CRM vs. Academia: Breaking the Misconceptions - CRMArch 340

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3:05Good morning. And Andrew in Southern California. That's right. I am. And it is not sunny because it's just starting to rain because of the hurricane. Ooh, it's beautiful. We're on that. Oh, I haven't even heard about that. Okay. Oh, yeah. And Southern California, or actually, it's just a central California, me, Santa Barbara, and it's not raining, but it is cloudy. So today, we thought we would talk about the differences between or the misconceptions about differences between cultural resources and academia. And, you know, I think we've touched a little bit on this before, but I think it begs to have a further discussions. I think that for me, I'm saying so more highlighted misconceptions that's happening as a result of the section 106 process. And I think, you know, everybody's a little discombobulated with what's going on. And so there's a lot of stuff that's being thrown out there.

4:07But for me, I really think that it's important that we make sure that we're not passing on frivolously some of this information onto our younger counterparts, people that are just starting in the business. And we have a responsibility as more seasoned professionals to make sure that we're not passing on these misconceptions. And so I think, you know, that's what we're going to focus on for this episode. And Doug had mentioned one instance that he had recently come across. And Doug. All right, I'll be standing Doug again for the second week. Yeah. Doug's back. That's right. California Doug. Yeah, you know, this, the idea for this episode came from me being in a conversation with someone at work. And they said, well, in CRM, you don't really get to do research. And I just kind of was quiet for a second. I didn't just like flow through in the conversation. I never really addressed it. And we moved on to something different.

5:09Then I started to think about it. And I was like, actually, you know, I did a lot of research when I was doing cultural resources full time. And there's a lot of benefits for people to do their own independent research or specialize in something. In fact, I personally feel that there's certain aspects to CRM that encourage you and foster you to do more research. And so, you know, some of the benefits are people have a deep knowledge and a certain kind of artifact or a deep understanding of some other kind of process like health and safety or running vehicles or something like that. And your crew is much better when you have people who have these specialties. And for me personally, like I started off as just a straight archaeologist, you know, when I was an undergraduate, just trying to learn like whatever I could. And I was, I over time became more and more attracted to historic artifacts. Because you can tell a lot more stories with the historical artifacts. And I always felt like it was so much more fun to go down these different rabbit holes when

6:09you find like a lotion bottle or something like that. And then you find out it's, you know, some 130 year old brand that was like the founder of ponds or some other kind of thing like that or some kind of brewery that used to exist in this town. But now it's torn down and instead, you know, it's been turned into something else. Like I always just thought that those rabbit holes that you could go down with these different historical artifacts, you know, I never stopped doing it. Like I still see artifacts and I look at it and I'm just like, what is this thing? Or what I wonder what the story, I wonder why these people had this product way out here in the desert or way over here in the forest. Like why would they go through all the effort to have this thing? You know, what was it all about? And then you start doing research and it's even more fun, I guess when you can't find a bunch of information. And so you're trying to put it together from patent filings and like, you know, you're doing all this different stuff just to try to figure out how to place this and contextualize this artifact. I always felt that's fascinating. I still am

7:10fascinated by that. No whole process. And over time I ended up just getting really good at historical artifacts because I spent tons of time learning about these bottles and ceramics and products and manufacturers that over time I just got to be the historic artifact dude that was out there and I got really good at it. Yeah, I think that is, you know, one other example of, having people with different kinds of skill sets is having people that are returning students and, you know, the value of having some other experience, professional experience outside of archaeology is amazing. In fact, I think in our in anthropology, you really should have that outside experience. You should have worked other jobs in order to really have a sense of life and perspectives from different people from different walks of life. It's important to not just try to understand people from different walks of life from a textbook, but to actually have

8:12experienced it in a practical way. And one really good way of doing that is having other jobs and having other experiences outside of academia. And that to me is one of the failings of having somebody go straight from high school to college to graduate school and then into the workforce never having really had much practical life experience. I remember that I had, you know, one of my first surveys that I ever did I was out there and at the time, so I was a returning student. So I had quite a bit of other professional experience under my belt. And I was doing this because I loved it. It was something I never I never lost my attraction to archaeology. And so when I went back to school, I decided to do archaeology and we were on this survey on BLM land and we came across like a it looked like just a dump, but it wasn't a dump. It was actually somebody who kind of set up a little almost outside living room back in the 40s on this BLM land. It was really kind of funny.

