Annie:
Welcome to the whole assistant podcast, where assistants come to embrace their badassery and discover how to show up more strategically for their careers, their executives, and most importantly, themselves. I'm your coach, Annie Croner. Join us as we dive into the skills, strategies, and mindset that will help you unleash your full potential. Let's go.
Melissa Peoples:
Hello, everybody. Come on in. So give it to us in the chat as everybody is coming in. Where are you coming from? I'm so excited that you guys are here, ready to geek out with Annie and I. I love this. So, okay, so we have people coming in from literally everywhere. Dublin, Ohio, Florida. Oh, my gosh. No. Today I was told that I look very Texan. What does that mean? I don't know.
Annie:
Very chic, actually. You're very chic today, Melissa. I'm loving it.
Melissa Peoples:
Thank you. Actually, somebody was like, I'm expecting you go to talk to Junior. And I was like, you have to be like our age to know what that means. Oh, my gosh. I'm gonna switch the format on this really quickly just so everybody can really easily come in. So we have Florida. Amazing. Okay, well, I. Let's go ahead and get started because we have so many topics that came in from everybody. Just really kind of everybody asking lots of spicy and fun questions. But how many of you guys. Let me see in the chat, how many of you guys are brand new to Annie Kroner because you would be living under rock if you are, because she's amazing and fantabulous. But let me know in the chat, like, give me a one if you are Brandy, because I'm so excited for you guys to get to know her. Everybody's like, no, of course I know Annie. Give me in the chat. Give me a two if you are. Oh, Blanca. Okay, Amazing. So we do have some people who are brand new to Annie. Well, by the end of today's session, you're going to love her literally as much as everybody else does. Give me a two. Jackie, give me a two. If you've never been in a session with me, are you coming from, like, Annie's world? And you are new to me. Everybody's like, no, absolutely not. We wanted to let this session be super chill. It really, really just kind of wanted to ask you guys what is top of mind for you? What are some of the things that you guys are thinking about? And how can Annie and I essentially give you free coaching and hashtag all of the things? So we do have your top 15 questions that you guys all submitted. So we're going to go over those. We'll see how many and I can actually go through because if you've ever been in a session with Annie and I, we actually do have a bunch of these on YouTube. We could go all day talking about the one thing we get so excited. But we're going to try and, like, keep ourselves together and see how many of these that we can get you through. But I also want to make sure that if you guys think of something, you're like, hey, this is really top of mind for me. Make sure you go into the chat and ask the question and then. All right, so before we do all that, let's do a little bit of housekeeping. So this is my amazing friend Annie Croner, who I absolutely adore. We love each other that we hang out literally every week as much as humanly possible. We are both EA coaches, but I wanted to kind of give everybody a highlight. Annie, before we get started, do you have anything super exciting that's coming up that you want to share with? Hashtag all the people? Yes.
Annie:
So I recently launched a new membership. So I'm going to put the link in the chat and the purpose of this membership is to level up in the cheapest way, the most cost effective way, and also in the least amount of stress. So I created very accessible, a very accessible offer. Part of that is a private podcast where you can, like digest the content as you're driving your kids to school in the morning. And yeah, so I'm going to pop that in the chat. And if you use the code empowered AF at checkout, you get an extra $50 off the annual membership. So please come join us. Look at Empowered Seat. And I mean, Melissa is bound to be in there at some point too, because that's just how we roll with one another, where we're here for each other's, all the things for each other and we're willing to support each other. And that's one of the things I love the most about Melissa, is just her willingness. I don't know, I just. She's just a good human. Just her willingness to, to come alongside and support any way she can. And I, I feel the same for her. So I'm here for her too. And we're here for each other in that way. Oh, yes. I'll put the code in the. In the.
Melissa Peoples:
So I'm going to give you guys a heads up on a pre training that is happening next week on the 20th. So I'm teaming up with Lauren Bradley and Ebony Bellheimer. Who Former high powered EA to. I'm the CEO of Switch and Sephora moved over into head of Ops and now she has launched her own AI platform. So now she's the AI founder. Super incredible. And then she is. Here's the link for anybody who wants to come. She is going to do a master class on salary negotiation and Ebony has not been doing as much speaking because she's like building this entire AI platform. So make sure that you grab it. It's free session. I just popped it in there. And then for me, I am launching a AI focused course. We're going to do a cohort on Microsoft AI, sort of like a six week course. I'm super excited about it. So more information coming your way about that. But okay, that's all of the wonderful things that are happening in our world. Let's get down. Shall we get friends? I feel like we should get very spicy because that's again, a little bit how we roll. All right, let's.
Annie:
I don't think we can avoid the Spice, Melissa. It's just impossible for us to avoid the Spice because I think, I think it. Because we're just so passionate to help you guys and we genuinely want to see you succeed and we generally bump up against certain things again and again and again as coaches. So I think we are. That's, that's where the spice is coming from. It's coming from a good place for sure.
Melissa Peoples:
But we like to, we like to bring it. I always say that Janni and I are typically the people who, who will tell you things that other people are going to avoid and not talk about. But we don't even care. We just want to bring it up. So I want to give you guys a little bit of percentages. Here's what we heard when you guys voted and registered that almost half of you, 43% of you, wanted more clarity on executive ops. So in that framework is a little bit around decision making, executive partnership, influence, the scope of the role and how to operate at the higher level, which, you know, I am here. 26.5% of you were really begging for help around systems and tech, which again, Annie and I are all about. And specifically you guys were looking for questions on AI, the ecosystems that you're in. But you guys were really calling out outlook teams and just overall workflow, which again, Annie and I love to get on. And then the last one was a combined 29.6% of you. We're kind of saying the area of focus that you're really struggling with right now is burnout and boundaries. To me, that is a massive red flag that really shows how overloaded and under supported this industry is. So I'm super excited to kind of go over all the things. All right, so let's. Let's start. All right, the question number one, I'm going to pump this over to Annie. So Annie question came in and it is, how do I get my executive to stop treating me like a glorified taskmaster and actually bring me into a conversation and have a seat at the table where decisions are really made? Yeah.
