Administrative Professionals Day (formerly Professional Secretaries Day) falls on the 3rd Wednesday in April. Let’s focus for a moment on the importance of secretaries & administrative assistants.

Consider this statistic from Management Review:

The problem: Many companies, trying to cut costs, have reduced their support staffs.

The solution: Hire secretaries & administrative assistants & allow managers to do what they’re paid to do.

Companies must do more than just hire secretaries & administrative assistants. They must treat them well & allow them to help increase productivity.

And, if they ask secretaries & administrative assistants to assume the tasks of middle managers whose jobs have been eliminated, they should pay them adequately.

Here are a few suggestions, some are based on focus groups that were conducted with secretaries and administrative assistants:

Don’t under use secretaries. Give them a role in decision-Makingng & the authority to act once they have proved their ability to deal with certain situations.

Value their time. Don’t ask them to do chores that can be done by others. And, when they are working on something vital, don’t interrupt them with other tasks that can be handled later.

Be sure your priorities are clear. Nothing angers secretaries more than working late one night on job "B" & having the boss come in the next morning & ask for job "C".

Meet daily with your secretary, discuss the day’s plans. This will help you to stay organized & will allow you to touch base on the many little things you need to follow-up on.

Introduce your secretary to guests when they drop in. Both your secretary & the guest will be more comfortable when they deal on the phone.

If you don’t use a small tape recorder or take notes daily, learn to do so. This makes it easier for your secretary to get to your work.

Always let secretaries know where you’re going & when you plan to return. Spending time finding you is rough on them.

Never blame secretaries for your mistakes. You’ll lose the loyalty of valuable assistants. Better yet, admit your mistakes; you’ll be appreciated as an honest & credible person.

Don Bagin & Frank Grazian,
Communications Briefing Newsletter