9:17And it was almost like you had a house, but no, but there was no structure and there was clearly no structure. It wasn't like there was a structure that fell down and disappeared, which would be weird if that wouldn't happen. But it was really looked like this setup in the middle of the desert with no structure included outside implements as well. And while I was going through graduate school, I worked my way through it teaching upholstery. And we were able to fine tune and to understand these elements because of my understanding of our of upholstery. And I knew that looking at and me, there was no fabric left or anything like that, I knew how to date that piece of furniture based on my upholstery experience. And so that's just to me one example of people from all different walks of life can contribute to your knowledge in the field. You'd be shocked. I mean, people that

10:21have, let's say now as we come across, you know, more modern things, I think about the study they did near the border. I don't know if remember if anybody remembers that. But I knew somebody that was on that and they had actually come across some kind of obscure game pieces and they knew exactly what it was and what it was dated to. And it's just, you know, I think it's important and for people that are in the field to understand that you're coming in with more information than you think you do. But also the value of other experiences outside of archaeology and anthropology. Bill. So, harkney back to what you're saying, Heather, about having like different jobs while you're in the like, while you're studying, I actually like will help me to do archaeology. I work in customer service and as how I'm able to manage my crews that gave me a skill set to understand people's behaviors as well as being anthropologists. But having not my my focus in academia really helped me

11:26look at the real world and apply it to CRM in terms of understanding like these people coming in and managing them. That's like archaeology is the easy part but managing your crews is the hardest part. And clients and construct. Yeah, it's no, I agree too. Because before I went into archaeology, one of the jobs that I had is managing like a pizza store. So managing people, I actually I used to work at Chuck E. Cheese. That's how I got most of my pizza wrangling talents, right? And also working with kids and also working with kids who are working. But then using leveraging those deep experiences as Chuck E to take care of crews at another pizza restaurant. Yeah, so I totally get where you're coming from like learning how to manage people and other jobs outside of archaeology. If I hadn't had done all that stuff when I was in college and in high school, then I wouldn't have those kind of like experiences of how to get people to do stuff even when they don't want to and like

12:31how to diffuse some of the workplace dramas that happen like, you know, how to handle yourself as an employee. You know, I think back to what you were talking about with having specialties with historians or whatever, the one thing that I think is great about CRM is that you can study different aspects of culture, historians, prehistoric or pre-contact. And you're not like academia and somebody may say there's a misconception with academia, but you're much more limited. You're focused on one specific topic or specialty for the most part. I know you can branch out a little bit, but in CRM, you really do need to be a jack of all trades. Now, some people will argue, well, then you're not able to really hone in and focus and get that a very fine tune understanding of whatever assigned, whatever research element you're talking about. And I get that that's where

13:32academia and CRM can actually tongue and groove. They can actually really be a good complement to each other because we don't have the time as CRM people to really dive in into the how, let's see, the tool marks from making shell beads on the on Santa Cruz Island and the channel islands in the Santa Barbara Channel region. Like that's very specific and that's something that's perfect for academia. You can have that focus. You have that ability to focus in that way because of other ways of bringing in funds. You have grants and I know Bill may say that's not that's starting with their way, but you have other ways in academia. If you're an academia and you're able to be funded, you have other ways of bringing in money rather than moving on to the next project. And so we can, as CRMers, use that myopic that that very highly focused research that's done on one single element

14:37to inform our work. But as CRMers, we do have to be a jack of all trades, of course, bringing in the research done by academics. But we do need to have lots of different skill sets and lots of different knowledge. And it keeps as a CRM person, it keeps you really engaged. It's fun because you're always learning something new. And it also allows for lots of people to have a fine-tuned specialty in one area, but then branch out and do other work and and that combined effort can make a really good team. Yeah. And I mean, I'd add also like I I recommend students do not just sit there and obsess over the tool marks on those beads because you know, you have plenty of time. So when you're in graduate school, you have the most intellectual freedom that you're going to have in your entire life because while maybe until you're like retired, I don't know, I haven't made it to retirement yet. But you definitely explore these things that you have questions about. I know that

