19th December 2010, 12:05 PM
(This post was last modified: 19th December 2010, 12:12 PM by Milton.)
Odinn,
Thanks for your response.
I fully agree that the set-up for county units varies from county to county, both in terms of their political and financial relationships with their own councils. Evidently our experiences of local authority archaeology are very different, and obviously I can only comment on my own experience, and those of my colleagues who were also ex-local authority at some point or other.
'I am certainly aware of clients that are unhappy about dealing with in-house council field units. While this is true of some council units, as I found when working in one area of the country for an external unit, it is definitely not the case with others. One council unit I worked for was constantly at loggerheads with the curatorial staff in the same council, who appeared to treat it much less well than they did even the dodgier private units. This went as far as the curators leaving the council unit off the list of units that had worked in the county, or, in one memorable case, scrawling obscenities next to the name of the unit on a list that went to a client.'
Taking this point about relationship between curator and unit, the examples in my region (and I’m referring to three local authorities) are all broadly similar i.e. ‘cosy’ chats, co-habiting in the same building, examples of curators recommending services provided by the unit and a poor level of review by the curator of the unit’s written outputs. The curators are guilty of practising one or more of these infringements of best practice. Incidentally, it also doesn’t help when people in the curatorial sections are married, or in relationships with, staff who work in the field sections.
'What lower overheads? In my experience, council units have higher overheads because they have to contribute to the overall council admin budget, among other things.'
In terms of funding, I can give first hand experience of my own county of how the unit is effectively subsidised by the council:
To be fair the situation in my own county might have changed since I left local government some years ago, but the unit principal always was very guarded about telling people about how much the Council subsidised the field section, even to the extent of being un-cooperative with his own senior Council staff about the same issues, as they weren’t clear of the situation either!
'Although the field sections are chiefly self-funding, the subsidies do make a difference to their charging rates, and therefore assist competitiveness against private companies who have to factor in all the usual overheads into their fees.
So how does this contribute to the lower overheads of the council unit that you mentioned before? It sounds more like it would increase their overheads.'
If the Councils are prepared to bail out the unit every year owing to loss-makers, then the incentive to let go off unproductive staff is reduced.
'I'm not convinced that there is only a narrow band of the public that is interested in archaeology. If this is the case, how do you explain the enduring popularity of programmes such as Time Team? It would not still be on the air if it were not a commercial success. The key here is not that archaeology is only of limited interest, but that it needs to be taken to the interested members of the public and promoted. If they are made aware of the work that is being done, they are likely to become more interested in archaeology in general. This leads in to the question of whether archaeology is a service for the community or not. If it is not, then why do we do it and why do developers have to pay for it? For that matter, why do councils have curatorial staff? If archaeology is not a service for the community then the council should not be involved in it in any way, manner or form. As such, there should be no council organisations dedicated to it at any level. Leave it to those that are interested in it to have a go when they can be bothered and remove it from the development agenda. After all, why should developers pay for something that is of no real benefit to the community either?'
I wasn’t suggesting that archaeology should not be part of local authority services. That would run counter to my own interests for a start, as most of the work that I do is generated by local authority policy and planning requirements. I was merely pointing out that most people aren’t that interested in what we do, despite the healthy figures that Time Team gets (whatever they are, but I’ll assume they’re healthy). Assuming for one moment that TT is an accurate barometer of the nation’s interest in archaeology that still leaves the rest of the nation that doesn’t watch it. Which is a lot of people.
'I have seen poor product from both council and private companies. There is little correlation between the quality of the work done and the ties or lack thereof to the council.'
I fully agree with you. That’s my experience too. The onus is on curators not to accept average products and make sure that WSI are of a higher quality than at present, and that the field unit in question are held to their commitment to fulfill those terms. Some of the meaningless generic WSI that curator’s accept from units, both county and private, do them little credit. If the curators are accepting poor product, then that is their fault and not the fault of the companies who produce them.
'In my experience very few clients are interested in good quality reports. They are predominantly interested in cheap reports that are good enough to get accepted by the curator. Getting the job done cheaply and with a minimum of fuss will get you repeat business, not producing a brilliant report that eloquently discusses the site's importance in the field of penis sheath typologies and places the site in its global context.
It also leads to greater exploitation of staff as the units cut corners to meet their target budgets by reducing wages, etc., and staff wind up having to work evenings and weekends for free to meet their deadlines or they get sacked despite the fact that the unrealistic deadlines were given to them by the owners of the company.'
If companies are exploiting staff then the staff are free to go and work for someone else who will value them more highly. Ultimately the company will lose out from losing their skills and experience and will be less likely to function well without them. Voting with your feet is the most effective way of ensuring better working conditions all round. I’ve had to work evenings and weekends for the same reasons, both as a field archaeologist (this was less common) and as a consultant (more commonly). I accept that a certain amount of additional work is required beyond what you’re paid to do. This is what the economy is like these days. People increasingly have to work outside of their comfort zones. I’d love to do my 37.50 hours a week and stop working on the dot, but that’s just not a reality. I also accept that doing additional work is stretching me, and to an extent that is good, as it assists my professional development and stops me from developing too much of a comfort zone.
GnomeKing – In summary I believe the government’s role should be a minimal one, and that their chief responsibilities should include internal security (security services, police and their various support services). That is why the dismantling of the FIU is a disgrace.
I’m sure you are experienced, intelligent and very good at your job. I just don’t think you should be paid for what you do by local or central government unless your role is a curatorial one.
In your previous posts you seemed to make the inferences that county units set the standard for archaeological practice throughout the country. I hope I’ve provided an alternative perspective.
Red Earth – well said.
Thanks for your response.
