下載個APP當助理 Secretary apps can never be as good as the real thing

What tools do you use at work that you didn’t a decade ago? That’s the question I posed to a group of friends recently, hoping for a host of interesting examples of how technology is transforming the workplace.

有哪些你正在使用的辦公工具是10年前沒有的？這是我最近向一羣朋友提出的一個問題，希望能夠收穫一堆關於技術正在如何轉變工作場所面貌的有趣例子。

But the responses from a disparate group that included insurance brokers, speech therapists and entrepreneurs surprised me. All the new digital products they rated were, in effect, secretary substitutes.

但是，這個由保險經紀人、言語矯治師以及企業家等組成的差異很大的人羣給出的答案讓我意外。他們列出的所有新式數字產品實際上都是祕書替代品。

I heard paeans to the utility of Skyscanner for corporate travel, the benefits of Google Docs for holiday rotas and the value of EchoSign for electronic signature of documents.

我聽到的稱讚是：航班搜索網站Skyscanner安排商務差旅是多麼有用，用谷歌文檔(Google Docs)安排輪流休假是多麼便利，用EchoSign軟件在文件上進行電子簽名是多麼有價值。

Regardless of industry or seniority, document encryption services and tools designed to prevent endless email trails also cropped up with regularity.

不論是在哪個行業，也不論級別多高，人們還都會提到文檔加密服務以及爲防止沒完沒了的電子郵件往來而設計的工具。

This is self-service in action and a vivid example of why administrative jobs frequently top the list as those Most at risk from automation.

這是自助式服務的生動實例，它也形象地說明了行政類職位爲何頻頻“領銜”受自動化威脅最大的工作榜單。

Back in 2001, there were nearly 400,000 secretarial and personal assistant roles in the UK. Now there are fewer than 200,000.

2001年時，英國有近40萬個祕書及個人助理類職位，而現在僅有不到20萬個。

The disappearance of that person who used to be the linchpin of office life has been driven by a combination of cost-cutting in the wake of the financial crisis — there was a 12 per cent drop in such roles between 2009 and 2010 alone — and the internet revolution.

曾在辦公室生活中扮演關鍵角色的人的消失，受到兩個因素的聯合推動：一是金融危機過後的削減成本（從2009年至2010年，祕書及個人助理類職位的數量就下降了12%），二是互聯網革命。

Administrators’ salaries proved a tempting target for businesses desperate to trim budgets, with the bonus that cuts could be billed as modernisation and as embracing new ways of working.

對於急於削減預算的企業來說，行政類職位的薪酬被證明是一個誘人的靶子；砍掉此類職位還能帶來額外好處：比如美其名曰“現代化”以及擁抱新的工作方式。

But has the efficiency drive gone too far? The days when companies needed someone to type letters and file correspondence physically are long gone, but the digital era has brought its own version of the administrative grind. The work has not gone away, it has just been dispersed across the workforce.

但對效率的追求是否已走得太遠？企業需要某人來打字並將紙質信函存檔的舊時光早已遠去，但數字時代帶來了自己版本的行政苦差。這些工作並沒有消失，而只是被廣泛分散給了員工隊伍。

While phasing out jobs that just “turn the handle” is all part of the move to a higher skilled workforce, there are consequences. A recent survey from Qualtrics found UK workers estimate that less than 65 per cent of the time they spend at work is productive. The hours wasted spent trying to get a computerised approval system to understand an edge case are staples of many a pub rant.

雖然淘汰那種僅僅“轉動把手”的工作是向更高技能員工隊伍轉型進程的一部分，但這是有後果的。調查公司Qualtrics近期的一項調查顯示，英國的工薪階層人士估計，他們在工作場所僅有不到65%的時間是有成效的。爲了試圖讓計算機審批系統理解某個特例所浪費的大量時間，是人們在酒吧吐槽的常見內容。

Vickie Sokol Evans, who trains Bill Gates’ executive assistants, and those in other organisations, in Microsoft technology, says there is great pressure in all organisations to “do more with less”.

爲比爾•蓋茨(Bill Gates)和其他組織培訓行政助理、使她們掌握微軟(Microsoft)技術的維基•索科爾•埃文斯(Vickie Sokol Evans)表示，各類組織都面臨着巨大壓力，要求它們“用更少的資源辦更多的事”。

But she argues that efficiency comes from using technology well, not just dropping it in front of the workforce and expecting them to get on with it. Is it really more efficient for 20 sales people to all do their own expenses and travel, or can one person who really understands both the software and the rules help remove some of the grit from the wheels of corporate life?

但她指出，效率來自於對技術的有效利用，而不是僅僅將技術扔給員工，然後期待他們自己搞定。讓20名銷售人員都自行處理他們個人的費用報銷以及差旅事務真的更有效率嗎，抑或一個既懂軟件又瞭解相關規章制度的人有助於讓公司生活少一點煩擾？

That would also mean the sales team could be out there doing what they were hired to do: selling.

這還意味着，銷售隊伍能夠騰出時間履行他們的本職工作：推銷產品。

Top executives, of course, have managed to hang on to their secretaries — nowadays more often than not termed executive assistants. But these roles are far broader than they used to be.

當然，頂級高管們設法保住了他們的祕書——現在這類職位往往被稱爲“行政助理”。但這些崗位如今的職責範圍比過去廣泛多了。

Monitoring budgets, preparing reports, designing slidedecks and similar tasks are increasingly part of the required skillset. A recent survey by Hays for Executive Secretary — whose conference Ms Sokol Evans will address in London next week — reported that nearly 90 per cent of senior staff said they could not to do their jobs without their PA.

監控預算、撰寫報告、設計幻燈片，諸如此類的任務日益成爲行政助理的必備技能。獵頭公司Hays近期爲《行政祕書》(Executive Secretary)雜誌所做的一項調查顯示，約90%的高級職員表示，沒有個人助理的話，他們做不了自己的工作。（索科爾•埃文斯女士將在該雜誌於倫敦舉辦的會議上發言。）

Peggy Grande, who was executive assistant to US President Ronald Reagan for 10 years, says no amount of technology or progress towards virtual assistants can make up for the human factor. “It is about not just what needs to be accomplished now, but staying three steps ahead,” she adds.

佩吉•格蘭德(Peggy Grande)曾爲美國前總統羅納德•里根(Ronald Reagan)當了10年的行政助理。她表示，沒有什麼技術或是虛擬助手領域的突破能夠替代人的因素。她補充稱：“這不僅關乎目前必須完成的任務，還要走在前面，超前三步。”

Ms Sokol Evans says she knows of at least one multinational that is reviewing its career options for PAs and is looking to create a twin track structure: one path for those who want to push for more responsibility and widen the definition of their role and another for those who get job satisfaction from ensuring systems actually work.

索科爾•埃文斯女士表示，據她所知，至少有一家跨國公司正在評估其向個人助理提供的職業發展選擇，並正在試圖構建一種雙軌結構：一條面向那些想要承擔更大責任、拓展自身角色定位的人，另一條面向那些從確保系統有效運轉獲得工作成就感的人。

The pace of the digital revolution shows no signs of slackening and few office jobs will be the same in a decade. But that means the need to help humans and systems gel is more pressing. Sometimes a calm, helping hand can deliver greater efficiency gains than a software upgrade.

數字革命的速度沒有顯示出任何放緩的跡象，10年後幾乎不會有哪項辦公室工作還保持今天的面貌。但這也意味着，幫助人類員工和數字系統有效融合的任務變得愈發迫切。有些時候，一個沉着冷靜的人類幫手能夠比一次軟件升級帶來更顯著的效率提升。