15:39you know, your research that you're supposed to do for your masters or your PhD, it's easy to obsess on it and to spend all your spare time. But definitely think about helping out other students or going in different directions or reading something different or you know, just doing something different in addition to just your masters. I'm not saying you need to take a whole separate research program on, but something to get your mind thinking about something different. Don't just sit there for two years or six years obsessing purely on one thing, right? First of all, your mind only has so much ability to focus at any given time. And then second of all, like, you will be this kind of one trick pony that is not really super useful for other universities, not useful for any CRM companies. Like all you did is just spend two or six years obsessing on one single thing. That's almost nobody wants someone who just did that. Yeah, really good. Yeah, that's totally true. Bill, I noticed that like, you know, we've made it almost 15 minutes in here now. And I haven't bragged about myself at all, which is probably a record. So what I did

16:43in grad school was actually I took a bunch of historic preservation classes that like, you know, that we're not recommended. You didn't need to take them. There was just no reason. And other academics were like, Andrew, why are you wasting time on these historic preservation classes? Because they were in the history department. I was quote unquote wasting my time because I had a bunch of CRM gigs. And I knew I'm like, you need to know that historic preservation shit. Like you need to know that. So like, that was a total great use of my time. And it relaxed my brain. So I didn't have to like think about collision archaeology like all the time, you know, it like, it just opened my mind. And it was enjoyable to do something different. Well, with that, we'll go to segment two. We'll be right back. Listen to the heartbeat. Chevy is called the heartbeat of America for a reason with SUVs made to move with your rhythm. The versatile equinox tackles your entire day. The spacious traverse fits your crew and your

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20:53Instant withdrawal subject to conditions fees and eligibility requirements may apply to certain checking features of the cash account. Proof would fall is back. In store, the predictions. Trade yours on cash. America's number one prediction market platform. Indie takes on Kansas City with Indie currently trading at 28% to win. A $100 trade pays out $336 if they win. Download Kowshi. Use code Hoops to get $25 when you trade $25. KALSHI. Kowshi. Trade what's next? 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply. Event contract trading involves risk and may not be suitable for all investors. Kowshi products are not available in all jurisdictions. Prices, values, and available markets may differ from those mentioned. For more information, see kowshi.com slash regulatory. Welcome back to CRM Archaeology Podcast Episode 340. Today we're talking about some misconceptions about CRM and not picking on our academic colleagues, but the misconceptions that generally

21:54from the academic side towards CRM. You can pick on us. It's all right. Everybody already does anyway. I feel like we have two on here. We can do that. You guys can defend all. We're all in teaching people. We don't want that in the United States. Stop teaching. That's right. So I'd like to dive in a little bit about the idea that CRM does not contribute to the overall understanding of archaeology and adding to the data that we have. And that great literature is not helpful in the expansion of our knowledge about the past. And I really do not agree with that. I do think that can be somewhat, there could be a case made for that only in the fact that the gray literature is not as published as the academic work. So I understand that, but I think that's something that we need to do better, but that doesn't mean that it's not contributing.

22:56Because for those that are not, I think most people know this, that are listening to this podcast, but if you don't know real quick, you know, there's repositories of information that CRM archaeologists use that are required to be used in all states. And we go in, we do a record search, and we pull all the records, either archaeological site records or reports. And that is what informs us all along with academic work in setting the stage for our research, developing a research design and a fieldwork methodology that is sound and that we know that when we come up with our findings, we do our analysis and we arrive at our findings that those are defensible findings because it's established with good research and good methodology or good methods. So we do contribute, I think there is a gap between what we turn into these repositories and what is understood as

23:56contributing to the overall academic or overall archaeological record. And so I think that's where the gap is, but it doesn't mean that the work that we do as CRM archaeologist does not contribute in general to the theory and understanding and data about past human behavior. It's simply not true. We do a lot of the work. In fact, we touch so many sites. We're so expansive in our reach as CRM archaeologists, just by nature of what we do, that you cannot ignore the contribution that CRM does. And so with that, I think it's important, I'd like to expand a little bit on that, but it's important for those that are in school right now that are considering what are they going to do next. I think that there is this misconception that if you really want to do quote-unquote real archaeology and do real research that your only option is academia and is absolutely not true.