I fully agree that the set-up for county units varies from county to county, both in terms of their political and financial relationships with their own councils. Evidently our experiences of local authority archaeology are very different, and obviously I can only comment on my own experience, and those of my colleagues who were also ex-local authority at some point or other.
'I am certainly aware of clients that are unhappy about dealing with in-house council field units. While this is true of some council units, as I found when working in one area of the country for an external unit, it is definitely not the case with others. One council unit I worked for was constantly at loggerheads with the curatorial staff in the same council, who appeared to treat it much less well than they did even the dodgier private units. This went as far as the curators leaving the council unit off the list of units that had worked in the county, or, in one memorable case, scrawling obscenities next to the name of the unit on a list that went to a client.'
Taking this point about relationship between curator and unit, the examples in my region (and I’m referring to three local authorities) are all broadly similar i.e. ‘cosy’ chats, co-habiting in the same building, examples of curators recommending services provided by the unit and a poor level of review by the curator of the unit’s written outputs. The curators are guilty of practising one or more of these infringements of best practice. Incidentally, it also doesn’t help when people in the curatorial sections are married, or in relationships with, staff who work in the field sections.
'What lower overheads? In my experience, council units have higher overheads because they have to contribute to the overall council admin budget, among other things.'
In terms of funding, I can give first hand experience of my own county of how the unit is effectively subsidised by the council:
- Preferential rates of rent for accommodation i.e. below the private sector market value for the offices they occupy;
- Free IT support as part of the Council system;
- Paid Bank holidays;
- Paid sick leave;
- The unit could produce a deficit at the end of every year (and for a period of many years they more often than not did) and the Council would bail them out, just so long as the loss was within ‘acceptable limits’.
To be fair the situation in my own county might have changed since I left local government some years ago, but the unit principal always was very guarded about telling people about how much the Council subsidised the field section, even to the extent of being un-cooperative with his own senior Council staff about the same issues, as they weren’t clear of the situation either!
'Although the field sections are chiefly self-funding, the subsidies do make a difference to their charging rates, and therefore assist competitiveness against private companies who have to factor in all the usual overheads into their fees.
So how does this contribute to the lower overheads of the council unit that you mentioned before? It sounds more like it would increase their overheads.'
If the Councils are prepared to bail out the unit every year owing to loss-makers, then the incentive to let go off unproductive staff is reduced.
'I'm not convinced that there is only a narrow band of the public that is interested in archaeology. If this is the case, how do you explain the enduring popularity of programmes such as Time Team? It would not still be on the air if it were not a commercial success. The key here is not that archaeology is only of limited interest, but that it needs to be taken to the interested members of the public and promoted. If they are made aware of the work that is being done, they are likely to become more interested in archaeology in general. This leads in to the question of whether archaeology is a service for the community or not. If it is not, then why do we do it and why do developers have to pay for it? For that matter, why do councils have curatorial staff? If archaeology is not a service for the community then the council should not be involved in it in any way, manner or form. As such, there should be no council organisations dedicated to it at any level. Leave it to those that are interested in it to have a go when they can be bothered and remove it from the development agenda. After all, why should developers pay for something that is of no real benefit to the community either?'
I wasn’t suggesting that archaeology should not be part of local authority services. That would run counter to my own interests for a start, as most of the work that I do is generated by local authority policy and planning requirements. I was merely pointing out that most people aren’t that interested in what we do, despite the healthy figures that Time Team gets (whatever they are, but I’ll assume they’re healthy). Assuming for one moment that TT is an accurate barometer of the nation’s interest in archaeology that still leaves the rest of the nation that doesn’t watch it. Which is a lot of people.
'I have seen poor product from both council and private companies. There is little correlation between the quality of the work done and the ties or lack thereof to the council.'
I fully agree with you. That’s my experience too. The onus is on curators not to accept average products and make sure that WSI are of a higher quality than at present, and that the field unit in question are held to their commitment to fulfill those terms. Some of the meaningless generic WSI that curator’s accept from units, both county and private, do them little credit. If the curators are accepting poor product, then that is their fault and not the fault of the companies who produce them.
'In my experience very few clients are interested in good quality reports. They are predominantly interested in cheap reports that are good enough to get accepted by the curator. Getting the job done cheaply and with a minimum of fuss will get you repeat business, not producing a brilliant report that eloquently discusses the site's importance in the field of penis sheath typologies and places the site in its global context.
It also leads to greater exploitation of staff as the units cut corners to meet their target budgets by reducing wages, etc., and staff wind up having to work evenings and weekends for free to meet their deadlines or they get sacked despite the fact that the unrealistic deadlines were given to them by the owners of the company.'
If companies are exploiting staff then the staff are free to go and work for someone else who will value them more highly. Ultimately the company will lose out from losing their skills and experience and will be less likely to function well without them. Voting with your feet is the most effective way of ensuring better working conditions all round. I’ve had to work evenings and weekends for the same reasons, both as a field archaeologist (this was less common) and as a consultant (more commonly). I accept that a certain amount of additional work is required beyond what you’re paid to do. This is what the economy is like these days. People increasingly have to work outside of their comfort zones. I’d love to do my 37.50 hours a week and stop working on the dot, but that’s just not a reality. I also accept that doing additional work is stretching me, and to an extent that is good, as it assists my professional development and stops me from developing too much of a comfort zone.
GnomeKing – In summary I believe the government’s role should be a minimal one, and that their chief responsibilities should include internal security (security services, police and their various support services). That is why the dismantling of the FIU is a disgrace.
I’m sure you are experienced, intelligent and very good at your job. I just don’t think you should be paid for what you do by local or central government unless your role is a curatorial one.
In your previous posts you seemed to make the inferences that county units set the standard for archaeological practice throughout the country. I hope I’ve provided an alternative perspective.
Red Earth – well said.