The meetings with your manager are very precious moments for both of you. Therefore, you should prep yourself beforehand as the meeting should be two-way communication and not one way. You should write down all questions you need to ask, the guidance you may need, points you need to bring to his attention and anticipate any questions he/she may have for you. In this way you can get on with your work confidently should he be unavailable during the day.
PA and manager relationship
These meetings will help greatly in understanding your manager’s rationale and you can confidently, make the right decisions on his/her behalf. Your manager, in turn, will trust and rely on you more.
At these meetings, do not be afraid to make suggestions or offer a solution to a problem. It may be dismissed immediately, but, you should look at it as a learning curve. Also, you are developing your thinking and reasoning abilities.
As you gain your manager’s trust and are more confident in your role, you can be more proactive and see if you can assist in taking on some of his/her minor tasks; ideally one at a time – there is no rush as you are looking to gain confidence in yourself and he also needs to trust you to do a good job.
The essential tool in a PA’s job or in any courses an aspiring PA attends is preparation. Preparation can be done by planning your day’s work and prioritising tasks throughout the day.
Networking internally and externally is also vital to your career. Take every opportunity to improve your skills by learning about anything that is new on the market and you know it will help you to work quickly. This may entail enrolling on a course in order to achieve this. Remember you will be more confident if you are working quickly and last but not least, it will boost your career real.
Find out more about becoming a PA or EA.