Annie:
So part of this is establishing trust, right? Because if your executive doesn't trust you and we're not showing up in a trustworthy way, so I think consistency is number one. So I'm going to tie this back into systems because your systems are what create consistency, truly. And I think also sometimes we are of the opinion that our executive is unaware of our whereabouts or whether or not we're working. So I think integrity is also going to be paramount to success when it comes to building trust. Because if we don't show up when we say we're going to show up, if we don't execute on the things that we say we're going to execute on, if we aren't consistent with the little things, then we aren't going to be trusted with the bigger things. And look, I think if you show up with consistency over time and you also improve your communication, learning your executive's communication style is also a challenge. So it kind of depends. I'd be very curious to know and have a conversation with whoever submitted this question, because I often will see this question from somebody who's only been in a role for, like, less than six months. I'll be like, my executive doesn't trust me. And it's like, okay, wait a minute. I hop on discovery calls all the time where someone's like, my executive. And I'm like, how long have you been in your role? Oh, six weeks. And like, well, yeah, of course, time is also a key indicator that builds trust. So if you show up consistently over time and also showcasing your values, another going to be another important thing, too. You're constantly bringing up like, hey, I can take this off of your plate. And then you're. You're considering that a C. Because oftentimes our executives will shut us down, right? They'll be like, no, I don't want you to manage that. I don't want to give you access to my inbox, whatever it is. And then something falls through the cracks and we can then bring it up again and be like, so this is a good example of a time when it would have been helpful for me to have access to your inbox. So really, it's like showcasing it's training. It's. It is sometimes if you have built trust with your executive and you are in alignment with them, sometimes it's asking for forgiveness and not permission. So it's kind of an interesting combination of all of those things all at once. And depending on the client and depending on what the client's roadblock is, I think there again. A few weeks ago, Melissa Peoples, Ebony and I sat down for a conversation on my podcast. I also run a podcast and we talked about gender dynamics in the workplace. We talked about how women often have a hard time. Female executives often have a hard time giving things over to their executive assistant. So there are some gender dynamics at play here, too. When you've been like socialized your entire life to take full ownership for everything and to be overly responsible for things, it's going to be a lot harder to give things up. So it just kind of depends on what the dynamic is there. But I definitely think that showing up consistently over time and showcasing your value are the top two strategies that I would implement immediately in order to gain trust. And then also that integrity piece, making sure that you are where you say you're going to be, that you're doing what you say you're going to do. And even when you sync, your executive doesn't notice because I now have people who work under me and sometimes I'm like, somebody's not doing their job. In the past, I have, I've got two great people now who aren't under me. But in the past, I've been like, okay. I mean, it's, you know, they thought that I wasn't aware, but they told. Yeah. So I think, I think that's a piece of this. We just have to show up with integrity.
Melissa Peoples:
I love all of that. The things that I might add would be, you need to start making sure that you put yourself in a position where you can have a seat at the table and that you can be in those decisions. So if you are invited into a room or if you ask like, hey, listen, I'm, I'm really interested in this topic. I want to start joining this meeting. And you have to be really careful in this role about how you show up while you're in the room. If you are multitasking and not paying attention and doing other things, you very quickly start to teach your Executive, business partner that you are not tuned in and leaned into the conversation. And I will immediately know if. So if, if I'm inviting somebody in and they're doing lots of other things, I'm immediately like, they're not even tuned in to this conversation. And you start teaching them that they can't trust you. Because the moment an executive has to catch you up because you weren't paying attention or you weren't like fully leaned into the business, I kind of going back to that trust piece, it's like, can I trust them with bigger things? So I think we even have to be more intentional with how we show up into the room. We have to start learning the language of business and start speaking at that level so that you are somebody that they're like, hey, here's a topic that we have. What is your thoughts on it? And really kind of level up your business acumen so that you are ready to be in the room where decisions are being made. Okay.
Annie:
Also, can I just attack something? Of course. I think also with that piece, it's like a self concept piece. So if you're always questioning like, why am I in this space? Everyone seems so much smarter than I am. Well, you're in that space because you're the odd person out, because you're the boots on the ground. And that voice is so necessary in spaces of high level thinkers. That person who can connect the dots, that person who can see how any decision coming down the pike will affect the company, the culture, an individual even. And you are meant to point those things out. I mean, Melissa has a really great story about working at Dell and about being in a room when a decision was made and sending an email that was ill fated, all because she chose not to speak up.
Melissa Peoples:
Right.
Annie:
And so I think, I think that there is that reality of self concept that we need to adopt too. Like, you're in the room because you're valued, even if you don't fully understand all the parts and pieces. And here's the truth, here's the truth. Even though these executives posture like they understand all the parts and pieces, they don't. That's why you have experts in the room. That's why you have a chief operating officer. That's why you have a CEO, chief executive officer, why you have a cmo, why you have a cfo. Each person is an expert in their own individual bucket that runs the business. You're. You're an expert too. You're an expert in execution. You're an expert in connecting the dots. You're an expert in being the bridge between your executive and the rest of the organization. You are an expert and people are going to share information with you that they don't feel comfortable sharing with their executives. So what that means is that your voice is going to be very valuable in that space. And oftentimes we downplay that because we're experiencing discomfort instead of actually stepping into our power and using our voice. And so those are like, this is a value add of a strategic business partner. You don't have to understand all the parts and pieces in order to be effective in your role. You don't have to understand everything in order to use your voice in that space. So I mean honestly, when it comes to strategic partnership, like I'm a huge mindset person. I love to do training, I love to train on mindset because it affects so much. It affects how you show up in that space and your self concept is a huge piece of that. So, so we have to grab onto that self concept of being the odd person out and understanding that is a superpower instead of a weakness.
