Chapter 4

THE GIRL AT WORK IN AN OFFICE

The girl who hopes to succeed in office work should be able to spell correctly and should have a good general English education. It is true that some girls have taught themselves to spell correctly after they have entered business offices; and ambitious, sensible girls, who find that letters dictated to them contain words the meaning of which they do not know, study until their vocabularies are greatly enlarged and improved. But, while they are learning, the employer is not receiving the service to which he is entitled.

The only practical way for the average girl to enter a business office is by studying stenography. But to have a really satisfactory school training, the girl who means to be a stenographer should be ready to pass the entrance examination into a college or university. Three or four years' attendance at a high or secondary school is a necessary preparation for first-class office work. The girl who is a college graduate is not too well equipped to be a stenographer. Even if a girl is compelled, by the necessity of earning her living, to begin office work early, still she can, by determination, courage, and hard work, equip herself with a good business education. But it is only the exceptional girl who can do this. The girl who wishes to engage in office work should have three years, if possible, in a good secondary school, before she enters a business college.

The business college should be chosen carefully, and the girl in training should attend the classes for nine months or a year. This is the least time required for satisfactory training. Unfortunately, too many students take only six months, or even three, at a business school. The result is that they begin work only partly equipped with training for the office. Many employers complain that stenographers are incompetent and careless. One reason for this is that they have not had sufficient training; their stenography, typewriting, and other instruction have been only half mastered. Office work would be a better employment for girls if these half-trained and incompetent workers were not lowering wages, irritating employers, and limiting the work and responsibility with which girls would be entrusted if the average stenographer knew her work thoroughly.

The girl who leaves a business college to enter an office should not feel that there is nothing more to learn. No one can be a thoroughly competent stenographer until she has been a year at work in an office. The school teaches her how to handle her working tools. But the real problems of office work are solved only in the office. There are endless details to be mastered. Every office has its own rules and customs and its own methods. It is necessary to learn how to meet people and deal with them. The girl must study the people with whom she works. She must learn how her employer likes to have his work done. The best workers keep on learning year by year.

Many of the qualities which go to make the ideal home-maker belong to the ideal worker in an office. The business girl will need self-control and tact. Her manners should be quiet and agreeable. An office is a place for work; and part of the usefulness of a business girl is in helping to make it a good place in which to work. She should therefore understand order and method. She should be tranquil and well poised. She should get her work done quickly without seeming to be in a hurry. Such a girl is a treasure in an office.

The business girl should be dressed suitably for her occupation. One of the first lessons for her to learn is that no employer is likely to believe that she can do good work if her general appearance is careless or untidy. Her dress should be quiet and pleasing, and it should not distract her attention from her work. A workmanlike dress can be very attractive. Business girls as a rule show taste and judgment in choosing their clothes and in keeping every detail of their appearance neat, suitable, and pleasing. Thrift in the matter of dressing and a suitable appearance are necessary factors in the success of a business girl's work.

The business girl must be trustworthy. She cannot be a success if her employer is in doubt as to whether she may talk about office business outside. Her memory should be good. It is a great help to have someone at hand who can remember a business conversation, where to find documents, addresses, and other memoranda. The girl will find that it is unsatisfactory to spend much time in social conversation. If she wishes to earn and keep the good opinion of her fellow-workers and her employer, she will attend to work, with only an occasional remark on anything not connected with office affairs.

The salaries earned by business girls vary greatly. There are girls at work in offices who are paid as little as five, six, or seven dollars a week. But these girls are very young, they are badly trained, unable to do good work of any kind, and they should hardly be called stenographers. They can address envelopes, do a little typewriting, answer the telephone, and so on. The well-equipped office girl should realize that she must keep up the standard of her employment, as one which needs thorough training and competent, well paid workers, so the work of the girl in business may remain a highly-respected and desirable occupation.

The supply of first-class office workers is never sufficient to meet the demand. A common wage for younger competent stenographers who have had some experience is twelve dollars. Experienced stenographers may get fifteen, eighteen, twenty, or twenty-five dollars, according to the positions they occupy, the character of the work, and the responsibility involved. Girls with managing ability may be promoted to hold important positions. They may become assistant managers of offices or confidential clerks or secretaries. Women in these positions receive salaries of from two to three thousand dollars a year. In an exceptional case a woman who is a manager may receive four or five thousand. But such positions and such women workers are rare indeed. Eighteen dollars a week is regarded as a good salary for a capable stenographer of some years' experience. The average stenographer receives as a rule two weeks' holidays with wages. This is an important consideration for it helps to secure her health and general well-being.

It is often said that a small office offers the best opportunity for a clever girl to win promotion. She is given work of all kinds to do and can make herself indispensable to her employer. On the other hand, the work may be easier in a large office since it is organized on well-established lines. Salaries, generally speaking, are higher in large offices, but there are fewer opportunities for promotion.

An unusually competent office girl with some capital may become a public stenographer. But, in order to succeed, she must have business ability and should understand clearly what she can afford and what she cannot afford in office equipment, rent, and so on. The work of a public stenographer is very exacting. Many stenographers are employed in the service of the Government. In general, an examination is required for a position in the civil service. The work and hours are regular and not exacting, and the pay is good. Many girls, however, find work in a business office more interesting, and opportunities for promotion are also better.

Some girls who have not the ability to become expert stenographers, may be exceptionally good typists. Such girls may find employment in typing letters from phonographs or dictaphones. Work with multigraphs, adding-machines, or comptometers is required in larger offices. Special positions may be obtained by girls who are of a mechanical turn or who have considerable manual dexterity. The girl who devotes herself to bookkeeping, if she has special ability, may occupy an important business position.

In whatever capacity she may be employed, the earnest and competent office-worker will find herself highly valued and well paid for her share of responsibility in the world of financial and commercial development.