Imagine a world where assistants are recognised not as overhead but as vital infrastructure — as strategic as HR, finance, or marketing. A profession where their voice carries weight, their onboarding is robust, and their potential is fully unlocked. What if empowering assistants didn’t just free leaders’ time, but shifted the entire trajectory of organisations?
Category: Strategic Business Partner
Stop Destroying Yourself to Survive: Why Assistants Must Reclaim Their Voice
Too many assistants are told they’re “too much” or “not enough.” They’re asked to shrink, hide, or erase themselves just to fit in. But you were never hired to disappear — your voice, insight, and humanity are your value. It’s time to stop dimming your light and start thriving unapologetically.
Why the EA Role Is Built for the Future of Work
In today’s fast-moving, complex organisations, executive assistants already possess the skills that matter most—agility, systems thinking, influence without authority, and strategic insight. From connecting people to bridging technology and human judgement, assistants are uniquely positioned to lead the future of work.
Stop Drifting: Build a Career Plan That Works for You
Many administrative professionals want more—more recognition, challenge, and pay—but lack a clear plan to get there. Without a defined roadmap, your career can be shaped by chance rather than intention. A written plan, aligned with skills, milestones, and support, is the key to turning ambition into measurable progress.
Assistant Succession: Planning for the Invisible Leadership Role
Executives often have succession plans—but what about their assistants? Senior assistants carry the executive’s operating system, institutional knowledge, and critical relationships. When they leave, the disruption can be massive, taking months for a replacement to reach full effectiveness. Intentional succession planning for assistants isn’t optional—it’s business continuity.
Scenario Planning: The Secret Superpower of Strategic Assistants
Executives make decisions; assistants make them work. The difference between a task-based assistant and a strategic business partner often comes down to one skill: scenario planning. From cancelled flights to tech failures, top assistants anticipate disruption, build robust alternatives, and execute backup plans before anyone notices a problem. This isn’t just logistics—it’s business continuity, risk management, and executive leverage.
The Future of Administration Is Multigenerational
The narrative that Gen Z and Millennials dominate today’s workforce misses a crucial truth: over half of workers are still Gen X, Boomers, or Traditionalists — and in the administrative profession, the average assistant is 48. Older professionals bring deep knowledge, resilience, and mentorship, while younger assistants bring digital fluency and fresh perspective. The future of work won’t belong to one generation. It belongs to the organisations that know how to unlock the strengths of all generations, side by side.
Are You Holding Your Assistant Hostage — or Helping Them Soar?
Too many executives hire assistants for a skillset, then freeze them at that level. Restricting access, keeping decision-making closed, and treating them as reactive task managers doesn’t just limit the assistant — it limits the leader. The assistants who become true business partners don’t get there by chance. They grow because someone invested, coached, and created space for them to develop foresight and judgement. If you want leverage, continuity, and strategic support, the question isn’t about their potential. It’s about your leadership.
Assistants Are Not Accessories: Why Outdated Mindsets Are Dangerous in 2025
When a CEO transition prompted someone to suggest an EA should “go with the pharaoh,” it revealed the persistence of a dangerous mindset: that assistants are disposable. In reality, assistants are infrastructure — holding institutional memory, guarding relationships, and ensuring continuity no handover can replicate. With AI accelerating change, organisations that still view assistants as replaceable risk burning out leaders, losing knowledge, and undermining business performance. It’s time to end the stereotype and start recognising assistants as critical strategic assets.
Grant Thornton May Have Cut Assistants — But the Business Community Is Pushing Back
Grant Thornton’s decision to axe nearly 100 assistants sparked anger across the profession, but the comments under the Financial Times article tell a more hopeful story. While some still cling to outdated views that leaders should “do their own admin,” many business professionals pushed back, recognising assistants as critical to productivity and profitability. From consultants warning that outsourcing admin is “a disaster waiting to happen,” to senior leaders pointing out that good assistants drive firm-wide efficiency, the message is clear: assistants aren’t overhead. They are infrastructure. And the wider business world is finally starting to say it too.