Melissa Peoples:
Thousand percent. I think the more that you can like manage those kinds of like self doubt and negative self talk, all of that you have, because I, I think that lack of confidence shows up in this world differently because we are naturally not invited into conversations. And I think in Annie and I have had so many discussions on this, maybe after we can link more of our conversations where people can deep dive on some of this, but where we talked about that where based on where our industry is, we're not naturally invited to these spaces. And then when we are invited, what does that look like and how you can level up your own confidence even when you're not feeling it. And you know, speaking up and speaking out and making sure that when you are, when you do have the opportunities that you actually grab ahold of them and you're not so afraid to based on some version of imposter syndrome syndrome that's not real, but it feels real. And then that's what you're leaning into instead of like making the shift, the mental shift. So I absolutely love that. Okay, let's go to question number two. How do I survive a rework when leadership will not communicate? All of the roles keep shifting and somehow my scope magically expands every single month with no end insects. I, I will say this. I think, look, we all have like reorgs happen all the time in business, right? And you have to be prepared for these moments of like constant shifting. And there's so much Ambiguity in our role. And I think to me it kind of really leans back into your comfortability in communicating. And one of the things that Annie and I, I know we, her and I have talked about this a million times. One of the biggest challenges that we see with our coaching clients and just in the industry in general is that we do not want to communicate with executive leaderships for whatever reason. Like for whatever reason. Whereas, like, peer to peer, I would be happy just to have a conversation and just kind of going like, hey, I'm noticing that there's a lot of great shift and reorg. I keep seeing that my responsibility is growing and it feels as if it's going to continue to grow. What does that actually look like long term? What is expectations long term, we don't have those conversations. Instead, we just kind of take it all in and we go, well, I guess this is my lot in life rather than like addressing it directly. And I think we have to shift that mindset that is re level setting expectation, having the hard conversations, even when it doesn't feel comfortable, because you've built a relationship with your executive business partners and it's really important that you lean into that rather than like walk away from them. But. Okay, go ahead. Annie, what is your, what is your thoughts on constant reorgang and taking on the role of everybody's job without up in compensation?
Annie:
Yeah, so I think first of all, I like how this, this question was worded. How do I survive a reorg without leadership communication? Like, there's just a lot of like victimy type verbiage here which can kind of tell me where the asker's at. And that's okay because it's real and it's authentic. And so I think first of all, like, recognizing that you're choosing to show up to work every single day and that that is a decision that you're making. And then also I would, I would question what your values are because it seems like there's a bit of misalignment here with your role. Like, you would much rather have a predictable work environment where, like, there are fewer reorgs perhaps, or your role is more well defined and you can find work environments like that. And so I think really getting clear on your values. What is it that you value? How is your current role out of alignment with those values? And is it so much out of alignment with your values that you want to look elsewhere for a new position? And so that is a question that I would have you do some soul searching. And I walk my clients through that process all the time. When I work one on one with a client, we start out with a values assessment just so I can have their values top of mind as we go through the coaching process. But I will say that, you know, either understanding what the end game is with the reorg can be helpful. And then plugging yourself in where it feels good and then also setting those parameters around your time and energy where it doesn't feel so good and advocating for yourself. And oftentimes this is going to speak to the boundaries piece. Like oftentimes we don't actually have the meaningful dialogue with our executives around what we want our boundaries to look like and what we want that to be for us. Instead we just wallow over here and we're like, well, because we play out, we play out the, the conversation in our head in a way that doesn't serve or support us. So then we don't actually use our voice to ask for the thing that we want. So then we don't actually get the thing that we want when perhaps we would have gotten the thing that we wanted. How we actually used our voice and advocated for ourselves. So part of this is like getting really clear on what your values are, aligning your role with your values as much as humanly possible, asking yourself what your deal breakers are and then also using your voice like we feel in advance so much because we don't actually use our voice and speak up and advocate for ourselves or even just ask.
Melissa Peoples:
The question, have the conversation.
Annie:
We don't because it's awkward and, and look like this is way. This is why I'm a huge fan of having awkward conversations. Because oftentimes we would get what we wanted if we actually had the conversation.
Melissa Peoples:
Thousand and it's so unique to this industry that so many of the questions that I know both of us are asked by our clients are so easily fixed with being brave enough to have that under, under uncomfortable, awkward, awkward to you conversation. It is not awkward in business, to be clear. Like people are having awkward conversations all the time. It's the perception that we have, like what is. Because it is, it is being comfortable in your position of power. It's being comfortable and you kind of going like, I'm a colleague here, I am a key stakeholder in the executive office and I this is only so much bandwidth that I can take on and if I've got, you know, 10 people's jobs and it just feels like it's continuing for success is going to look like it's going to look very different. And we're going to have to re figure out what expectations are going to look like, what the long term goal is going to be, what is the plan? Because I am not the solution to your HR issues. And we don't ever feel comfortable having those conversations. You don't have to be Annie or Melissa spicy. You can be you spicy and whatever feels comfortable for you. But you have to get comfortable having really awkward conversations that don't feel good. This comes this like, this is a really close follow up. So let me. This is a question that somebody had sent in that I think really kind of leans into this. So the question was, how do I set boundaries with leaders who genuinely believe it's my job to be on call and cheerful? Lord almighty, do not get me started 24 7. Because I think Annie and I, we talked about this in our like gender dynamics conversation where it's like we have been socialized and again, this industry, somewhere between 92 and 98% female dominated that as women it is my job to put on the smile and be beautiful and cute and do all the things for you and make you feel good. Because that's like a concept of a 1950s like madman episode versus it's not my job to actually protect you from your own consequences because I'm not your mother, I'm not your wife. So it's not my job, you know, to like massage your feelings. But somewhere in. And we talked about that like work wife. So I would definitely point everybody to that conversation around sort of those gender dynamics and the pressure to feel like it's my job to massage your feelings and make you happy. Because I'm not here for it.
