For a moment, it feels good. It should feel good! However, if you’re honest, there’s often a small voice in the back of your mind asking a slightly uncomfortable question: where is this energy the rest of the year? Where is it when the annual salary reviews come around?

Because next week, things will likely go back to normal. Meetings will be booked over carefully protected time, you’ll be left off email threads until something goes wrong, and you’ll be expected to solve problems without much context. The appreciation fades, but the reality of the role remains.

That’s why Admin Professionals Week can feel slightly misaligned. It offers a moment of recognition without necessarily changing anything underneath it.

Appreciation vs Respect

The real issue is the gap between appreciation and respect.

Appreciation is easy. It’s visible, it’s quick, and it doesn’t require any real shift in behaviour. Respect, on the other hand, is demonstrated in everyday actions. It shows up in whether you’re included early or brought in late, whether your judgement is trusted, whether you’re given context instead of just tasks, and whether your role is understood beyond basic support.

Those things don’t appear once a year. They are built into how people choose to work with you on a daily basis.

Get 20% off The Extra Wrap this week

The Risk of Waiting to Be Valued

There’s also a more subtle risk that sits underneath all of this. If your sense of job satisfaction is tied too closely to external appreciation, you end up handing over a significant amount of control.

Appreciation is inconsistent - we know that. It depends on personalities, company culture, and sometimes whether people simply remember that you fought tooth and nail to get that last seat on that flight to New York. Some executives are excellent at showing it, others are not. Some organisations embed it into their culture, others overlook it entirely.

If your sense of value rises and falls based on whether someone acknowledges your work, you are always operating on unstable ground.

For high-performing EAs, this becomes even more pronounced. The better you are, the less visible your effort often becomes. When everything runs smoothly, people notice the outcome, not the work that made it possible.

Where Real Satisfaction Comes From

If appreciation isn’t reliable, it raises an important question: where should satisfaction come from instead?

The answer isn’t to disengage. It’s to shift where you look for validation.

Read more

That version of the role is disappearing because business travel no longer runs on predictability. It runs on probability.

Flights are cancelled. Strikes appear with very little notice. Air traffic control issues ripple across entire regions with little to no warning. Weather events are more frequent and more disruptive. Aircraft are delayed not by minutes, but by hours, and that’s all before we take into account the disruptions caused by wars - or threats of wars.

Most companies, however, are still planning travel as if none of that is true. They optimise for efficiency and cost. They build tight itineraries that only work if everything goes exactly to plan. Which means they are building fragile systems.

And when those systems break - as they increasingly do - the impact is immediate and visible. Missed meetings, lost deals, and your exec stranded in Zurich with no way to get home without flying the wrong way around the globe. Entire days written off to “travel disruption” as though it were an unavoidable inconvenience, rather than something that could have been mitigated.

This is where the role of the EA has already shifted - whether it has been acknowledged or not. You are no longer just booking travel - you are managing the risks that come with it.

The illusion of a “confirmed” itinerary

Remember, a booked flight is not a plan. Rather, it’s a best-case scenario.

The problem is that most travel is still treated as a fixed sequence of events:

• Flight departs on time

• Connection is made

• Arrival happens as scheduled

• Meetings go ahead

In reality, each of those steps carries risk. And the tighter the itinerary, or the more steps you have, the more those risks compound.

A 45-minute connection might look efficient on paper (especially to your exec who wants to walk directly from one plane to the next). In practice, it is a single point of failure.

The last flight of the day might be convenient. It is also the one with no recovery options that don’t involve an overnight stay in whatever hotel happens to have an available room.

An early morning meeting straight after a late arrival assumes everything runs perfectly and your exec doesn’t get to their hotel at 3am after dignificant delays.

When you start to look at travel this way, the role changes. You are no longer asking, “What is the best route?”. You are asking, “Where does this plan break, and what happens when it does?”

The hidden cost of getting it wrong

Most organisations do not measure the cost of travel disruption properly. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever worked anywhere that measured it at all. They will track the price of the flight, they will likely negotiate on hotel rates, and you might even have a policy to only make changeable bookings.

But they rarely account for:

• The revenue impact of missed or delayed meetings

• The opportunity cost of senior leadership time

• The reputational damage when someone does not show up as planned

• The internal disruption when schedules have to be reworked at the last minute

So the cheapest itinerary often looks like the smartest choice, right up until it fails.

When it does, you usually the one absorbing the fallout. Rebooking, rescheduling, Fixing, explaining - the cost for which probably isn’t tracked either.

From efficiency to resilience

You have to stop optimising for efficiency, and start optimising for resilience.

That means:

• Building in buffers, even when it feels excessive (unless your exec is like one of mine who would deliberately cut his travel plans so fine that I would lose sleep)

• Choosing routes with fallback options, not just the shortest duration

• Avoiding single points of failure (tight connections, last flights, back-to-back critical meetings)

• Thinking in scenarios, not schedules

It also means being willing to challenge decisions, because “this is cheaper” or “this is faster” is no longer enough justification if the plan cannot withstand disruption.

