Background
At the job I had for 24 years at a CPA firm, I started out in 1980 as a "secretary" (we don't even use that term anymore) making $250/week. In 1982, the firm decided to "go computerized" and bought two IBM PCs (floppy disk type, no hard drive). They cost $10,000 each, so it was a huge investment for them.
They wanted to use them for tax preparation and financial statements. The floppies were 5-1/4" disks and there was one for the system (program) and one for the data. The computer would not even boot up without the system disk (called "DOS").
One computer was given to me, and one was given to another secretary and we were told to work together to get these systems going. The DOS book had all the commands and we had to teach ourselves. I took it home every night, she never even looked at it. The tax system was linked to a server a whole state away and all of the teaching was done by techs via phone. The financial statements were done using a word processing program called "Wordstar." That, at least, had a manual.
In one year, I had both going strong. The other secretary either could not comprehend it or didn't want to participate. She was given one program to master, "Lotus," and she used to spend hours crying. They finally gave that computer and program to a young CPA who figured it out.
I had tax input forms piled up on a counter next to me and on the floor next to my desk every morning when I came in. By the end of the day, I had them all done. I worked a lot of OT, not compensated. They were sent via modem to the server in PA by the end of each day. We would then get the hard copies back from them within a week. Eventually we were able to get HP printers in-house to print them ourselves, and within a year and a half we were entirely self-contained with that program. Many, many updates came after that. I handled them all.
Compensation
My yearly reviews were always perfect, they never even filled out the form. They praised my work and offered me 8% raises. After a year or two of that, I began to realize my value to the company. I started asking for much higher increases. Whatever they offered, I doubled it, and I got it. To make a long story short, and after I had run the "computer department" for over ten years, I was making more than the new young CPA hires.
By the time I retired in 2004, I was making over $1,500 per week, and I still knew that had I been a man I would have made more, as I was running two servers and 36 workstations, and still doing it alone. I was responsible for all hardware and software updates, and after Windows arrived, the program updates had to be done on each workstation computer and we had at least 30 programs by then. When we were still on DOS, I only had to update the servers. Windows made my job much harder and far more time consuming.
Yet I was still typing financial statements (by this time using MS Word) and doing secretarial work for two of my bosses, one of whom would just sit in a chair next to me and talk while I typed. Within just minutes, we could get a full page letter dictated, typed, and printed out to be mailed. I had stopped using steno a long time ago. The other boss would just say, "send a letter to so-and-so and tell him . . . (whatever)." I always had to rewrite his letters anyway, his dictation was so horrible.
I guess I should end this what some may consider braggadocio post by saying, they considered me a tough customer, they were not fond of me. Yet they panicked to the hilt when I told them at age 66 that I was moving and would be retiring. I gave them four months notice. A few weeks before the deadline, one of my bosses came into my office and asked "are you really going to do this?" I answered yes. He came back after a meeting I saw taking place in one of their offices, and asked me to write a manual with all of my contacts and everything I did. I did that for them. It was twenty pages long.
I wound up being adequately paid because I spoke up. I knew I would never get what a man would have gotten, but I did make good money, had a significant 401k and had signed up for their Long Term Health Care Plan (thank goodness) which I have been getting benefits from since 2010.
Oh, and in keeping with a couple of other posts, I didn't care that they didn't love me. I was dealing with the harsh reality that no one was going to support me, that I was on my own, and had been since my girls were little children.
Formerly Ford1224
We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Elie Wiesel 1986
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