Annie:
Yeah. And I think part of this too is like there was a time in my career where I didn't mind being on call 24 7.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
It literally did not bother me. Did not mind. And then I had my babies.
Melissa Peoples:
And.
Annie:
Then it became a hard path.
Melissa Peoples:
Right.
Annie:
And then I had to set parameters around my time off and my I, I had to say, okay, so if you need to reach me after hours, you're going to have to text or call me. I'm not going to be living in my inbox after hours. And if it's urgent needs to be happen that next morning, go ahead, text and call me. And occasionally I get a text that was not urgent and I would just wait till the next day to answer it. But I do think, I do think that if you're in a role where leadership expects you to be on call and happy and perky 24 7. So the way I teach boundaries is really data driven. And so I think there's this concept that I like to use called a want match. And a want match is basically aligned expectations. You want to do the role in the way that your executive wants the role done. And this is a classic example that I give around being on call 24 7.
Melissa Peoples:
Right.
Annie:
And it doesn't make you bad or wrong to not want to be on call 24 7, nor does it make your executive bad or wrong to want you to be on call 24 7. But there's a misalignment. There's not a want match with that one thing. So what you have to decide, and I'm guessing that you've already had the conversations with him around this. First of all, we want to advocate for ourselves first that step number one, if nothing changes, that's okay. It's just a good data point to look at. It's like, okay, this is, this is something I need to be aware of if I'm going to stay in this role. This is the expectation. And I can either allow myself to get resentful and frustrated by it, or I can choose to be happy with it, or I can look elsewhere for a job. And oftentimes that's what happens. It's like this is, this work environment no longer feels in alignment with me and who I am. Like I could never work in a startup environment now after having worked in VC and have, having worked in like the private wealth management, family office space, all of that sort of thing. Like it was a very predictable environment, lots of moving parts and pieces for sure. But like the bar was not constantly moving. There were like, it was a much more structured environment. And I think I know that about myself and I don't make that mean anything bad or wrong about me, nor do I make it mean anything bad or wrong about startup environments. It just is what it is. So looking at the data points and deciding for yourself, hey, okay, so now that you know this, is this an environment you want to stay in and being very real and honest with yourself and not trying to make a situation work that is not for you, I think also what comes with that is like this belief that you won't make as much money somewhere else.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
Which is such a thing. Bs. Sorry, I don't want to get too spicy. It's such BS because we can 100% make any amount of money in any like with any type of dynamic. And I'm a firm believer because I've literally walked hundreds of clients to the process of like looking for new roles and what they want and compensation and all the things. And, and I don't think you have to work your fingers to the bone to make a really good money. As the poor professional, it's not one or the other. And so those are, those are my thoughts around that. And, and also like you don't, I think oftentimes, like Melissa was alluding to, we do become overly responsible for our executive states of being. We become overly responsible for their lives and all that sort of stuff which makes sense in these roles because it's literally our job to make someone else's life easier. It's literally our job to serve and support. And so like those lines can get blurry. And I will tell you that you know that you cross the line for yourself when you're experiencing some sort of resentment.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
So if you're experiencing some sort of resentment in your role, it either means you need to speak up, there's some kind of misalignment with, with want, match and that sort of thing, with expectations. And those are some really common things that I see. And like when I coach for sure.
Melissa Peoples:
And I think that there's times in your career where you might go, I'm in a really high powered environment and that's fine with me because this is my career directory that I want to get to blank role or position and this is what that's going to look like. But it's calculated and it's intentional. And I think that is like a perfectly fine situation if you crafted that and you're going with an intention. There's other phases of life that you might just go like, that is not what I'm down for. Here's. I think for me what was key in that question is the boundary. If you feel like it's pushing the boundary or you feel that there's the pressure to like make everybody happy and it's your job to do that. That is like absolutely not. Not. Okay. So for me, I, I had really clear conversations with my executive business partners around like, what were my like off zones. Right. So I'm like, listen, like Sundays and Wednesdays I'm at church. I'm not, I'm taking a rest day with my family. Do not call, text, do whatever unless the world is burning down. Because I will not be answering. Like that's the. And having that conversation really, you know, up front allows them to also go. And I want to go like, how can I protect. What is your time to recharge and refuel if we don't have these conversations around ways of working, then nobody talks about it. And the person who is like constantly responsive and texting you all hours of the day and night, are you kind of reinforcing that behavior by responding in seconds then? If that's not the conversation that you guys have set to establish boundaries, then that might be where you need to look at and say, hey, listen, like, I noticed that you, you messaged me. I really don't think this was a high priority. Was this just top of mind for you and you wanted to get it out of your head, but you understood the expectation wasn't until tomorrow or were you actually needing me to respond? And again, it's having these conversations, like, just start talking about the things, the boundaries, the conversations, the expectations, all of it. We just have to start talking about it. Okay. Oh Lord. I like this question. How do I handle colleagues who don't respect deadlines and act confused when their delays wreck the entire executive work? Well, oh my goodness. Well, who's going to take that to.
Annie:
Life as an ea? Like, what can I tell you? Like, this is just life, right? Like, people not behaving the way that we want them to behave. So much fun.
