So, you’ve started as an administrative assistant and you want to get promoted.  As I’ve told my students, the administrative position is often a great starting point to working your way up the ladder.  It gives you the opportunity to show off your skills and to show that you have a great work ethic.  But that doesn’t mean that it is easy!

Getting your first promotion requires hard work and a great attitude and it also requires patience.  I’ve seen it happen several times – an employee works hard, smiles all the time, does whatever she is asked and doesn’t get the first promotion they aim for.  Then they go storming into the boss’s office spouting off all the things they have done for the company and demanding to know why they didn’t get the promotion.  Patience – without it you’re going nowhere fast.  In all most every instance the employee was laid off in the next 6 months or left of their own will.

Here are some other ways to increase your chances of getting a promotion:

• Take charge of your time.  Don’t make excuses for not getting things done – just get them done.  And get them done when you say you will.  Be conservative about giving people times for completion of projects – realize that sometimes you will have interruptions and things will take longer than you expect.  It’s better to have something done before you say it will than to have to call them in the middle of the afternoon and beg for an extension.  Track your time using something like Chrometa and watch for where time is being used inefficiently.
• Network with other employees.  Your job is a great place to network – you don’t have to be at a seminar or workshop to network.  Talk to other staff about their projects.  Find ways to work together.  Offer your expertise.  Share information that will help others do their jobs better.  Don’t keep it all to yourself.
• Use email as a tool.  Email isn’t just about communication.  It’s about displaying your skills, your work ethic, and your knowledge.  When you write an email keep sentence structure, spelling, and grammar in mind – even when it is just a brief email that you don’t consider important.  Every email you write tells the person you are sending it to something about you.  And always, always, read over the email you are responding to first (I one person I worked with in the past that constantly replied to my emails without actually reading the email I’d sent them and as a result I would have to send another email asking my questions again) and always, always proofread your emails to make sure that you are saying what you actually mean to say!

Watch for part two of How to Get a Promotion!

There are two things you should remember about leadership.

First, you should know that leaders are not born – they are made.  Leaders work hard to develop skills that will help them guide people.  Leaders take charge of their own learning and are inner motivated and they never stop advancing in their knowledge.

The second thing you should know is that there are two types of company leaders.  There are the ones that have a title and acquire leadership along with that title and there are the ones that take on a leadership role by default.  Either kind of leadership can help you advance in your career.

Chances are that as an administrative assistant you will not have leadership assigned to you but if you take on a leadership role on your own having a title that comes with leadership may not be far off.

How can you take on a leadership role?  Here are a few ways:

·         Watch for those in the office that seem to be lacking direction.  Help them find direction, whether it is from you or from others in the organization that can help them.  You may suggest to a manager or a team leader that someone needs a little extra attention or you might direct the one who needs help to the person who can answer questions and give them guidance.

·         Look for opportunities to motivate.  Managers should be the real motivators in the company but we all know that this is not always the case.  When you see that someone has put a lot of effort into something let them know.  When someone seems to be having an off day, make them smile.

·         Find ways to make the job more pleasurable.  Boring tasks can be made more interesting with small competitions (who can make the most phone calls in a half hour period) or by encouraging people to find ways to be more efficient.

·         Encourage socializing.  When people get to know one another they feel better about working together and then they feel better about their job.  Ask several different people out for a lunch one day and try to mix up people that don’t normally socialize together.

When you take on a leadership role without being asked, others will notice it and you will soon be considered a company leader, even if you don’t have the title to go along with it.  As more people look to you for leadership managers and leaders in the company will notice and you may soon find yourself being offered a position with a title that has formal leadership role associated with it.  

Office supplies are part of our business.  We need lots of supplies to help us stay on top of our jobs.

So, what are the office supplies that you can’t do without?  Here’s my list:

·         Sticky notes – I love them.  I have them in all sizes, too.  I like the little ones for quick notes that I know I’ll get rid of as soon as I finish a task.  The bigger ones are great for putting additional notes in a book or on a report.  Like when you need to add something to it.

·         Note pads.  I always have a notepad handy to jot down messages, things I need to do but not until later.  I fill up a small note pad every week almost so I like to have lots of them in stock.

·         Colored file folders.  Those colored file folders help me keep everything organized and it is so much easier to find something when I can narrow my search down to a specific color.

·         Paper clips.  I know staples are annoying to have to remove so when I need to keep papers together for my own purposes I use paper clips.  And the colored plastic covered ones make it easy to color code things, too.

·         Colored highlighters.  Different colors of highlighters help you to edit documents.  You don’t need to make notes about what is wrong because you can color code your edits.  Green for spelling, pink for grammar, yellow for wordiness.

·         Hole puncher.  I put lots of documents into binders and a hole puncher makes life easier.

So, what office supplies can you not live without?  Leave a comment!

from That Other Paper on Flicker

Do you ever feel that working online makes your time management ineffective?  Ever wonder exactly how much time you are spending on things other than your work?  If you really knew how much time you spend on sites that aren’t helping you get things done you might be surprised!

There are some great time management tools out there though that can help you.  One of the best ones that I have used recently is called Chrometa.  After trying the trial I just wanted more!

Chrometa is a time management tool that allows you to keep track of the websites you visit.  It will tell you how long you were there exactly.  It will also track all the applications you use, like Word or Excel.  This is a great options as many time management tools don’t allow you to do this.

Of course, what would time management be if we couldn’t assign tasks to different projects?  Chrometa does this as well.  You can set up many different projects and you simply drag and drop the sites into the projects.  It’s so easy.   And of course, you can export all your files into an easy-to-read Excel file.

The best part about Chrometa is that they don’t just give you the tool and then expect you to figure things out on your own.  Their site offers a video tutorial, a Quick Start Guide (so easy to read!), and a 5 Tips & Tricks email that will teach you how to do some really cool things.

If you need to management your computer time more efficiently but aren’t great at writing things down as you do them this is a great tool.

Click here to check them out for yourself.  You won’t regret it!

Would you love to work with animals and utilize your organizational skills at the same time?  Then listen and see if a career as a veterinary office assistant is right for you!