24:59Yeah, I think that's true. And I love the, if this was an academic symposium, it would be called in defense of gray literature. And I think that's actually a great point. I love that point because it's like you'll see, I was in a room once where everyone was bitching about gray literature. I'm a gray literature and a man and I actually spoke up. And I know that shocking that I spoke up. And I was like, hey, y'all, how many of you have actually written a gray literature report? And like everyone's hand went up. And I'm like, yeah, exactly. So stop your bitch in. And it's better than nothing. I always say that. You know, a gray literature report is better than nothing. And on top of that, as you were saying, Heather, it serves as a great jumping off platform for things later. Like you can use that report to do a conference presentation or something like that. So there's nothing wrong with them. Yeah, I think the biggest limitation though is that a lot of times folks are not doing like, they're not going to the information center. They're not going to

25:59the ship out of fine. Yeah, those reports. So without requesting them. And what's interesting is at least in California, I know this was true in Arizona as well. And it's also true in Idaho, where I've done research as like an academic, you get a different pay rate if you work for university and you're trying to do this for like, furthering education for students or there's like some kind of research involved. Like a lot of times the information center of folks who don't know the regions, like it could be your entire state or in California is divided up into several regions, but they're repositories for the artifacts, but also for the archaeology reports and all the GIS data. And so like if you have a legitimate research question or you're working with a student or you're doing some kind of research, you know, and it involves the university, you don't pay the same amount that CRM companies do when they request all those site files because CRM companies, they're doing this, you know, for clients and other stuff. It's not always just pure research.

27:00And so when they ask the information center for all the sites within one mile or all the sites within 10 or whatever, they have to pay, it depends on what the place is. Like sometimes it's just only for the data, other times you also pay for the time in labor that it takes for the folks, the archivists to pull that information. Sometimes it's like by the gigabytes, sometimes it's by the page that's scanned or copied, right? Well, you have a different pay rate if you work for a university. And so I don't understand why folks who are doing research in parts of the United States, why they don't pull all the previous sites and all the previous records before they start publishing their stuff, right? Probably because it's a lot easier to just go to the library on campus and just look and see who's written anything. But a lot of times when you look for that great literature, you're going to find a whole bunch of information that never made it into any book or article that would really put your research like head and shoulders above others because you know all the previous sites. That's right. I mean, great literature really like there's

28:00like diamonds in the rough. Like you find some really good gems and it adds like a lot of value to your writing, especially your reporting. And I don't add to little flavor, you're like I have that you don't so here we go. I enjoy it a lot. Yeah, I think you know the great literature as CRM is we don't have a choice but to be looking at that. What I think is a shame is just that there's just we're really we have a large gap between academia and CRM right now where we could actually have a much better understanding. There could be theories that are being developed just looking at the patterns as as a CRM archaeologist. I'm moving from project to project. I don't have the time. In my mind, I start developing these patterns as I work in an area on a regular basis. So I have these patterns in my mind that I'm working with but it would be awesome if academia and CRM could work

29:02more in lockstep so that we could actually start developing these theories better. I do know that does happen. We do have some firms that specialize in one area of the country and because of that, they've really been able to develop these patterns and they do have a higher focus on the higher level research and that combination that's another like hybrid. So you have the arch academia, you have the CRM archaeologists that are just working all the time all over the place and then you have these areas. One example in one example I think in California would be far Western. They have combination of highly capable academic researchers, scholars and then they also have the CRM archaeologists or they have people that are both and because of that, they have produced some pretty amazing publications and it's because though they also don't go outside, they do expand a little bit but they're not going all over the place and that's something sometimes that I think

30:06would contribute to the argument that CRM sometimes loses that standing as far as academic research goes because we are all over the place all over all of the time and we are so spread out in our capability, you know, it's so spread out in our work that it prevents us from being able to really fine tune but having the two together, it doesn't have to be a competition of academia versus CRM, we should be working together to be able to do that but with that said, back to our theme of the misconceptions, it is absolutely not true that CRM does not contribute in academic sense. It's not true. Well, I just put in the show, I'll put in for their actual show notes too though and exact, an actual example of exactly what you're talking about, big data project where the University of Arizona, Barbara Mills and some other folks, Barbara Mills is a Southwestern ceramic archaeology specialist, she's absolutely awesome. She's also doing a lot of research on trying to figure out more

31:10ways for women to publish and to get in journals. So one of the things that she did a few years ago, probably 10 years ago was using big data from hundreds of archaeology sites in the Southwest, tons and tons of ceramics to try to show these different social networks across the Southwest. And it was a National Science Foundation funded grant, but it drew the first thing they did is go, well, the second thing, the first thing they did was go to museums and look at all the ceramics where they were there, but they also combed meticulously through thousands of cultural resource management reports to identify the location of where these ceramics were found, also obsidian too. And from that multi-year program, they published a couple articles that were showing like these vast connections between Mexico and the Southwest all the way up to like Colorado. I mean, it was actually a really interesting thing. It was done right on the edge of AI, so pre-AI, but showing what you could possibly do now that you have AI, you could put a lot of this different

