My recent thoughts on personal branding got me thinking…
If we want to be perceived as more than just an admin, we have to be able to demonstrate our value and quantify our success.
With performance metrics customary in most businesses, it’s no surprise there are some pretty standard measures consistently seen for many departments; increase revenue, decrease churn etc. etc.
So why is it so difficult to define metrics to measure the success of an admin professional?
I recall early in my career as a receptionist one of my SMART objectives was to answer the telephone within three rings. I wasn’t assessed on whether I was polite, whether I addressed the caller’s needs, or anything for that matter other than picking up the call quickly… is that really the measure of a great receptionist?
Unfortunately, things haven’t gotten much better throughout my career. I have seen many great leaders struggle to quantify what success looks like for their admin professionals. And speaking to peers, I’m not alone, this is a common issue across the industry.
I know lots of great admins, but how do I know they are great?
I’m not their Manager, I haven’t set them performance objectives, I base their success on my interactions and…wait for it… their personal branding! People’s perceptions of a great admin professional seldom come from metrics, but I see a future of admin professionals actively managing their personal brand AND quantifying success across the industry.
Often as individual contributors benchmarking what success looks like is much harder but having a common set of industry standard measures (I know we’ll never get to ‘one size fits all’ because our focus and priorities are often dictated by the ever-changing needs of our own executives/business) that we can draw from would go some way to addressing the issue.
We are a very smart, resourceful industry so let’s not wait for someone else to quantify our success.
Let’s start the conversation.
