Annie:
Welcome to The Whole Assistant Podcast. I'm your host, Annie Croner. I'm a former assistant who's passionate about our profession, and I'm also a certified coach who's invested in your success. You've come to the right place if you want to know what it looks like to stand in your power and achieve success as an assistant. From overwhelm and burnout. Now, onto today's episode. Welcome to 2025. I don't know about you guys, but I had a great holiday season.
Annie:
I am so ready to get back in the swing of things. I thrive on routine. I really, really do. I love my life. I love my routine. And I know it makes me sound kind of boring, and I don't even care because it has been a challenge. It has been a challenge to be out of my normal routine. It has been a challenge for my boys to be home with us as we're also trying to work.
Annie:
It has also been so much fun to spend time with my family. My family came to Denver for Christmas, which was great, and New Year's was also really laid back and chill, which I love. I'm just ready to get back in the swing of things. So today on the podcast, we are talking about your biggest barrier to developing a more strategic partnership. And I'm going to be focusing on the core topic that we're going to be talking about, which is setting yourself up for success. I also feel like this is very timely given that it's a new year. I'm not big into New Year's resolutions, but what I am big into is reassessing your processes, setting yourself up for success so that you can kick butt and take numbers and not even have to think about it. The great thing about a good process is that it's almost done on autopilot, especially if you can, like, work in some automation tools and stuff like that.
Annie:
So we're going to be talking about that in just a minute. But before I get to that, I do want to share about an upcoming free masterclass I'll be hosting is gonna be three ways to establish trust in your executive assistant role. And I'm really excited to be sharing this information with you. It's gonna be such a fun time together. I have never shared this information in this way before, so I'm really looking forward to that as well. And the dates for the masterclass are January 15th at 1:00 Mountain Time. I'm in Denver, so it's gonna be in Mountain Time. 1:00 Mountain on Wednesday.
Annie:
The 15th and then Friday, January 17th at noon. There is a link below to register for this masterclass. I'm going to be sharing a lot of things in this masterclass. I'm going to be sharing how developing trust is crucial to strategic partnership, where to invest your time and energy to make your greatest impact, and one secret that will turbocharge trust with your leader. So please join us for three ways to establish trust in your executive assistant role. You can go to wholeassistant.com/trust wholeassistant.com/trust register or I will also link to it to that link down in the show notes below. It's gonna be 100% free and I hope that you can join us. Okay, so today we're talking about the biggest barrier to developing a more strategic partnership that most of us don't think about when it comes to strategic partnering.
Annie:
And that thing is setting yourself up for success, taking the time to actually contemplate how you can set yourself up for success in your role and in your life. And this is something I've been focusing on a lot because it is the new year and I really wanted to make sure that I'm setting myself up for success and I'm setting my clients up for success in a bigger, more impactful way as well. So I've really been contemplating all of those things and almost just even giving myself permission to dream. Dream about what things could be. Dream about the next level for me. And I would encourage you to do the same thing. What is a next level for you? Where do you want to take your career in 2025? And as I mentioned earlier on, I'm not big into New Year's resolutions, but what I am big into is committing and assessing. So we want to commit to our goals.
Annie:
We want to also assess where we're at currently so that we know the next steps to take and we can actually implement like a boss. Also, it's worth noting that what got you to where you are won't get you to where you want to go. For many of us, we've worked our way up into an executive assistant role from another role. And I know that I started out in the admin profession as a receptionist right out of college, just looking for something to pay the bills. And I got inspired by my executive at the time, my boss at the time, and her relationship with her executive. She was the EA to the CEO. She also manage the entire office, soup to nuts, really. She was so impactful for me and my career and I was just a really, really hard worker.
Annie:
And I was willing to be everyone's yes person. I was willing to do whatever anybody asked me. But honestly, what got me to that point? Success in my early career, I had to leave some of that behind and assess where I wanted to take my career and were the actions I was taking then aligned with where I was headed. So I will say that too, that like there's not going to be the most amazing career where you only spend time doing exactly what you want to do. For most of us, that's not how life works out. There's always going to be something that you have to do that you don't want to do. But I will say that if you can really get clear on what it is that you want and then take your time. Take the time to set yourself up for success and take the time to actually assess where you are now and assess where you want to go and create almost a roadmap for yourself that can be really impactful for you and your career.
