In order to enter the electronic information system which is the office of the future, you simply key in on your computer terminal. This is the equivalent of unlocking your office door and gaining access to your desk and files. First, you'll probably call up your electronic calendar to check over your day's schedule, and then, perhaps, review the calendars of your subordinates to ensure that they have a full day ahead of them. Then.. you call up your electronic in-basket. You notice an electronic memo from your boss; she wants to see you in her office at 1400 hours. Quickly, you key in a reply and have it routed electronically to her electronic mailbox or in-basket. Next you read a letter from a colleague in a regional office, who would like to see the notes you made on a conference you recently attended. These notes are in your personal electronic files. To send her a copy, you simply key access to the file, type in the command and your colleague's name, and the job is done. No need to hunt out the address or copy it; the address will be in the electronic directory. No need to run off a copy; the notes in digital form will be accessed automatically.

In one office, where I did my research for Women and the Chip, the senior professional managerial group with desktop terminals use the electronic information system to do up to 75 per cent of what secretaries used to do for them. They refer affectionately to the system as "my electronic secretary."

I noticed that they've developed a curious shorthand for their electronic messages and memos. For instance, one executive had written: I want 2 C U 4. . . ," I was amazed, but also somewhat chilled at this additional indication of how writing as a separate activity is disappearing through automation. With word processors, we're seeing the automation of retyping, which has been estimated to account for some 70 per cent of typing time. With optical scanner units, we're seeing printed material converted into electronic form without the need of a keypunch operator or data-entry clerk. And with computer systems increasingly being able to interface or talk to each other, there is no need for a human intermediary there either. Hence, retraining women from writing on paper to writing on terminals is a short-term measure at most. Already there is a decline in demand for data-entry clerks. Key punch operators are obsolete. And in the much vaunted, new occupation of word processing, when I was speaking in Peterborough, Ontario last spring, the local Manpower official on the panel with me informed us that there were some 700 unemployed word processor operators in the Peterborough district.

In addressing this issue, we have also to address the need for a new approach to the design of jobs, to accommodate the rapid obsolescence which has become, if not a permanent feature, then at least a prominent characteristic of this period of transition into the computer age. And we must consider this for more than just office workers, since computerization is transforming every sector of our economy, every type of workplace imaginable. Throughout the service sector, the work associated with delivering services is being substantially automated. That's saying a lot, because most people employed in service industries are involved in delivering services, rather than developing or marketing them. Here, too, we're talking about some 30 per cent of the women who work; these include bank tellers and telephone operators. These jobs are commonly referred to as female job ghettos, because of their high concentration of women and, most significantly, because of their lack of opportunities for advancement. Hence, as computerization advances, automation takes over the work these women do; they are left with nothing to do; they are left behind.

Let me give you a couple of examples. In the telephone industry, the telephone operator used to physically plug cords into a switchboard in order to connect long-distance calls. Now all the skill and knowledge associated with that work has been incorporated into a computer program, and the calls are connected automatically through the electronic exchanges. In the banks, the automatic banking machines (also called automated tellers) represent the final piece in the automated system through which banks now deliver services to bank customers. The skill and knowledge associated with expediting deposits, transfers, etc., are now incorporated in the software, which is activated by the bank customer using the sidewalk terminal on a self-serve basis.

There have been some dramatic reductions in employment. For instance, Citibank Corp., on the forefront of banking automation in the U.S., reduced its teller and other support staff from 10,500 to 5,000 while introducing banking and related automated systems through the course of the 1970s. An insurance company, cited in a University of Calgary study, reduced its typing, secretarial staff by 30 per cent while introducing automation through the 1970s.

I identified three overall trends in my research which, together, spell trouble for women. First, I found a consistent decline in the labour requirements at the level of support staff. Second, there is an increase and intensification of work at a more professional, specialized level of work. Third, there is a growing skills gap between these two levels of work - on the one level, merely handling information, while on the more professional level, using information in analysis, decision-making and so on.