Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-07-22
THE VISITING SECRETARY.
Good One II Rare, Says an Authority
Right Qualifications.

From the New York Tribune.
firm which secures all sorts of places
for self-supporting women says, that the
most difficult sort of employee to find is a
good visiting secretary.
There is an immense amount of visiting
secretary work to be done in New York at
certain times Of the year." said one Of the
firm, land it is going steadily to increase
as rich women grasp the idea that there is
no more reason why they should write their
own letters than sweep their own floors.
There is a large number of women who do
not wish to keep secretary permanently
who want one to come in at intervals. Some
let their correspondence accumulate, and
send for secretary when the heap gets
too big. Others, who like to keep 1t done
up Oh time, have one drop in for an hour
every morning, leaving the letters and notes
OF the mornings mail with a memorandum
or the reply. Many women pay bills only
once month The bills lie unopened until
the end Of the month. Then the visiting
secretary comes in, looks them over for
duplicates and errors. asks the woman II
she bought the things. and makes out the
Checks very simple variety of arith-
metic Is required for this, but good many
girls who want to be visiting secretaries
haven't got it.
for any ordinarily educated woman, but it
Is difficult to get any one who can do 1t
properly. The girl who has had some
money and lost it thinks of visiting secre-
tary work the first form of money earn
ing. She thinks because she has been out
herself, answered invitations of her own
and written her own letters that she is COM
petent to do it for any one else. But her
form and style of letter writing are rarely
good enough for the really fashionable wo-
man. They aren't up to the mark. Then.
ordinarily, she has no accuracy; she for
gets to date her letters. and, worst Of all,
she doesn't know how to compose letter.
She cannot express her own ideas adequate
1y and clearly. My first test for an appli-
cant for visiting secretary work is to tell
her to go home and write me a note telling
me what she wants, and 1t Is surprising
how few can write an application that sets
forth their own wishes in way to COM
mand attention. Even such work as this.
that seems unprofessional. needs profess
sional training.
Then there are occasionally business men
who want visiting secretary sent to their
homes in the evening, and that requires
still more business knowledge. Then dur
ing the social season there Is an enormous
mass of directing of invitations to be done.
That Is, of course, more mechanical, yet 1t
is surprising how particular some people
are about 1t.
1T is curious thing to me that for all
such work women prefer young girls to
older women. 1t is the general tendency in
New York, among men and women employ
ers alike. l can't understand it, for the
older people, other things being equal. have
the more experience. and young people do
such dreadful things in getting their expe
rence. But it Is fact that young wom-
is preferred to an older one
1T is necessary that the visiting secre
tary should be a lady as well as a compe-
tent correspondent. In fact, all our EN-
ployes are either gentlewomen or servants.
We find we have field for the 'betwiXt
and between class.
The visiting secretary is wanted only in
the social season, and that, in New York, is
getting shorter and shorter every year.
People go to Palm Beach almost before
they come back to town. l think it will be
eventually in New York as it is in London
The people who form society will live In
their country homes and come to New York
only temporarily. The real homes of the
families will cease to be in the city. Even
In the little time we have been in the work
numbers of people who used to have New
York houses open several months in the
year have given that up entirely and go to
a hotel when they come to town.