Administrative Assistant's Update - sample

3 Administrative Assistant's UPDATE Should your executives be actively using social media? By Leslie Hughes Your executives should be part of the conversation on social media, listen- ing to your target audience, and, whenever possible, actually engaging. Social media can be used not only for marketing, but it can be used for sales, branding, customer service and employee advocacy. Your clients/customers and your team are looking to your executives, the leaders of your company, for both cor- porate branding and corporate culture. According to the Altimeter Group, a technology research firm, "Only 52 per cent of companies say that executives are informed, engaged, and aligned with their company's social strategy … which limits the social growth path." A report by Weber Shandwick, a global public relations firm, stated that 80 per cent of employees say they would rather work for a social CEO and two out of three customers say that their perception of the CEO im- pacts their perception of the company. Your executives are the forward- facing brand ambassadors of your organization and should consider having a strong presence online to showcase their thought leadership. So, where do they start? They may be most comfortable using the world's largest business network – LinkedIn. With over 414 million members worldwide, LinkedIn is the most popular channel for executives. They can connect with their peers, get access to industry news, share company updates and even write and weigh in on industry issues via long- form blog posts. The great news about LinkedIn is it doesn't take up as much time as any of the other channels to manage their presence: only 10-20 minutes every other day (as a minimum). As your executive becomes more comfortable using one channel, you can encourage her or him to use other channels such as Twitter, blogging, YouTube and more to help your com- pany deepen relationships with your target audience. Leslie Hughes was called a "Social Media Guru" by CBC Radio and has been working in digital marketing since 1997. She is a LinkedIn optimization specialist, professor of social media, corporate trainer and principal of PUNCH!media. PUNCH!media clients include The Children's Wish Foundation of Canada, Guardian Life Insurance Company of America and TVO. www.punchmedia.ca (sign up for weekly newsletter) leslie@punchmedia.ca Leslie Hughes Organize with Time & Space Inventory By Staff Being organized is a given for the administrative professional. But did you know that personality type and strengths, which vary from one individual to the next, influence how one organizes time and space? This means that the way you organize your work and workday may not exactly suit other members of your team or your executive(s). So how do you accommodate style preferences to achieve an efficient, harmonious system of doing things? You can take an inventory of your own preferences to begin with. Julie Perrine, founder and CEO of All Things Admin, writing as a guest blogger for Office Dynamics Inter - national, suggests the Time & Space Inventory (TSSM), created by Cena Block of Sane Spaces. It's a tool, says the Sane Spaces website, "that helps you figure out what makes your life flow. It helps you find your sweet spot." It measures degree of prefer- ence for time use (how you handle priorities, attend to details, deal with action items) and space use (how you arrange your space, assign value to items, tolerate disorder). Once you've used the tool, Sane Spaces says, you'll know yourself better, then "create the spaces, systems and support you need to be in flow." Thus you'll be in a stronger posi- tion to suggest it to your executive(s) or colleagues. (More information at www.sane- spaces.com.)

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