Annie:
And when it comes to developing a more strategic partnership, we kind of have to slow down before we can speed up. Meaning that we need to really break free from the whack a mole mode. We really need to assess whether what we are doing is impactful or not. Especially for our executives. We need to consistently recalibrate to our executives priorities, right? And so often we get stuck in the weeds, we get stuck in the to do list that we almost lose sight of your executive's priorities. I've just seen this a lot with my clients and even in my, in my own world, in my own life, running a business, I can get really caught up in the minutiae of things. Instead of taking a step back, taking a broader picture, really assessing where I'm spending my time and then really investing my time and energy into those high priority, high impact things. So what does this look like exactly for an executive assistant wanting to develop a more strategic partnership with their executive? What does setting yourself up for success actually look like? I know I'm going to sound like a brokered record when I say this, but it really looks like developing your processes.
Annie:
So looking at everything through the lens of process, what is working well, what is broken, what is getting pushed by the wayside, what is getting forgotten about? How can you look from a process perspective and improve your processes? I also like to look at processes for another reason. And that reason is when we are able to articulate our processes, that helps us also slow down long enough to articulate our value proposition. And so when it comes to developing a More strategic partnership, especially if you want to move into a more strategic mindset, you maybe want to move up in your role, maybe you want a title change or move to a chief of staff type role or whatnot. You're really going to have to be able to articulate how you're adding strategic value now and how you planned on expanding on that strategic value as you go down your path, as you either get the promotion, as you either decide to level up in that way. And so really looking at your processes and being able to articulate them is a great way to also be able to articulate your value proposition to your executive. You will also likely find inefficiencies in your processes, which then you can then improve. And then you can also even be thinking about your executive and his processes or her processes or their processes. Right? You can be looking at processes across the board and really thinking more strategically about how you want to show up.
Annie:
Whenever we look at process, I think it's also important to note that we want a daily calibration around the top priorities. So we actually have to have something lined out where we can see those priorities outside of our brain. We can see them lined out somewhere outside of us. A big fan of Trello for this reason, because I'm a very visual person and I like to see everything lined out, I think also goals and objectives. If you can actually have this strategic planning session with your executive, and there's a free download on my website wholeassistant.com to where I walk you through the process of holding your strategic planning session with your executive soup to nuts. It's a really cool freebie, so be sure to check that out as well, that if you are actually able to do that, then you're actually able to calibrate around your executive's goals, their priorities, your leader's objectives, all of those things, that's how we set ourselves up for success. We kind of have to zoom out for a minute and get out of the weeds and get out of doing long enough to actually assess what's working for us and what isn't. And most of us skip this vital, vital step.
Annie:
I know it's very simple and I know our brains have a tendency to like, over complexify and try to make things harder than what they are. But this is the biggest barrier I see to developing a more strategic partnership is people not investing the time and energy into setting themselves up for success. Also, when we take a look in this way and we're actually really mindful about our processes, not only Are we able to articulate our value proposition? But our processes also foster consistency, and consistency builds trust. And I think a lot of us downplay the consistency piece and we think that just showing up for our job is enough. That is not enough. We have to show up consistently over time, and that's what builds trust. It's a very simple thing, but it's also very hard to execute for a lot of us because most of us aren't aware of that link between consistency and trust. So I also am just going to point out a few barriers to success that I have noticed in my clients and also in myself.