32:10data in if you weren't letting it go to the wrong people, but you can really write script to do this kind of analysis through these huge volumes of CRM reports that you have in the Great Literature to find out where bottles are coming from or where different kinds of ethnicity, like Chinese American, African American sites, where they distributed across your state, you can start doing some of this stuff now. That's awesome. That reminds me of this kind of turning into instead of misconceptions, but how can academia and CRM work together? But another, let's look at what is academia have that's a major benefit? What does CRM have that's a major benefit that maybe the other does not have access to? Here you have in academia, you have people that have, and not they have an amount of time, they don't, but their time is focused on this kind of stuff that you're talking about for University of Arizona, where that's their focus is doing this large data set mining, data

33:12mining to create pattern or to understand patterns. They have that capability CRM, maybe we could do it, but we don't have the time to do it. Why would we go and do that when that's not what is cold for in our role? Let's let academia do that. On the other side, CRM, we have access to engineers, we have access to digital solutions professionals, we have access to all these other types of other disciplines that are right at our fingertips that have the technology that we don't have to purchase for CRM, it's already there. So if you're in a larger engineering environmental or even a medium-sized engineering and environmental company, you have access to resources that maybe you're not using, and that's something that we can also bring to academia as these grants and funds, the different funding mechanisms start dwindling, and if they continue to dwindle, that means that

34:16the procurement are going to be few and far between in academia, but in CRM, maybe we're not companies not purchasing it specifically for CRM, for example, GPR. There's lots of different uses for GPR, ground penetrating radar, but those systems are very expensive. So maybe your CRM practice does not have the ability to buy a full GPR, however, you have a survey team, you have other teams that maybe you have a locate team in your engineering department, and they have GPR using that same, you know, teaming up with them so that you can use those technologies or just, one other strategy, and that is something that CRM can contribute and can, if we're working together, academia and CRM, where we can provide these resources that maybe academia doesn't have. Yeah, I think, you know, that's a brilliant idea. The one thing I can say right now that

35:21I would love to access is like the tablet-based data collection tools, man, because I'm having to make them myself. The companies already have them. They already bought them. And so I know that a lot of times it's like bicep subscription or whatever, but you know, it's getting to the point now where these paper forms that we're using because I just don't have the time to build the app. Yeah, they're just, they're obsolete, right? And anyone who works with me is learning some ancient skills that they're never going to use when they get a job at CRM. And it's not because I don't want to switch over. I have a stack of tablets. I just don't have the time to update the app that I started using and then start really collecting the information. So I worked with someone when I first came to Cal, they built an app. They have done zero support. They, you know, they bricked one of my tablets. That's why I've always told people to watch out for these kind of like archaeology-only app builders because they, they're fly by night and they just like, you know, they don't have the support. You should really work with a company that builds apps for a whole bunch of different

36:23companies because that's their entire business, right? But in the, you know, going digital, Chris Webster and I used to talk about it all the time. It's not easy, mainly because the file type or the the software's change. And I don't have time to rebuild every single thing like every like 10 months when they come out with a new version. So my app is obsolete and the people who helped build it, they've moved on to other stuff and they no longer provide customer service. And so I've just gone back to paper. Yeah, yeah, I hear you there. With that, we'll see you in segment three. Be right back. Chevy is called the heartbeat of America for a reason with SUVs made to move with your rhythm. The versatile equinox tackles your entire day. The spacious traverse fits your crew and your whole weekend and tracks bring style with value you can count on all infused with tech that has your back. So your drive always hits the right cord.

