits, in this case Civil Engineers.
(Scene: boardroom with long table packed with suits, male and female, and two blokes in sports jackets; side board groaning with top notch sandwiches, tea and fruit juice. The last revisions to the draft have been agreed with resident barrister and it is set to go to the printers).
Senior officer of the IFA: "What are the arrangements for review and revision of the CoC during its first few years of use ?"
Stern-looking suit at head of table: "We will review it when a judge tells us to."
Welcome to the real world..
Mike Heaton
mike@michaelheaton.co.uk
michael j heaton
It's only shortcoming is that it assumes (as did the non-archaeologists on the CCSJC) that professional archaeologists have a working understanding of contract law - and few do - and that we had appropropriate pricing and 'valuation' mechanisms - which we don't. See my articles in TA about Measured Work etc. It would benfit from us drawing up compatible CoC's for sub-contracting (all specialists are sub-contractors)and a range of 'valuation' mechanisms for the different types of work we undertake.
For those of you thinking about revision of it, I'll relate a quick exchange that took place at the final meeting of the CoC Working Group that illustrates the enormous gulf in professional understanding between archaeologists and the big boys in suits, in this case Civil Engineers.
(Scene: boardroom with long table packed with suits, male and female, and two blokes in sports jackets; side board groaning with top notch sandwiches, tea and fruit juice. The last revisions to the draft have been agreed with resident barrister and it is set to go to the printers).
Senior officer of the IFA: "What are the arrangements for review and revision of the CoC during its first few years of use ?"
Stern-looking suit at head of table: "We will review it when a judge tells us to."
Welcome to the real world..
Mike Heaton
mike@michaelheaton.co.uk
michael j heaton