Annie:
When I was an executive assistant before, I actually overcame them. So the thought of I can either take the time to plan and set myself up for success, or I can just jump in and get it done. How many of us have ever thought that thought before? I know I certainly have, and I know I still do. I've got this whole morning routine that I'm going to be executing in 2025 that is going to be really impactful for me. At every morning when I sit down, my number one thought is, oh, I can do that, or I can just jump in and get things done. Like, because the weight of the world is on our shoulders, because there's so much responsibility that we carry, we have that thought about taking the time to plan versus just jumping in and getting it done. But instead of addressing this thought and the discomfort it brings, many of you try and action your way out of discomfort. When this is really more a thought problem, this is really more a problem in our brains and really taking the time to actually unravel some of that and unpack some of what's going on for us there and lean into that discomfort.
Annie:
We try to just action our way out of the discomfort by getting a whole bunch of things done. And then we tell ourselves that we will go back to plan once we've actually executed on a few things to ease our mind. And I gotta tell you, 99.9% of the time, you're not gonna go back because you're already in the swing of your day. So really taking the time in the morning to set yourself up for success, taking that first 15 minutes to like outline your Trello board, to outline your objectives for the day, to touch in with your. To touch base with your executive, to see what's on the. What's on the horizon, to look up and to actually see what's coming down the pike and to actually plan for those things. Just even 15 minutes to a half hour every day will have a huge impact in your ability to show up more strategically in your role and in your ability to show up as a more strategic business partner. Another barrier to success is, is the dopamine feedback loop of completing tasks.
Annie:
So every time we complete a task, our brain gives us a little dopamine hit. And what ends up happening is that we end up chasing the dopamine hit instead of really showing up more strategically for our time, showing up more strategically for a day. So what ends up happening is we end up playing Whack a Mole, that arcade game, Whack a Mole, where there's a mallet and you just hit the moles. We end up doing that all day long and looking back over our day and recognizing and realizing that nothing of actual value got accomplished. Another barrier to success there again is discounting or downplaying your processes, right? Discounting or downplaying them instead of fine tuning them. Instead of making incremental change towards better processes, we discount that, like, oh, whatever. Process, process. Yeah, yeah.
Annie:
Here you get. What? No, no, actually investing the time and energy into fine tuning your processes will be a game changer for you, regardless of the type of work environment you want to be in, regardless of the type of partnership you want to have with your executive. Truly a game changer. Okay, so then where do we start? Where do we start when it comes to taking the time to set yourself up for success? So the first thing that I'm going to propose is that you develop a strong morning routine that includes assessing the priorities and ensuring alignment with your leader. That's it. Assessing the priorities and ensuring alignment with your leader. And then recognize that every moment spent on optimizing and articulating a process has the potential to save hours later. So every investment we make now has a potential to save literally hours of work later.
Annie:
And I know that it doesn't feel like we've got the time to invest now, but even if you take just a few minutes to, like, research a new tool to use, like, there's some great tools out there. There's Cabinet, which will help you streamline your calendars, especially if you manage lots of calendars. There's this app called Text Blaze. I'm going to be doing a podcast episode probably later on this month about the tools that I like to use in order to streamline processes. But. But I gotta tell you guys, every moment that you spend optimizing and articulating a process not only has the potential to save you time later, it also will help you solidify for yourself your unique value add. So just start small. Just start with one to three systems per week to refine and optimize.
Annie:
Just one per week. So as we are trying to set ourselves up for success, I'm gonna be covering systems this month on the podcast and all the different vantage points that can take with systems. But we really need to be setting ourselves up for success and also thinking bigger picture for our year as well. How can we set ourselves up for success by actually considering what it is that we want for 2025 and also like your steps to kind of get there. Okay, guys, so that is what I have for you guys today. I hope you found it helpful. And also please join me for my upcoming free masterclass, three ways to establish trust in your executive assistant role. There again, you can go to wholeassistant dot slash trust to pick a time and register and I hope to see you there.
Annie:
And I hope that this year is full of joy and delight and that this is your most impactful year as an executive assistant yet. Okay, guys, that's what I have for you guys today. Be intentional. Be whole. That is all for now. I help assistants apply the concepts I share on this podcast. If you're ready to take your growth deeper and you're curious whether working with me in a coaching capacity is right for you, please email me at [email protected] to schedule your complimentary discovery call.
