“Secretary. In the ’80s and even early ’90s, every middle manager and up had a secretary to coordinate their schedule, type all sorts of things up, take their calls and messages, and often literally ‘guard’ their door as they were generally stationed right outside their office. There were tons of them, and they were always women. I had a shared one when I started my first corporate job as a junior individual contributor ‘manager’ in the ’90s.

Administrative assistants these days seem more reserved for executives and serve as general-purpose personal assistants doing what secretaries once did and more. There are far fewer of them.”