P.A. - old fashioned style secretary job

downshifter

Dear all, I'm interested in an admin job I've just seen advertised in a small company but when I rang up it sound like an old fashioned secretarial job. Having worked in the public/charity sector for so long, where even senior people arrange their own travel/cars/ wife's birthday presents/computers etc I was quite surprised that this was part of this private sector job.

Are these kind of jobs still common? Are people still employed to sort these kind of things out for their bosses? It kind of reminded me of an old fashioned sitcom almost. The rest of the job sounded fairly interesting though I probably wouldn't get it anyway, not having done those type of things.

If it's still the norm in the private sector for admin jobs? If so I need to rethink my job hunting a bit as I'd feel really uncomfortable doing all that..

Thanks

DS

SandC

It's very common in the private sector yes - but not really for admin jobs, usually it's those advertised as PA or secretarial (secretary is not used much as a job title these days).

From what you've described I think they have the job title completely wrong. It's not an admin job, it's a PA job. If you do go for it I would question it.

One other thing - in small private businesses the emphasis is very much on mucking in. Whilst they will have job descriptions you will often find yourself doing things that have been out of the remit of previous positions with the same type of standard job description.

downshifter

Many thanks for the explanation. Mucking in is fine, in the small charities I've worked in then that's what you do, and it can make life interesting an learn new skills. However if I were to make some arrangements such as sorting out travel for someone then on aother occasion he or she would do the same for me if needed. It sort of feels a bit like waiting on someone really, when they could just as easily do it themselves. I didn't realise companies still worked like that, especially small ones.

Anyway it's been an eye opener, being a PA isn't for me obviously!! Back to the drawing board it is.

Anihilator

Even in the public sector/charity apart from the tiniest company senior management will have admin support. Normally CEO's do not book their own hotels etc. Yes they may do a bit but they will always have someone to help out.

If you work for a company small enough this wont be the case but that doesnt make it the norm.

onlyforboards_2

This happens in loads of companies public and private. Using staff to buy family gifts is generally frowned upon though!

SandC

Downshifter my experience has always been that you get one or two more senior people doing their own thing (especially if they are female!) but generally senior management to directors will have admin staff or a dedicated PA (who may not just work for them) do all that kind of stuff.

Basically, admin or PA workers are there to make the more senior staff's work easier by taking up the slack of admin and organisational work.

My boss doesn't have me do much private stuff apart from booking the odd restaurant (I did find one of his Wife's crimbo pressies on the internet though). It's a very individual thing and you must decide at interview stage whether you are prepared to do this stuff or not. My last bosses all had me doing private stuff such as taking their dry cleaning in, putting petrol in the car etc. sometimes of which was a pain in the proverbial cos you've other stuff to do.

Generally speaking I would think it was mainly senior PAs who still do a lot of personal stuff, but anything connected with work is not 'personal' anyway.

alenax

On a related note, how do you get into PA work? I would love to do it but are there any courses I can take that would help?

poet123

My OH has a PA who books travel, arranges meetings, co-ordinates diaries, etc, it is part time role though.

smartpicture

downshifter wrote: »

However if I were to make some arrangements such as sorting out travel for someone then on aother occasion he or she would do the same for me if needed. It sort of feels a bit like waiting on someone really, when they could just as easily do it themselves. I didn't realise companies still worked like that, especially small ones.

To be honest I'm surprised that you're surprised!

It's just economically sound business practice in any business for the more highly-paid people to spend more of their time on whatever they're specialists in, and for lower-paid people to do the things that anyone can do. Okay, that probably sounds a bit snobby, but it really doesn't make financial sense for, say, someone on £70 an hour to spend an hour booking travel arrangements when it could be done by someone on £10 an hour. That's not being derogatory about the £10 an hour person, their role is equally valuable, it's about a sensible distribution of tasks in the way that best benefits the business.

I agree with you about doing personal non-business tasks like buying the wife's present though - although even that is not uncommon. You wouldn't have liked working for my ex - he got his secretary to spend a morning going through my itemised phone bill line by line to find out who I was ringing and whether I had a new boyfriend :eek:

SandC

Ouch, Smart - but at least she must've told you about it after the event!

It doesn't sound snobbish at all smart, that is exactly what PAs/secretaries like myself are paid to do - help other people to do their jobs, whether that is on a one to one basis with a CEO or whether you work for a whole team of senior management. It's surprising how time consuming just arranging meetings and travel is and all the other stuff that goes with it.

So far as getting into PA work is concerned, well when we last advertised we asked for 5 years experience at senior level. If you are looking to work for senior management or directors you will need a recognised secretarial qualification or maybe even a degree, alongside at least 2 years experience. You can also work up to the position by starting in admin type roles.

To be honest requirements vary from business to business but the experience is usually key.

alenax

SandC wrote: »

Ouch, Smart - but at least she must've told you about it after the event!

It doesn't sound snobbish at all smart, that is exactly what PAs/secretaries like myself are paid to do - help other people to do their jobs, whether that is on a one to one basis with a CEO or whether you work for a whole team of senior management. It's surprising how time consuming just arranging meetings and travel is and all the other stuff that goes with it.

So far as getting into PA work is concerned, well when we last advertised we asked for 5 years experience at senior level. If you are looking to work for senior management or directors you will need a recognised secretarial qualification or maybe even a degree, alongside at least 2 years experience. You can also work up to the position by starting in admin type roles.

To be honest requirements vary from business to business but the experience is usually key.

Fair enough, unfortunately experience is the hardest thing to get! It's a bit of a catch 22 situation - can't get a job without experience, can't get experience without a job.

Thanks for the info!