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39:31about CRM Archaeology by mainly by the academic world and specifically trying to denounce some of the misconceptions so that people that are early on in their career are students trying to figure out where they should go next, making sure that they understand CRM from the actual CRM perspective. And so we're trying to clear up some misconceptions and Doug, you want, I'm sorry, I keep saying that. Bill is so awesome. I don't know why I keep doing that. It's insane. Doug, you have to come back. Yeah, you got to rescue me, Doug. I lost my identity to sad. It's so crazy. I don't know why I say it. Okay, Bill, you had a good point about conferences. Yeah, so we've talked about conferences before on the show, but there's a kind of idea amongst students and other folks that the CRM companies are not going to pay for you to go to a conference. And I'll tell you that is partially true,

40:33but then again, the university doesn't pay 100% of the expenses either. In general, when I was doing cultural resources, I remember I could go to conferences if they were in town, like they never cared, they would find some kind of a pathway for us to have that day off or we would be there. So if the conference was actually in the town where we were at or very close, then most of the time, it was like personal development hours or they would just let you find some kind of a way. And then you could go there because you weren't staying at a hotel and you were just going for a couple of days and they would and this is where I say that there's a asterisk, right? Not every single person can bail and go to the California Archaeology Conference or the Arizona Archaeology. Like you can't shut the entire company down because everybody wants to go to the conference. And so there was a aspect of like first come for serve or you know, you were presenting information that the company, you were going to show some of the research the company had done. That was another critical thing. But normally they'd also pay either part or all depending on

41:35the year and like, you know, who the people, the owners were willing to do. Like they would pay for me to go to other conferences. I remember when I was doing culture resources, I got to go to like Florida and Boston and some other places for archaeology conferences. Now once again, you had to present on information that was company stuff. And depending on what they were doing, sometimes they would pay the the airfare and the hotel, but they wanted you to pay registration or a lot of other times you'd have to pay to file your abstract and then you would have to pay the like membership fees, but they would pay the registration and the flight and all that. But it was, you know, 80% of the money was covered to go to the conference. You'd have to pay for your own food. And then you didn't have to take sick time. They had personal development time. And personal development time was also sometimes for other trainings that weren't specifically required for your job, right? So I know you get paid for mind safety and for hazardous waste operator. A lot of times those are just rolled in as like part of work things. But other trainings too,

42:38like I'm trying to think like certain artifact workshops and other things that were being held nearby, they would go ahead and let me go and just use that for personal development. The one on like mapping African American houses and stuff in the Pacific Northwest. It was a conference. There was in Tacoma and my company was like, yeah, just go ahead and take the day off, go down to Tacoma, learn about this stuff, even though you don't do mapping, even though you're, you know, there's very few African Americans learn about this. And then you can bring it back to the company. And so they did invest somewhat in employees and you did get to present research that you'd done for the company and they would pay for it. And since I have gone to work at a university, I see a lot of the people at things like the Society for American Archaeology, the California Archaeology, the regional ones, a lot of those folks are cultural resources archaeologists and they're all presenting stuff on things that the company has done. Yeah, I think such a good point. The one thing that you need to remember and you know, from a manager perspective, we're looking at

43:42yes, we want to invest in the knowledge of those that are on our team, but that knowledge must contribute to the overall path and success of the CRM practice. And so, you know, it's, there's always this wing of how does this effort because that's, you know, the time that you're spending is not billable. So it's not just the cost of the conference. In fact, that's not really even what I would say is the premier concern. The premier concern is the lack of billability. And so, you know, when you're going there, you're not able to build that time except for in very specific instances. So, you know, that is one major concern. So when you are asking for time to improve your skill set, you have to make an argument for it on a business level. You just have to. So if you say, okay, I want to go to a conference in police and you want your company to pay for

44:49it. Now, you certainly can take your own time and do that. And I would argue, I don't think that companies should be saying, okay, we want you to learn much more about ceramics so that you can contribute and be our ceramics person. And then expect you to learn that on your off time. That's different. But if you have an interest, let's say in my in archaeology, you want to go to a conference in police, but you think you're, and I'm exaggerating here, I think this is an exaggerating example, but it's to make a point. And you want your company to pay for this academic or pay for this conference. That makes no sense because your company is in Colorado. And they focus on Colorado archaeology. How is this going to benefit them? And it's not an unfair ask for you to go to a conference and to be able to contribute through the knowledge that you're gaining while you're at that conference to the company. So yeah, yeah, if you have, let's say you want to do that. And you're

45:55like, you know what? Our company just opened a regional, let's say, an office in that area, in in the area around police. And this would be an opportunity for you to market the company, an opportunity for you to maybe look for talent and to introduce yourself to this region. Like now there's a lot of, you know, particulars there. I mean, you can't just say, I've worked in Colorado my whole life and not going to go to police and work, but you know, you could potentially make an argument for it if it would benefit the company. But if it's not going to benefit the company in any way, I mean, that's what you have to be looking for. And I think that's where there's a disconnect because people say, oh, conference, you know, my company won't contribute to me going to a conference. Well, what conference are you asking to go to? And how does this relate to increasing the skill set of the CRM practice in general? You know, Heather, you bring a good point.

