How much help do you have in your life — from nannies to work assistants to personal shoppers or trainers or more? What has made the biggest impact?
How Much Help Do You Have In Your Life?
Gift Guide: Personalized, Small Gifts for Your Assistant or Secretary
Wondering what the best secretary gifts are? These are our favorites!
Difficult Coworkers: Temper Tantrums, Crying, and More
2017 Update: We still stand by this advice on how to deal with difficult coworkers, but you may also want to check out our more recent advice on how to deal with extreme coworkers. How do you deal with difficult coworkers, such as those who are overemotional or throw temper tantrums? Should the strategies for dealing … Read More about Difficult Coworkers: Temper Tantrums, Crying, and More
Should Your Work Friends Include Your Assistant?
Do you socialize with your assistant or secretary? Do you consider him or her to be among your work friends? Or do you keep your relationship with staffers friendly but avoid turning it into an actual friendship? If the relationship has swung too far towards “friendship,” how do you bring it back to “collegial”? Reader N … Read More about Should Your Work Friends Include Your Assistant?
How to Delegate: How to Start Delegating Work To Your Assistant
Ladies: let’s talk about the art of delegating work to your secretary, assistant, or another third party.
The Bad Assistant: When To Switch, When to Fire
What should you do when you’re stuck with a bad assistant, secretary or subordinate — and your assistant doesn’t assist? When is just time to switch assistants, or even fire the person? Reader K wonders: We are a small (12 people) conservative professional investment firm serving high net worth clients. I recently moved from front office … Read More about The Bad Assistant: When To Switch, When to Fire
Should You Ever Hire a Friend?
Hiring friends: yea or nay? Does your answer vary if you’re hiring a friend to be a colleague/equal versus hiring an assistant? We’ve talked about interviewing with friends, but not the reverse situation, hiring a friend. Reader M wonders… I work at a small law firm. I’m pretty junior, but I have a considerable amount … Read More about Should You Ever Hire a Friend?
The Lazy Secretary
How do you get a lazy secretary to work harder for you — or how do you complain about her to the Powers That Be without seeming petty? Reader E, a reader from New Zealand, has this very problem… I share my secretary with my supervising partner, however he hardly uses her and often if … Read More about The Lazy Secretary
Delegating: Using Your Assistant Well
2016 Update: We still stand by these tips on delegating to your assistant — but you may also want to check out our latest discussion on how to delegate! Reader E wonders what you can and should ask your assistant or secretary to do — and what is off limits. Great question! I have been … Read More about Delegating: Using Your Assistant Well
Navigating the Murky Waters of Being Friendly With Staffers
Can you be friends with your secretary? We got this e-mail from Reader A and it raises a lot of interesting questions, such as how to treat your assistants, how to behave in a male-dominated field where you’re one of the only women who isn’t a secretary, and so forth…. I’m wondering how one is … Read More about Navigating the Murky Waters of Being Friendly With Staffers
