Conrad's comments notwithstanding, I think we moved quickly away from Julie's circumstance, which is a grant-funded project not intended to provide employment. The issue is fair compensation for archaeologists, particularly, but not exclusively, those just beginning or considering the field as a career. I can speak most knowledgeably about commercial archaeology, although I've pulled a stint or two as an adjunct professor at several colleges in which the pay rate was a fraction of the combined pay and benefits offered full-time faculty to teach the same courses.

In commercial archaeology, significant amounts of money get sucked up in overhead and profit, and the pay difference between management and labor can be very wide. Government funded projects are particularly expensive, and yet the field and lab people who staff them probably earn less than the folks who work on my small private sector jobs. A more eqitable arrangement no doubt is possible. I think we need more ideas about how to increase the material rewards of professional archaeology, because, in the end, job satisfaction doesn't pay for housing and doesn't keep the pantry full. Keeping rates low means only those with other sources of income or wealth can afford to be practicing archaeologists, and we will revert to the elitist discipline we once were. And we will lose talent that we sorely need. My current business model grew out of frustration in not being able to hold on to some very talented staffers.

I'd like to hear some of those ideas in this continuing thread.
 
 
 
James G. Gibb

Gibb Archaeological Consulting

2554 Carrollton Road

Annapolis, Maryland USA ?? 21403

443.482.9593 (Land) 410.693.3847 (Cell)

www.gibbarchaeology.net ? www.porttobacco.blogspot.com
 
On 09/15/13, Martha Zierden<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
 
It appears to me that Dr. King has developed a very interesting research
project and has managed to raise X amount of money. Folks can choose to
apply for the positions, or not.



On Sun, Sep 15, 2013 at 9:13 AM, Conrad Bladey <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> It saddens me as a professional to see minimalist presence or absence
> archeology dominating the field- in the future it will be viewed as only
> minimally better than pot hunting- availability of funding has not brought
> more science but less-I can't count the number of crm style report
> presentations which were totally devoid of anthropology. It is all just
> look what we found. And as pointed out here crew pay does not qualify as
> real employment-at this point reset calls for less money rather than
> more-there is no way money can ever be found to do adequate work-archeology
> needs to be a public life way -not just a profession-we have not made the
> same progress as the ecological movement -largely due to professional
> snobbery-I have already posted out the waste of funds by professionals-a
> significant problem exists with the exploitation of volunteers for profit
> taking-the entire field needs rebuilding-
>
> Conrad Bladey
>
> Thank you in advance for your prompt response!
>
>
> On Sep 15, 2013, at 7:58 AM, Jim <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> >
> > For what it is worth, I have occasional recourse to a quip when my
> clients try pressuring me: archaeology is like dentistry; rushing it could
> prove painful.
> > That said, I've found most of the postings on this subject to be
> client-focused. It's a little like writing about generals and generalship
> without regard for the people who actually fight the battles.
> > Is it possible that a well-paid crew, loyal to employers they know put
> their health, welfare, and future first, perform better and help produce
> products that are good, fast, and cheap? Certainly that has been my
> experience, but I dare not extrapolate from a sample of one, and an
> admittedly biased sample at that.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > James G. Gibb
> >
> > Gibb Archaeological Consulting
> >
> > 2554 Carrollton Road
> >
> > Annapolis, Maryland USA ?? 21403
> >
> > 443.482.9593 (Land) 410.693.3847 (Cell)
> >
> > www.gibbarchaeology.net ? www.porttobacco.blogspot.com
> >
> > On 09/14/13, Boyer, Jeffrey, DCA<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > Many years ago, a colleague and friend taught me the basic equation of
> contracting: "Good. Cheap. Fast. Pick Two."
> > This holds whether one is getting a house built or a site dug in front
> of the bulldozers. I have to say, with sincere apologies to Chico Escuela,
> "Archaeology been berry berry good to me," but "berry berry good" has not
> always included a salary equivalent in value (in my mind) to knowledge and
> experience. I know very few archaeologists who are not or have not been
> willing to start at the bottom and work up but we all know we'd like to get
> paid up as we work up.
> > What most of us run into over and over and over with private and public
> sector clients is their apparent desire to get all three and, if not, to
> get cheap and fast. Looking at it from the client side, as that same
> colleague and friend showed me, what they need and, therefore, want from us
> is a document or set of documents confirming that their planning and
> development process met the relevant, necessary legal requirements. As all
> CRMers know, or better figure out, our branch of
> archaeology-as-a-profession is a branch created by laws and regulations,
> without which client-driven archaeology would not be full of grads and
> post-grads looking for work. An industry created and maintained by laws and
> regulations has the feeling of being pretty wobbly and justifiably so given
> the see-saw fluctuations in public political will. We work, those of us on
> the client-driven side of archaeology, in an industry required by law and
> regulation and for our clients the ultimate product are thos
> e
> >
> >
> > legal documents that allow them to proceed with whatever they have
> planned. In that environment, is it any wonder that the primary
> requirements for selecting some of us over others of us are cheap and fast?
> Good is great until it impacts cheap and fast in ways that lead to more
> expensive and slower.
> > My son, a born entrepreneur if ever there was one, contends that
> contractors -- he is one, in an entirely different profession, one that I
> would think would wax and wane a lot with financial vicissitudes but which
> actually keeps him not only very busy but doing quite well at it -- must
> set for themselves and for their clients the difference between cost and
> value. Admittedly, in his profession, good is the primary goal of most
> clients but cheap and fast are highly desirable. His challenge, then, is to
> help his clients see that good is not a matter of cheap or fast or a matter
> separate from cheap and fast, but a matter of value, that there is
> considerably more value in the expertise and, therefore, the product of
> someone who is good, and that value is sacrificed when buried beneath cheap
> and fast. As he tells me frequently (paraphrasing), "Almost anyone can do
> what I do. Hardly anyone can do it the way I do it. That's my value in the
> situation. Are potential clients concerne
> d
> >
> >
> > with the value of my experience and expertise? If so, then they become
> clients. If not, then they don't. I'm not interested in having clients who
> aren't interested in the value of my experience and expertise and can't or
> won't see that value reflected in how good my work is." His mother and I
> have been very concerned about what appears to be an elitist business model
> -- "Can you afford to turn down clients?" we have often asked in fear for
> the security of his business -- but, we have to admit, it works well for
> him.
> > The other side of that model is epitomized by those situations, with
> which we are all familiar, in which contractors underbid all competition
> and either 1) produce results that are not good, to their own detriment and
> that of the rest of us, and end up blackballed (and hopefully go out of
> business or change their ways) because their work is so shoddy, or 2) go
> out of business trying to do good, cheap, and fast all at once and ending
> up taking financially impossible losses on contract fees.
> > Since one can only select two of the three aspects of contracting, and
> since, with precious few exceptions, pretty much all of us want to do good
> work, work that contributes to understanding the human past as well as work
> that provides our clients with their necessary legal documentation, I
> suspect that my son is right and we must, ourselves, identify value in our
> experience, our expertise, and our capability, helping our clients
> understand that value -- contrary to discount-store advertising -- is not
> found exclusively in cheap and fast, that they get value when we are
> allowed to work with them to identify what is good and find appropriate,
> relevant ways to balance that with cost and speed. After all, who knows
> more about what is good work than the people who do good work? The client
> might well identify the scope of work but we can and should identify the
> value of work: we know what it takes, how long it takes, and how much it
> should cost to generate a consistently good pr
> od
> >
> >
> > uct and that is our value. If we don't, then it's time to find another
> profession.
> >
> >
>