To the Recently Promoted

Dearly Annoyed,

We are hear to express our frustration with the recently promoted.  While we do not begrudge them their opportunity to grow and learn, we do begrudge them their sense of entitlement.

A sense of entitlement that has them grabbing for perks that not even their new bosses have.  Assuming that they are now on par with upper management (Director does not equal VP or President). OR the constant, Ooooo an ‘admin at my disposal’ routine, when the individual in question is shared by six other people.

Therefore, you who have been recently promoted, listen with great care.  While your paycheck and title might have changed, you have essentially stayed the same.  If you, the recently promoted, continue to yap at the heels of the administrative staff demanding perks that are not in-line with your actual jobs.

Please be aware that we will do nothing to help smooth your way into your new responsibilities.  And you will most likely end up the recently departed.

Printer Responsibility

As Admin Gal passes the only color copier/printer on her floor, she is APPALLED at the lack of discretion used by her fellow employees.  There are print jobs going to the printer that should be done in black and white, church bulletins, pictures of jewelry lusted after, house listings, copies of pictures of peoples children, etc – there are some things I don’t want to know about you.  All of this during working hours.  None of this should be occurring at all.

When a resource is limited, people should keep in mind that it is just that – LIMITED!  It shouldn’t be burdened by personal jobs, thereby inhibiting others from getting actual work done.

Not to mention the cost of making color copies or print to a color printer.  Even though this is not coming out of the offenders actual pocket, SOMEBODY is paying for it.

So Admin Gal admonishes people to think twice before you print to a color printer.  Is it necessary?  Will it bog down some one else’s job?  Think of someone else besides them self.

BTW, effective immediately Admin Gal will start recycling all non-job related print jobs she sees.  AND a code that only she know will go on the printer, so you will now have to come to her for your print jobs.  Try explaining little Joey’s cute picture now!

A Word to the Wise…

Dear Sales Person, Employee, and/or Person in General,

Administrative Assistants around the world are not creatures who sit around doing nothing.  We are productive members of any business environment.  We contribute to ongoing projects, we maintain office order, calendar cohesion, document management, personnel moral, in addition to a myriad of other tasks and projects that are assigned to our functions.

Copying our supervisors on an email about a task that is not priority will not miraculously cause it to surface to the top of the list.  Flagging any correspondence with ‘HIGH PRIORITY’ only indicates your own sense of inflated ego.

To the sales people in specific, if an admin tells you their boss will not be meeting with you now or in the future – that is the truth.  Sending the boss an email with available dates and times and copying the admin is the epitome of classlessness.  Be prepared to be shut down.

We work with our bosses to prioritize our projects and tasks to benefit them, not for someone who is not in our organizational structure.  While the persistence and ingenuity can be admired, the audacity can only be considered appalling.

A word to the wise, flagging, prioritizing, or copying our supervisors/bosses with your projects and tasks only makes us annoyed.

Sincerely,

The Admins

Traveling Well with Others

I’m sitting on a jammed packed flight, on my way home from a successful business trip. I’m grooving to my iPod as I review my notes, when the man in 17C decides to fling his seat back to it’s fullest recline. I now have six inches between the top of his balding head and my nose.

Can I tell you that I am justifiably offended?

Most people will recline their seats minimally, understanding that the people behind them might have their laptops open working, meals on the tray, or are enjoying a book.

Instead I must restrain myself from jamming my knees in the back of his seat. In order to not spend the rest of he flight staring at his bald spot, I now have to sit slouched. Somehow I do not believe that he will pay for the chiropratic adjustment this is going to require.

I really dislike inconsiderate people.

Pearls before …

In the world of an Adminstrative Professional, there are a multitude of levels that can be achieved. From the receptionist, whose demeanor sets the tone for employees and visitors as they enter the facility. To an actual executive level, where the Adminstrative Professional sets policy and procedures for the admins through out the organization. An entire spectrum lays between.

I only point out this breadth of range because of common comments I hear amongst my peers. “I have no way to advance.” or “Nobody takes me seriously because I’m an admin” or, my personal favorite, “I just can’t do what they are asking me to do because they haven’t trained me.”

Pardon me as I call bullshit on these whiners! I’m sorry to be blunt and rude, but enough! We who are admin are not brainless space holders who do nothing. If that is all you do? Get out now. You are doing your peers no service.

If you feel stifled, plenty of opportunities abound.  You just have to take them.

Today’s economic climate does not leave pearls strewn across the road for the lucky to find. Instead you have to be savvy. Take advantage of work assisted education. Look for grants and programs that might suit your circumstances.