Melissa Peoples:
I will tell you what I tell people constantly around this is that one, we have to be super careful that we are not always connecting, like the needs of the business and name dropping with our executive business partner. So if I'm Annie's ea, if I am typically going, oh, Annie needs this. Annie is asking for it. Annie is like, you're immediately taking yourself out within that position of power. And which is why I'm always telling assistants, like, stop doing that a thousand percent. Like, start having the conversation of the negative impact within the executive office when somebody is not like, aligning to the established workflow. And I've said this a bunch of different times. If you can think of the most like celebrity executives that you can think of, there is never, at least in my experience in corporate America, it has never been a situation where an executive could go to that person and be like, I went on their calendar tomorrow. Not going to happen. Because you have a high performing executive who's aligned with a high performing EA who says, that's interesting. But within this executive office, this is what I'm going to need before it goes on the calendar. And I don't think it has anything to do that It's a celebrity executive. I think it literally just has to do. But there's a high performing executive and a high performing EA who have aligned what the executive office, like, function is going to look like. And so rather than leaning in and go like, well, Annie needs it, having a conversation that says, hey, I noticed that you missed this deadline three times in a row. How do we partner together to make sure that, you know, the whatever, the deliverable is, the deck or the whatever, like whatever that deliverable is is actually provided. Because this is the negative impact and this is how that like, impacts the rest of the team. I'm not talking it because Annie needs it. I'm talking about the impact from the executive office. I'm offering to partner with them and align on expectations and have an open conversation. But you have to learn how to hold people accountable and whatever. And Annie can answer this. But again, it's not. Boundaries are not what you expect the other person to do. It's how you respond when somebody crosses that line. So it's not about what are they going to do, what are you going to do? Like, for me, when I was in corporate America and somebody, we had the expectation that a pre read was sent 48 hours in advance to the meeting. If it was not sent, you were, the meeting was automatically canceled. I talked to everybody about it ahead of time. Everybody knew the expectation. I gave them like one oops. And then after that, and then it wasn't why the executive was no longer looking at me. They were looking at that person and going, hey, this was the expectation that we say, I'm not looking at Melissa, why I don't have a pre read. I'm looking at you as to you didn't send it. And now we didn't have that meeting. And blank happened. So the responsibility clearly shifts from me as the EA who doesn't have my stuff together and the person that was my boundary. So you could behave any way that you want to. But that doesn't mean you're still going to meet with my executive business partner. If you wanted spice, there it is.
Annie:
I do think too that like coming up with a process by which we remind people so that you have an outline process especially for like getting deck materials for say a board meeting or whatever, or an ELT meeting, whatever. So we have the process, right? Like I send out one month in advance the request for slide updates. I remind two weeks in advance, I one week out, I send another email. Three days before it's due, I send another email. And then the morning of, I send another email. And there's not, not if it's not in my inbox by the deadline, then it doesn't Go in the deck. And I know most of us are like clutching our pearls and being like, what? Oh my goodness, you won't include it in the deck. And here's why. Because just what Melissa said, like, if you do not hold to that boundary every then, then your boundary is not actually your boundary. And look, I'm not saying that we don't need to get buying from our executive first on the process. We definitely do. We want to get their buying. We want to say, okay, so I've noticed so and so and so and so are really terrible getting me their deck materials. They may get it to us late, but then they're going to look like the person who got it to us late when it's not included in the thing. Do I have your backing? And look, your executive may not back you. That's okay too. If that's the case, then the person needs to update the deck themselves. Yeah, it's like, okay, this deck is, is on the share drive. You can go in and update it. But if there are typos or anything like that, that's not on me because you got it to. You got, you got to pass the deadline. So there are other workarounds too. But I do think that more often than not, the reason why we don't hold to the boundaries around getting materials and that sort of thing is because we're afraid it's a reflection on us one, which it's totally not. And we've not gotten buy in from our executive number two. And I think also there's also kind of this underpinning of people pleasing, which I define people pleasing as making other people happy at our own expense. So what ends up happening then in that case of people pleasing is they get it to us right after the deadline, we stay late to make sure it goes into the materials. Then we end up feeling resentful because we're trying to people please our executive. We're trying to people please instead of like there being actual accountability. So I think really having open, honest discussion with your executives around what does the accountability structure look like? Can you hold this person accountable who is chronically getting things to me late? Can we let something fall through the cracks once or twice? Because I got to tell you, it's only going to happen once or twice, probably one time where their materials don't land in the deck and then they feel like an idiot come the meeting time. So I think, I think that's the piece. It's like a self management piece because we, because we are trying to people Please. So that's, it's just, it's challenging for sure, but necessary at the same time.
Melissa Peoples:
But I also want to highlight that in both of these scenarios because you better hope you are working with Annie, because I'm not checking with my executive business partner because they don't run this office. Like, I'm going to go, I'm going to like, that's Melissa being spicy, right? I'm just special in that way. I'm going to go, here's the expectations, like, but I have very clear, like workflows. I've had set expectations. I mean, with my colleagues having these conversations and both in the way that Annie and I both approach it, we're both, we actually have an sop. There's a standard operating procedure that has been developed, documented, communicated. Everybody's clear on it. If I am doing a new like tech process, I'm going to give everybody a 90 day plan and I would like baby you and do all the things and do all the reminders for you for 90 days after, like on day 91. I'm not doing that. So I think that's sort of the key is the more that we shift in this industry away from like this, I just show up and do the work rather than I actually have standard operating procedures and workflows. And I've optimized the way that this needs to go. I've also communicated with the key stakeholders and colleagues. Like, that is the push. But if you don't have it, you can't expect anybody to like rise to the level of your expectations because you haven't communicated, you haven't trained them on it, you haven't. So that's like a really key piece. I think the more that we focus on this, we have to think and this is what executive operations is. It is effectively running the day to day office of the executive and whatever that means and whatever level that you are partnered with. But it can't just be I show up and like everything happens. It's got to be. I have a process and a system so that people understand that you're actually running the office of still on the blank, rather than you're just the assistant who does things.
Annie:
So, Melissa, there's a question that came in, in the chat that I do want to highlight for you and this one came from Katie. She said, what if your exec is the one who's late with the slides? And I would love to hear your response. I have a response to this too, but I'd love to hear your response.