47:01I could be a prime example of why my company said no to going to a conference that I wanted to go to. It was in Germany and it was for an infrastructure conference. But I'm like, okay, but it has to do with landscape archaeology. And they're like, well, yes, you have, we get funds because it's called IEA. It's continuing education. It's $3,000. You get it yearly. But they're like, what can this do for us in a business development sense? You want to go to an international conference. But what is that going to help us in the States? So I ran into a snag. They're like, yeah, you can go. No problem. But we're not going to fund that because it's not doing anything for us. So, but I had to like, to set an argument of why I'm like, well, it's an infrastructure conference that deals with transmission lines. We can look at how we can potentially help, you know, at different country doing strategizing like archaeology in the States that help, you know, develop something or whatever. Like, that's a horrible example. But anyways, but like the point is, so I tried and they're like, no,

48:06sorry, this is not conducive to our business plan. So you're not getting a free vacation. And the other thing is, yeah, the other thing is you have to look at, you have to have an understanding, a broad understanding of what is your company focused on. Like, some companies don't want to touch transportation of work. Other companies are trying to get into transportation of work. And so understanding the environment you're in, the professional environment you're in, is key to being able to sell a conference. And you have a responsibility to do that. It's not just like this concept that, oh, I should be able to go to at least one conference a year and it doesn't matter what kind of conference it is. That's baloney. The company has a right to feel like they're getting value from you going to this conference. And I'll tell you another thing, if you're going to the conference, you better be learning. Yeah, you know, my experience is very similar to bills in terms of like

49:09the CRM stuff. And so although I don't think I ever got money for a conference from any firm or anything, and definitely not for the belief stuff. I never even asked for belief stuff, but I will say for the California stuff, they were always very supportive though. They did all that sort of second stringer stuff like Bill was talking about. Like I never had to take, you know, like sick leave or something. They were always very supportive. Like, oh, that's great. You're going, you know, and it was super simple to take days off and stuff. But I never got any money. And I will say I didn't miss it that much of that makes sense. I mean, I would have loved to get some money to go to a local conference or something, but I had way other larger complaints about certain CRM firms I worked for rather than how much they paid or didn't pay for a conference. And I will say, you know, another thing, you know, I've posed the a compromise will pay, our company will pay for you to go to the conference, will pay for the hotel, will pay even for your podium, and will pay for the conference. You on work days, if the conference starts on a

50:14Thursday, it's a Thursday and a Friday conference, we will, you'll get paid to be there. But if it extends to Saturday and Sunday, that's at your own time. Yeah. And that to me is totally fair. But I've heard a lot of people buck at that. And what I think I suspect when people buck at that, you're not really focused on getting the most out of this conference. Like, there needs to be a combination of needs that you're investing, the company's investing, and you need to invest as well. Well, that goes into that party land aspect of the conference too that, you know, is unstated, but totally real. The thing that I thought I always have thought was not cool was win, like, the principal investigators or the other PhDs who actually didn't do the work and they're not even given a presentation and they're all going to the conference. And it's like, okay, so now all the bosses are gone because the conference is in like Maui. And so, you know, they all, you know,

51:16it's in New Orleans. And so magically all the people who didn't actually do any of the research and they're not presenting on it, even though they, you know, they might be getting some of their stuff comped. They might not be they've all like the whole office has decided to like empty because the conference is somewhere cool. And I always thought that was kind of like a raw deal because the rest of us are sitting here like, you know, stuff doesn't move the same if there's no contact to supervisors. Like when you have questions, stuff's not happening. And they're all off enjoying themselves because they all went there. And you're just kind of like, so wait, what did you present on again? Oh, you know, I didn't present in your shaking your head like, so I had to present just to go to like, you know, I don't know Omaha, Nebraska, but you get to go to, you know, Tampa or New Orleans and not present. And like, there's questions about, didn't even get covered. Like, that ends up happening quite a bit. And I always thought that was like a raw deal. It is. I'll argue that maybe having one or two leaders go to a conference along with the rest

