Professional Skills for Administrators & Secretaries

Successful secretaries and administrators often require many of the same skills as senior staff in an organization. They are often the person in charge of the organization's correspondence, and are very often the first point of contact for visitors. Therefore, they must display a highly professional image at all times.

The role of being a professional secretary or administrator requires: excellent office skills, accurate filing, preparing for meetings, dealing with people, both on the telephone and face-to-face, exceptional interpersonal abilities, and first-class business writing and communication skills. This programme covers all of these, and more.

By the end of this training, participants will be able to:

• Develop the skills and attributes of a first class office professional and make a greater contribution in their workplace.
• Become more confident
• Become more proactive
• Communicate more confidently and effectively with your manager, colleagues and other departments
• Deal with the difficulties and pressures of working in a modern office.
• Prioritise between urgent and important tasks
• Plan, organise and manage time more effectively

Introduction/Roles, Competences and Personal Effectiveness

• The ‘competence’ model of skills, behaviours and values
• Emotional and Chronistic Intelligence
• Personal competence review
• Time management constraints – resources, systems, other people and self
• Handling requests and conflicting priorities

Team Working, Communication and Meetings

• Team working and team roles
• Briefing skills – giving, receiving and passing on
• Organising and participating in meetings
• Notes, minutes and follow-up

 Managing Working Relationships /Communication Skills/Supervising Admin Staff

• Delegation – giving and receiving
• Communication and listening skills – lessons from NLP
• Developing a network of working relationships – influencing skills
• Assertiveness and conflict
• People problems and problem people
• Practical motivation
• Criticism skills

 Managing Time/Desk Management and Office Technology/Writing Skills

• Planning and priority setting
• Managing the paper-load and developing paperless systems
• Getting the best from office technology
• Letter writing
• E-mail efficiency and etiquette
• Writing and editing reports
• Proof-reading skills