Melissa Peoples:
So I am going to push you on executive workflow optimization. And I always use me as an example is because Danny and I both have been ease and we both have ease. And my EA can put something on my calendar and we both do a lot of decks. So I'm going to use this exact example. Right deck for blank. Right. Right deck for EA night, or right deck for whatever you're doing. That's sweet that you put that on my calendar. But unless you understand my ideal workflow, that does not matter. And I will be late in my scenario. My personal workflow, because I am an external communicator and I do not have an internal monologue is when I have an idea for a topic and I don't have an internal monologue. So I'm not talking about it with myself, which Annie does. And I'm sure Annie is like having the whole conversation with herself and going through all the scenarios. I don't have that. So I prefer to ideate with a thought partner that is trusted. And I'm like, here's my idea, here's why I want to pitch. Blah, blah, blah. And they're like, I like them to give me feedback. I have that brainstorming meeting then because I thought it through and rather than me just staring at a blank deck going, do I even have the information in my brain? Then after I've had the conversation, I can go build it out. And then like, so I want my A to help me make sure that I'm. I've got my perfect process in place. I don't want them trying to force me to do like, what is a best practice for Annie because her brain works differently than mine. So that to me is that executive workflow optimization. You have to understand the way that they communicate, what kind of a decision maker they are, how do they show up the most effective, end the best and repeat that process repeatedly? So I would actually unpack. Why are they always late? Are they late because they don't have time? Are they late because they don't have the information? Are they starting from scratch? Are they somebody who wants to brainstorm and get it off to somebody else and then see the deck and check it off? Are they building it from scratch? So I'm really uncovering the why and optimizing that piece so that I am like that conduit of information to make sure that they're not late because I'm giving it to in the way that they will engage with. But any, that's me.
Annie:
So I think it depends on the personality of, of your employer, of, of your executive. There are some executives who are glitter throwers and cannot focus to say that to save, to save their lives. They, they throw out all these big ideas and typically the executive assistant is going around trying to put the glitter back in the bottle but then it's already been like spilled all over. So that, that's hugely challenging place to be. I honestly think they're again getting buy in from your executive on the process is going to be key.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
I do want to name one issue that I've seen frequently and that is when you're dealing with a narcissistic personality and deadlines because when you're dealing with a narcissist the bar is always moving and changing and it's very challenging personality trait to have to deal with in a work environment. And I'm sure many of you have bumped up, bumped up against this at some point in your lives. But I do think that we are not meant to babysit our executives. We're not meant like these are full grown adults. And so what I see often with narcissism is the executive putting undue weight on the ea, on the support person and then changing the bar and then changing it again to where the executive like, to the support person is like feeling not confident in their abilities anymore because of the dynamics with this executive. Right. So I do want to name that because I've dealt with that a lot in my coaching practice, especially this last year to maybe a year and a half. I've worked with a lot of clients who have dealt with narcissism at really challenging levels. And so that's a piece of the puzzle. And also like if you're exact, executive is just chaotic. A lot of executives are chaotic. There's this book by Dan Martell called buy back your time. And in that book Dan talks about how executives often were raised in challenging environments as kids and their brains have been grew up in chaos and thriving chaos. And so what ends up happening is the executive creates chaos around them because it's comfortable to them. And I know some really great executives who operate like that and really great EAs who support them. And so then it's just a matter of calming the executive down of like really fine tuning the time and space. They're going to work on it having the executive support person do a bit of hand holding, do a bit of like ideating with the executive to get them on track. And so it just kind of depends on the personality you're working with honestly. And I just wanted to name the narcissism piece. Because we can tend to feel gaslit if everyone around us is having success with one like structured way of getting their executive executive to like show up and do things. And you don't. It may not even be about you, it may just be them. And so there is a fine line between the narcissistic piece and like the chaotic piece. And kind of figuring out where your executive is at between those two things can be tremendously helpful in helping you move your executive along with their actual priorities. I think also just slowing them down to have a strategic planning session with a quarter is also helpful. Like so you can align with their priorities and then you can also like hold them accountable to those priorities. And then when they come to you with some off the wall idea, you.
Melissa Peoples:
Can be like, great.
Annie:
What needs to shift or move off of your priority list in order to make space for this? For this. And that can be tremendously helpful as well. So there are some great strategies. It's a challenge and sometimes you're going to be in an environment where the expectation is that you just swoop in last minute to do all the things because your executive is always last minute and you've tried everything under the sun and you just have there again have to decide whether or not that's a want match for you moving forward.
Melissa Peoples:
1,000%. I love that. The other thing that I would, I really encourage you to think about kind of going back to the chaotic piece is that some executives really do thrive in chaos and they feel empowered by the chaos. They love it. They don't like, they may say that they want downtime, but they're not ever actually going to do it. And those are generally like your high activators and you figuring out in a really strategic way what partnership like one you have to even understand. Do I want to do that? Like, is that a value add for me? But if it is, like what are the strategic ways that I can optimize the way that they're working? And then I become the conduit of information because they're living in chaos. How do you step up as the strategic mindset in that space so that everything isn't automatically going to them? So there's a thousand percent, there's so many strategies around, which is what I think that's sort of the interesting thing about coaching is that we can give like lots of ideas around. Here's what you can try. But the cool thing to me about coaching versus just general professional development is you actually get a deep dive in your executive and the way that they think and like actually develop strategies around it. Okay, so here's another one. How do I organize my entire workload, task inbox, calendar and project without drowning in competing priorities? You want me to go? You want to go? Because I'm sure both of us are like, I so am.