Opportunities abound, no one will hand them to you on a silver platter.

Upon Your Actions

The hierarchy of the workplace is a fascinating thing.  For some, their rise is a result of steady, quality work that is rewarded by promotion through the ranks.  For others, hierarchy is viewed as a maniacal game of strategy.  The farther they are promoted, the better the ‘parachute’ is on the way out the door.  For the rest of us, it is truly only a mindset.  Work provides only a base for our lives outside of work.

The reality is we all put our trousers on one leg at a time and bleed the same color, red.

Whether we drive a Yugo or a Lamborghini, you are only as important as you are in your own mind.  Respect is earned through your actions, not through your paycheck or title.

Businesses are only as good as the people who manage them.  If managers are always seeking the next nifty, shining business model that promises to save the company and put the profits through the roof the end result is nothing.  But when managers use common sense, respect and hard work, their employees can see and respect that no matter the out come.

Countries have been won or lost based on the respect or lack of due to the actions and behaviors of their respective hierarchies.  The same can be said about companies.

Resource Management

When offices consolidate, space becomes premium.  Old habits of squatting wherever you want are hard to break.

Admin Gal has been forced into the role of Space Police.  If a conference room has not been booked by the inhabitants, Admin Gal has to play Bad Cop.  This is not fun when the person out ranks you.  Evicting a Director, Vice President, or President is a dicey situation.  But when it is a consultant, Admin Gal has no issue.

Granted their assigned space is limited, but so is the actual working space of the working environment of the company.  Courtesy says you do not just plop yourself down and claim squatter rights.  Where most of the time possession is 9 tenths of the law, when it comes to resource management, not so much.

Admin Gal is happy to try and find space for people.  But don’t act like a toddler if you don’t want to be treated like one.

A Day Away

When an Admin is away, be it for vacation, training, or whatever, strange thing happen to their desks.  Mountains of paper gravitate mysteriously to any flat surface forming precarious piles. Anything of questionable nature lands haphazardly on the desk chair, the desk or the floor around the desk.  Plants mysteriously sicken and are never the same again, this Admin thinks they’ve been traumatized by what strange things they’ve witnessed.  Needless to say, time off is a terrifying proposition.

While the time off is often needed and wanted, a small part of our brain way back in the back is ticking down the time to our return.  Doing our best to ignore it, we turn off our cell phones, promising our selves we will ignore all calls from the office. We approach all computers like they are live ordinance, fighting the urge to log on to our email client just to get a jump- start.

Sometimes the urge is to strong and we give in, only to be horrified by the sheer volume of people ignoring the Out Of Office (OOO) message.  The assumption that we will take care of them during our time off because they are special.

If the Admin is smart, they book  a cruise were cell phone reception or internet connectivity is non-existent and have a long cold drink.

How Rude!

Earning an income is a simple equation:

Work x Application = Income

This isn’t rocket science (unless of course you are a rocket scientist, then it’s a whole other ball of wax).

Admin Gal has an ax to grind with Sales People.

Admin Gal gets the fact that sales people need to make a living.  If they are respectful of her, she will do what she can to get them to the right people to open a dialog.  No, sales people do NOT need to speak to the top of the totem pole at the first swing.  Let me get you to the correct person.

DO NOT call incessantly hoping, beyond hope, to catch Admin Gal’s boss on the phone when she is ‘off duty’.  It isn’t going to happen.

A – Admin Gal’s boss won’t pick up a number he doesn’t recognize.

B – Breathing heavy then hanging up is just plain RUDE.

C – Just do what Admin Gal has asked you to do.

Contrary to Popular Opinion …

Contrary to popular opinion I am not a miracle worker, a maid or a butler, a childcare provider, a janitor, a dictionary or encyclopedia, an ATM, or whatever else the pointy-hair boss can think of.  I often produce what is perceived as miracles, however it is simply know how to do my job well. 

I can not properly set-up meetings, this includes conference rooms, call-in numbers, and invite attendees, without ALL the information.  Just FYI, ESP does not come naturally in the role of Administrative Assistant.

Unless it is specifically spelled out in my job description/ contract, I am not required to pick up your dry-cleaning, walk your dogs, or oversee the contractors building your mega-mansion.  This falls in the realm of a personal assistant, and that is a whole different kettle of fish.

Your children are adorable. But if they have to come into the office after school and I have deadlines, please keep them in your office.  My desk is not for childcare or their entertainment.

I hope that this small tutorial can prove to be instructional in the use of an Administrative Assistant.