Administrative professionals’ day is celebrated each year on the Wednesday of administrative professionals’ week. There is usually a conference to coincide with this week but, you guessed it, it is canceled this year.

Who are Administrative Professionals?

Administrative professionals are vital to the running of an organisation and often have a much more significant impact than many realise. The purpose of this day is to bring the spotlight onto these individuals and their work. Administrative professionals range from frontline to backend employees and often offer the first impression of an organization in a wide variety of industries, from finance to hospitality.

The term ‘administrative professional’ can include multiple roles such as Administrative Assistant, Executive Assistant, Office Manager, Secretary, etc. but the amount of these professionals and the duties of their positions will vary depending on company size and industry.

So why are these people awesome? While their roles are incredibly diverse, from greeting people, linking teams and departments, drafting vital correspondence and facilitating meetings, there is one thing they all have in common: they are often the backbone to a business’ success. If you work with one of these professionals that you know your organisation would struggle without, take a moment to (distantly) thank them for being awesome and share the below tips with them.

Top Tips for Admin Professionals

We understand many people’s situations have changed, so we are here to share our top five tips for administrative professionals right now, whether you are currently not working, working part-time, are busier than ever or are even considering a career in administration in the future:

Break your day down into small tasks.

It’s a challenging time, and with working from home, away from managers and co-workers, many people find themselves overcompensating and working much harder to show they are busy at home. That can get very tiring, so we suggest breaking tasks down into smaller segments that you can do between coffee breaks and teaching the next school lesson! This will also have you feeling a lot better about yourself as you can tick things off as you complete rather than feeling daunted by a mammoth task.

Example: instead of writing ‘respond to emails,’ try writing more specific tasks such as “Respond to flagged emails due for completion today” or “Respond to Louise.”

Research new organisation systems.

One trait of these amazing admin professionals is their organisation skills! If, like many of these professionals, a new organisation system or fresh notebook excites you, then research a new system that can help you while working from home. New colour coded tabs I hear you say? How exciting! It may be something you had wanted to try before but never had the time; you may even trial it now and implement it fully when back in the office. The organised world is your oyster, from the safety of your own home, of course.

Take a personality style test

You may or may not know this, but the Nova team has a soft spot for personality profiles. These can be insightful and eye-opening about our workplace behaviours and interactions. Maybe ask some co-workers to do the same test as you so you can compare and understand how different profiles interact with each other. Now is a great time to do this as many of us unknowingly behave differently in stressful situations.

There are many free tests online that can be found with a quick Google search, or you can try one of our favorites:

You’ll be saying,” Oh my gosh, I do do that!” in no time.

Identify what gives you energy and what drains you.

This is a personal favourite of mine. For all of us right now, our routines have changed, whether we like it or not. Some people may be energised by the fact that they can walk five steps from their bedroom to their ‘office,’ others may have been energised by stopping at their favourite coffee shop on the way to work. The important thing is to acknowledge what it is that gives you energy and if they are not accessible to you now, looking at ways to recreate them.

Example: I am energised by being around people, so when I have a task to do where I am not on the phone, I go and sit beside my partner just for some human interaction. Sounds crazy? Maybe, but office chit chat was my energiser, and this is the closest recreation I can get.

Write.

Letters, diaries, gratitude journals, whatever comes to mind, write it down. This is a new experience for the majority of us and one we may forget when some normality is restored, so writing things down as a way of documenting them could be interesting to look back on in a few years. Also, if you are like me, anxiety can creep in when I start thinking about the long term, and this helps focus on the present.

Example: a part of my daily work routine now is to list five things I am grateful for; I do this at 11:30 am with a fresh cup of coffee, and it doesn’t matter if they are the same five every day, it is still something for which I am grateful. I also finish my day by noting my observations of the day to try and prevent me from finishing the week by going, ‘wait, what day was that on?’ Because let’s face it, they are all rolling into one right now!

The current situation we are in is unprecedented, and many people are finding themselves in difficult situations, faced with new challenges. It is important to note that while we share these tips that are designed to help you be productive and use this time for reflection, it is also more than okay to struggle to get out of bed some days! We will all handle things differently, so now more than ever, we need to encourage Cayman Kindness.

Interested in having a chat about administrative positions here in Cayman? Contact Emily at emily@nova.ky to find out more!