Annie:
Okay, so here's the thing. You actually have to have a system by which you manage everything. Like, this is so boring. I know. And I talk about it all the time in like my, I have a, a training series I do on strategic partnership specifically. And I'm always talking about systems as a foundation of strategic partnership. And the reason why your systems are the foundation of strategic partnership is because they're literally underground. Nobody can see them.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
But until you have that foundation strong, you cannot build up very high. And, and your systems have to be laid with a rebar. And it has to be really like well thought out and well articulated. And so at a certain point then competing priorities become moot. Yes, because, because, because when you see your task tracking system, and I recommend planner or trello because it's visual and you can actually drag and drop things to other lists and like, it's really a mobile way to manage all the things in a centralized digital location, which I'm also a huge fan of. And also to create recurring tasks for your recurring tasks seamlessly and without even having to think about it. So it just reduces a lot of the mental load that we carry around as support professionals. So here's the thing. Like, I think there is this myth of competing priorities. There is no such thing as competing priorities. From my vantage point as a coach and I've coached, literally, I've clocked thousands of hours of coaching support professionals. I had 20 year career as a support professional. Because once you're clear, once you find that alignment piece with your executive, that's another kind of key piece that I would say as a part of all of this, once you that alignment with your executive, you're going to know. And if you have questions, that's what a priority is. You can always check with your executive. And then it's just a matter of execution. Then it's just a matter of like checking things off your list, of going down your, your task list for the day and actually executing on them. And so I think, I think the reason why it feels so overwhelming, the reason why it feels like there's so many competing priorities is because we've not actually created a system by which to manage everything by which to manage your workflows. And I know that's challenging. And I also know because so many of us work in environments where they're always shifting and moving. Yeah, that's true. That's a reality. Many of us have shifting priorities. Like many of us think our day is going to look one way and we get in to the office and it's completely derailed. 100% true. But it's not that they're competing priorities, it's that this other thing now takes precedence. So we focus on that until we execute it. And then the next thing. And then the next thing is calming this up here in order to deal with everything that's overwhelm comes when we give equal weight to everything.
Melissa Peoples:
Yes. And I think Annie and I both really approach this. I'm going to ask everybody to do this. I want you to just pause for a second and I just want you to like, can you describe if you and I were in a coaching session, could you describe what your process is to manage? Hashtag all of these. And if you cannot give me like an exact workflow, you do not have a process or a system. You have a bunch of habits and that's not the same thing. And so for me, you have to really, really, really break this down. This is how I manage my inbox. It's like so you almost like so one, you have to build a tech stack. So what are the ecosystem that you're in? And then building your tech stack around that supports that, including AI and automation to help you go as fast as you can. But the second part is you have to understand the way that you are working and you kind of have to build in. Like, how are you managing your inbox? Are you closing out of your inbox? Are you spending all of your time responding to emails? I mean, both Andy and I are huge advocates of close your freaking inbox. Close your inbox. Do not be in there all day long replying. Set communication around like, hey, I'm checking my inbox three times the day. This is what I'm doing. If you need me as my executive business partner, they're not emailing you, they're texting you. They're dming, they're doing something else. If it's an oh my God emergency. But we have to start valuing the high impact part of the business rather than low impact part of the business. Like, do you know how many emails on average you're getting in a week? Do you know how long it's taking you to actually manage your emails versus doing the strategic work in the business, if you don't know those things, you are going to feel like Annie said, everything is like competing priorities because everything has the same value add. And that's just not the case. So you've got to streamline your work. And here's the other thing about like, workflow optimization maybe nice. If you have never optimized your own workflow, you will never in a million years be able to do this for an executive business partner. Cannot happen because you have no concept of like the, like the process and iterations of optimizing the workflow because you've never done it for yourself. You have to use yourself as that, as that test case of going. And it doesn't have to look like theirs. It's like, how do I work best? How does my brain process information? How do I get over the need to be in my inbox all the time? Like, if I'm in Outlook, what, how am I managing my task? How am I, am I using planner? Am I using to do, am I using paper? Like, what am I doing? The more that you can optimize this, you learn what is the best practice to then optimize this for your executive business partners. But you have to be your own EA and you have to get out of the concept that I reply to everybody in two seconds and I'm like flying by the seat of the pants. And everything is a yes. And there's never any boundaries around the way that we work or any systems. And if you want to perform at optimum level, you got to get that under control. You cannot also be the person who's living in chaos.
Annie:
I will also just say that there's a physiological thing that happens with this. And this is why we spend so much of our time in whack a mole energy instead of. Instead of strategic energy. And whack a mole energy is like living out of your inbox and doing the thing that is the easiest that pops up in our inbox first because we're afraid to do the actual project that's high impact and needs to get done right. It's like, I'm gonna look over here because this over here kind of scares me a little bit, Makes me a little squirmy. And so the physiological thing that happens is we get a dopamine hit whenever we execute on a task.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
And so we spend our day chasing the dopamine hit instead of. And then what that also does is it trains our brain to be distracted.
Melissa Peoples:
Yep.
