Six years ago, I had the honour of chairing the World Administrators Summit in Papua New Guinea. It was recognised by representatives of 29 countries that there was a clear need to provide a career progression model for the world’s administrators as a critical component to professionalising the role.
In-depth research followed, and the result is a remarkable piece of work that looks likely to change the landscape of the administrative profession.
The research showed that:
- There were over 160 job titles for administrators
- 58% of administrators felt underutilised
- 73% felt their organisation didn’t understand the role or potential impact of using them properly
- 60% felt there was little or no opportunity for career progression within their organisation
There has never been a more important time for organisations to utilise their administrators to their full potential. COVID-19 has increased the need for management to be more agile and to operate at maximum capacity. An organisation needs to ensure the ROI on their executives’ salaries is maximised.
A career administrator with clear goals and objectives, combined with personal development and career progression opportunities, is a key component for achieving this. But with most companies having generic job descriptions, no administrator-specific training, no clear career progression and no objectives or key performance indicators (KPIs) in place for their administrators, the potential impact of utilising their administrators is lost.
The World Administrators Alliance published the full report and the Global Skills Matrix on 16th September, and we are delighted to publish, alongside this issue, a supplement containing not only the Matrix itself, but also commentary from some of the world’s leading authorities on our profession about what it means.
The supplement is a celebration of this defining moment for the profession and you can download it by clicking here.
If you have any questions or would like us to talk to your HR department about how to utilise it, please contact me at lbrazier@executivesupportmedia.com. Both Helen Monument, Chair of the World Administrators Alliance, and I have committed to talking to as many companies and at as many events as we can about the impact of the Global Skills Matrix over the next 12 months.
You can also visit globalskillsmatrix.com for the full report and to download tools to help you to share it with your HR departments and executives.
Let’s go change the world!