52:24make sense for business development and for recruiting purposes. Absolutely. And just overall management and making sure everything runs smoothly from a logistics point of view, especially if you have, you know, count, you know, tables, presentation tables and things like that at in book rooms or in the vendor room. Then to me, that makes sense to have at least one leadership or two. I don't know what kind of manager or practice director is going to a conference and is not trying to weigh out. Okay, how much, how much pain am I going to be in when I have to go back to work? Because there's going to be so much work that's piled up on me. Like, when I'm, there's not one conference that I go to where I'm not working at least eight hours in addition to the conference. Like, I'm still working. I'm answering emails. I'm pumping out reports while I'm sitting, listening to a, you know, like, this, I think that if you have a manager who's had a conference and is not working while they're

53:25at the conference, they have their job is not that necessary. Well, totally true. Yeah, but Heather, you know, that there's some people that are running high levels and they are just the email zoom box. It's just the email. So yeah, they're working in quotation marks with their, and that's why they've decided to go to Honolulu. Right. They can just do those email spasms and questions and like, just chain emails to make it look the performativity of work. Yeah. This is actually getting work done. Yeah. There's tons of people who do that. Right. Well, I mean, it's hard because Heather, I understand what you're saying. Like, when I go to conferences, I bring my work computer because I have obligations. Yeah. I go like, it's just what it is. Right. So, but I choose the conferences I go to, but I want to like reiterate, I go there to network, but see what the current research is happening. And then like, look at the vendors and see like, what can help my company in terms of technology or like potential client interactions or whatever. Like, it's always in a business development

54:33sense. It's like, why are you here? Here we are. But I have to make sure I have it's a fine balance, but I understand what Bill's saying. People are going just the party for the week and then actually like, go to a conference or just drink and have a good time. That happens at both sides. It happens at all levels. It's more of a personality than it is a level where that happens. But I think, you know, in summary, let's think. What are the misconceptions we talked about? Misconceptions that CRM, CRMers, if you go into CRM, you're not going to have the opportunity to do actual research. That's not true. Another misconception is that CRM does not contribute to the overall understanding of cultures. And to the, yeah, that's a check mark. That's another misconception. I think we talked on a side. We talked a little bit about how can academia and CRM can, you know, collaborate together and make sure in that same vein how we can, you know,

55:36all the status sets that we have that is being generated and created by CRM. How can academia, how can we employ academia and the time and the knowledge that they have for data mining, how can we employ that to really make sure that we're getting the most out of the data that CRM is putting together. And then finally, you know, as far as conferences, if you're in school right now and you think that you're not going to be able to go to a conference if you're getting to CRM, that is not true. Just make sure that you are understood, that you understand where you're at. Right now, you are not, you know, when you get into the professional world, you have a responsibility to make the business argument for every action. You should, the most successful people in CRM understand that for every action in business, you have to have an argument for it. And there's nothing wrong with the bottom line. That's how you have a job. You want to get paid to work. The company must make money in order for you to get paid to work. So find that argument that's going to sell your

56:41capability to go and sell the company ongoing to a conference. If you do that, you should have no problem. Well, one of the things I also want to know is like, it's not as hard as you think. It is. It's not true. It's not. All right, well, thanks all for joining and we'll see in the field. Take it easy. See you guys next time. Duce is everyone. That's it for another episode of the CRM Archaeology podcast links to some of the items mentioned on the show or in the show notes for this podcast, which can be found at www.arcpodnet.com slash CRMarc podcast. Please comment and share anywhere you see the show. If you'd like us to answer a question in a future episode, email us. Use the contact form on the website or just email Chris at ArchaeologyPodcast network.com. Support the show and the network at arcpodnet.com slash members. Get some swag and extra content while you're there. Send us show suggestions and interview suggestions. We want this to be a resource for field technicians everywhere and we want to know what you want to know about.

57:48Thanks for listening to this podcast. The Archaeology podcast network's chief editor is Rachel Rodin. Our executive producer is Ashley Erie. Our social media and newsletter coordinator is Matilda Sebrecht. The APN was founded by Chris Webster and Tristan Boyle on December 1, 2014. We're supported by our amazing podcast hosts, many volunteers and listeners like you. Check out membership at www.arcpodnet.com slash members. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology podcast network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.arcpodnet.com. Contact us at Chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.