Annie:
Right. Because like, if, if we've got a million things open and we're being pinged by a million things and we're answering email and then we're also have like 2 projects up and like 10 tabs open. Of course we're training our brain not to focus and when we do our best work is when we're focused. So this is the real challenge for us, especially if we've been operating this way for a long time. So I always challenge my clients to challenge yourself to close out of your inbox for 20 minutes three times a day. 20 minutes, three times a day. And also we need to, we also need to get buying from our executives. So you can go tell your executives, hey, I went and listened to two coaches do a coaching session online and they're telling me I need to close out of my inbox. So I'm going to close out of my inbox for 20 minutes at a time. I also do not have any notice notifications on my phone ever. The only notification I have are text messages because that's how my school reaches me, my kids school reached me and this is how my former executive reached me. I do not have any email notifications on my phone. I do not have any social media notifications on my phone. Nothing. Because when I'm heads down on a project or with a client, I want to be fully present with my clients. And so I think, I think it'd be. And so set on your phone, set a 20 minute timer. Now I'm going to share with you what will happen when you set that 20 minute timer. Your brain is going to be like I wonder what's going on on insta. I wonder what's going on. On LinkedIn on. I wonder, should I check with my executive about A, B and C? Like it's going to get a little squirmy and I want to share with you, nothing has gone wrong. It's completely normal, completely natural. Especially in this day and age where there's scan culture and all these other things that are distracting. But I got to tell you, I was closing out of my inbox for hours at a time. It's like a muscle that you build over time. And while you may freak out that closing out of your inbox, what if I miss something? Is often what comes up for us as it's as, as support professionals. I will tell you there again you tell your executive how to contact you in the case of emergency, send you a text. Case of emergency, send me a text. Otherwise I will check my inbox in an hour and if you're worried about it, you can always set an autoresponder. I do have clients who do this too, where they will close out of the inbox, even for 20 minutes, even for a half hour, hour. They'll be like, I'm hands down on a project. I will, I'm going to check my email at this time. They give a very specific time. And so everyone knows that if they need to reach that person during their focus session, they will literally physically call them. Yeah, but that just. What I love about this too is it actually gives people a chance to think because oftentimes people are like, she, she solves my problems, she solves my problems. And then give them an hour. They've solved it for themselves.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah.
Annie:
And I think we also make that mean something about us when instead of building self sufficiency with people, we're actually enabling them to rely on us more than we probably should, especially for people who are the primary person that we support. Right. So, like, that is also super helpful people being resilient and resourceful for themselves. If you're heads down on a working session. So those are some strategies to start the practice of closing out of your inbox. Even though it's super challenging, but you definitely want to get buy in, you definitely want to share with your executive how best to reach you in the event that you were heads down. I know it's scary, but I got to tell you guys, it absolutely revolutionized, like my task tracking system. When I got that set up in Trello and I had those recurring tasks pop up, pop up. That was one piece that revolutionized my how I work. And so did closing out of my inbox. It absolutely revolutionized how I worked. I was able to get so much more done and accomplished at such a higher level, such better quality than I ever had before. And my executive was always getting comments like, annie, so responsive to email.
Melissa Peoples:
I'm like, I'm only in my inbox.
Annie:
Three times a day. But thank you, that's awesome. Like, I think because I had my workflow, I would sit down at my desk, I'd open my inbox, I'd do around first thing in the morning. And that for whatever reason, people just thought that made me super responsive to email. It's fascinating how that works. So play with it, try it, and just know that your brain is going to freak out and just know that that's part of the process.
Melissa Peoples:
Yeah, absolutely. I totally agree with literally everything she said. I would say that if you really get to the point where you try this. So, like, Kat's asking how many times I. I think Annie's suggesting just start through for three times. Just try it for three times. And if you guys are in the Microsoft ecosystem or Slack, but specifically the Microsoft ecosystem, if you put on your do not disturb notification, you have to check the box at the bottom that says notify people of this message. Or even if, because I would have one in there that was like, cuts down, like, I'll get back to you. Like, I'm not checking my messages right now and I'll get back to you, whatever. If you don't have that check, they don't see it. And that's why people are like, I want to not disturb. And people still at law. But you could. You should do that in both. Right? But also create. Use a distraction list. So it's a distraction list is just a piece of paper right next to you where something pops into your head and you like, write it down. And I like to have my distraction lists organized by like, hot topic, idea or question. And if it comes into your hand and your head and you're really, really going, oh, my God, I'm struggling with that 20 minutes, like, habit distraction list nearby, if that helps you. Like, I like using them. But you don't have to. But the point is, like, you have to retrain your brain that you are not constantly on demand. Like, it's not, you know, somebody like, pings you. I totally with Annie, I don't have notifications on my phone. I also don't have notifications on my email. I don't have notifications that pop up on my desktop. I'm super controlled around where my attention goes. And I also try to really communicate that with people. Like, text message is the only things that is going to pop up on my phone. But nobody, nobody like Microsoft and Google both are trying to keep you in their app, right? Well, all apps are doing that. They're all trying to keep you in the tool. So they turn on every ping you can possibly imagine. So the part of this workflow optimization is like being really intentional. Of what? Like who gets to distract you and why? If it's my executive business partner or it's a key stakeholder. Okay, fine. Yes. And we'll talk about it. Everyone outside that is like out here and they are not your, like, inner circle people. They don't get to distract you like that. You determine when you engage and how and why. Oh, my gosh. Can you believe we have two minutes left? Okay, you guys, this time went by so fast. I so appreciate you guys hanging out with us if there is anything that we didn't get to that you want us to do again or, you know, Annie and I meet pretty often, so maybe you can come together and do a quick session for everybody. But you guys are amazing. Thank you guys so much.
Annie:
We are going to put this up.
Melissa Peoples:
On YouTube, so if you're looking for.
Annie:
Like, what did they say about this again?
Melissa Peoples:
We'll hit you back up with the replay. But big, big hugs, everyone. I hope we will see everybody next week. We're going to send out a recap and then we'll let you know when this goes out on YouTube. Big hugs, everyone. I hope you have an amazing day.
Annie:
Connect with us on LinkedIn too. If you're not connected with us on LinkedIn, I just put my LinkedIn chat in the.
Melissa Peoples:
In the.
Annie:
In the chat. So, yeah, connect with us there, too. Thank you guys. It's been so much fun.
Melissa Peoples:
All right, bye, y'. All.
Annie:
Hey, before you go, don't forget to grab my free Strategic Planning Session guide. This stealthy playbook will help you and your executive find clarity on their priorities so you can make a greater impact. Go to wholeassistant.comguide or click the link in the Show Notes to snag your copy. And if you're loving the podcast, please subscribe, leave a review, and share with another assistant ready to level up. Thanks for listening, and until next time, keep embracing your badassery.
