Course summary

Executive Assistants, Executive Secretaries and Personal Assistants must understand key management skills and be able to use them effectively in order to ensure success in today's highly competitive world.

In this course, you'll learn and practise the essentials of how to communicate effectively, how to manage yourself and others, and how to continuously upgrade your skills and manage your career.

If you have more than five years of experience as an Executive or Personal Assistant, we recommend attending the Experienced Executive Assistant’s Course. You can also enrol in it after completing this course.

Learning outcomes

By the end of this course, you should be able to:

• reflect on your role and appreciate the steps for self-development
• understand the communication process and how to enhance it
• discuss ways to support your manager
• read the messages in voice and body language
• build rapport with everyone you meet
• use your listening skills in a variety of work-based situations
• implement the key steps to written structure
• understand and set goals and priorities
• meet deadlines
• say 'no' to interruptions and others' priorities
• delegate up and down
• defuse stress
• assess your values and skills
• set career goals and action steps.

Content

Recognise the changing dynamics of the role

• Define strategies to assess and improve professional skills
• Identify opportunities for personal development
• Discuss ways to manage your manager

Maximise communication effectiveness

• Review verbal and non-verbal messages
• Consider email protocol and office etiquette
• Practice the art of ‘active listening’
• Enhance your assertiveness capabilities
• Create ways to build rapport

Improve time management skills

• Cram 24 hours into every morning
• Learn how to say ‘no’ guiltlessly
• Engage in the art of delegation
• Identify how to set priorities and manage deadlines
• List ways to defusing stress

Review your workday, habits, and construct action steps for personal goals

Prerequisites

None

Who this course is for

Suitable for current Executive Assistants and Personal Assistants who wish to refresh their communication skills through group discussion, interactive exercises and self-awareness. New and less experienced EA/PA's will also benefit from defining and reviewing professional skills essential to their role. If you have more than five years of experience as a PA or EA, we recommend you attend the Experienced Executive Assistant’s Course.

Delivery modes

• Face-to-face, presenter-taught training
• Online training via the platform Zoom

Delivery style

Constructed around the principle of the learner achieving a state of ‘consciously competent’, i.e., creating a realistic awareness of not what you do in your workday but, how you do it. You will be involved in discussions, group exercises, case studies and supportive learning.

Materials

A course workbook is distributed electronically using Dropbox.

What you need to do before the course

Prior to attending, you should:

• generate an example daily to-do list
• create a general list of all core responsibilities and duties
• think of one example of a 'time constraint'
• prepare one case study that involves dealing with a difficult person in a professional setting.

To get the most out of the course, please bring your own laptop so you can take part in the in‑class activities.