Are you in the process of hiring an administrative assistant? Don’t make that job offer until you watch this tip. This one suggestion could change the way you think about administrative assistant requirements forever!
Today’s instant hiring tip is about hiring administrative assistants. Here’s one of the biggest mistakes I see some of my clients making throughout the country. It seems a lot of hiring managers are under the impression that administrative assistants need to be huge extroverts with really outgoing personalities. You know people that love to talk, are outgoing and just always seem to be at the center of attention.
I’m not sure how that trend got started but in my experience extroverts aren’t necessarily your best choice for administrative assistants. Unless, of course, they also act as a receptionist and interact with people on a continuing basis you generally don’t want an outgoing personality in an administrative assistant role.
In my experience an administrative assistant position is better suited for people that are bit more low-key and reserved and prefer to work behind the scenes. Extroverts make great sales people but in an admin assistant role they can struggle as they yearn for more social interaction. An extrovert with an outgoing personality may feel compelled to interact with others in the organization with they should be providing critical support.
Imagine yourself delegating critical tasks to your administrative assistant who would much rather be walking around the office chatting it up with co-workers than providing a consistent and reliable direct line of support to you.
When hiring personnel we just have to submit to the fact that certain people/personalities are going to be predisposed to certain behaviors and will be ideally suited for some positions and not so much for others.