This is where the role becomes more senior because you are not just executing instructions, you are advising on risk.

Of course, it’s ultimately your exec’s decision if they accept the risks or not. Invariably they will, because the alternatives mean they have to spend longer away from their families or spend less time with their clients. However, I’m a firm advocate of providing all of the information so they can make an informed decision.

What this looks like in practice

At a practical level, this shift is less about doing more work, and more about doing different work.

It is:

• Stress-testing itineraries before they are booked

• Understanding which trips are business-critical and which are flexible

• Briefing your exec on risks, not just timings

• Having a clear view of alternatives before they are needed

It is also about recognising that a “perfect” itinerary on paper is often the most dangerous one in reality because it leaves no room for error.

You will soon learn what are their dealbreakers when it comes to accepting risks. If one delayed flight means they will miss their family holiday, I’d bet that they will want to take a slightly less risky option. However, if they can squeeze in a final meeting with a key prospect at the risk of having to stay overnight in a questionable hotel in Paris, then they might be a little more open to it.

The Plan B Travel Framework

Right, we’ve reframed the role, now we make it operational.

“Have a backup plan” is easy to say. Actually building one - consistently, quickly, and without doubling your workload - is where most people struggle and of course, this is where I’m here to help!

Below you will get your Plan B Travel Framework, plus a downloadable Google Sheet with everything you could possibly need to become a Risk Manager for Business Travel.

Read more

It looks organised and it sounds strategic. There’s a doc, maybe even a colour-coded tracker. But scratch the surface and you’ll find a familiar pattern - vague intentions, borrowed priorities, and a hope that “being busy” will translate into “being valuable.”

For Executive Assistants, that gap matters more than it does for most roles because your work is already invisible by default. You don’t get credit for what didn’t go wrong. You don’t get a neat pipeline to point to. And if you’re not careful, you can spend an entire quarter being indispensable… without being recognised as strategic.

Q2 is where that either continues - or changes.

No Time Like The Present

By the time April rolls around, most companies have already drifted from their Q1 plans. Priorities have shifted. New initiatives have appeared. Old ones have died without anyone officially calling it. Leadership teams are recalibrating, whether they admit it or not.

This is where you have an advantage - if you choose to use it, because you sit closer to the real version of the business than almost anyone else.

You hear the offhand comments in meetings. You see which projects are getting airtime and which ones are being avoided. You know where decisions are slow, where friction is building, and where things are starting to creak under pressure.

Most people wait for Q3 to adjust, however, the best EAs start now.

Move From “Task Goals” To“Positioning Goals”

If your Q2 goals are a list of tasks, you’ve already lost.

“Improve calendar management.”
“Support more projects.”
“Get more involved in meetings.”

These aren’t goals; this is your job description, and if your goals are to do what’s in your job description, you’re not progressing yourself.

Q2 goals need to do something far more important: they need to change how you are perceived inside the business, because once perception shifts, opportunities should follow.

So instead of asking, “What should I do?”, ask:

• What do I want to be trusted with by the end of Q2?

• What problems do I want people to automatically come to me for?

• Where do I want to have influence that I don’t have today?

This is the difference between staying where you are and moving towards Operations.

Three Strategic Areas to Focus on in Q2

You don’t need ten goals. You need two or three that actually move the needle.

Here’s where to focus.

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On the surface, it looks like excess. Too many meetings, too many requests, too many moving parts competing for attention. The natural conclusion is that there is simply too much work to be done. However, in practice, that is rarely the root cause.

More often, the issue is that responsibility has not been clearly defined. Work exists, but ownership does not. In that vacuum, tasks are not completed, decisions are not progressed, and accountability becomes non-existent. The work itself does not disappear; it simply moves around until it settles with the person most likely to resolve it.

In many organisations, that person is the Executive Assistant - i.e. YOU.

We all know this is not what you were brought on to do. It is a function of proximity, visibility, and competence. Executive Assistants see what is moving, what has stalled, and what is at risk of being missed completely. You are often the first to notice, and usually the most likely to intervene.

Over time, this creates the appearance of a workload problem. The volume of activity increases, calendars become saturated, and work becomes increasingly reactive. However, the underlying issue is not capacity. It is the absence of clearly defined ownership structures.

Ownership Drift and Its Consequences

In well-functioning organisations, responsibility is explicit. Decisions have clear owners and progress can be traced back to accountable individuals.

In less structured environments, responsibility is implied rather than assigned. This creates what I describe as ownership drift: a gradual erosion of clarity around who is responsible for what. Honestly, it drives me bonkers.

Ownership drift emerges through language and behaviour that avoids direct assignment:

• “Can someone take a look at this?”

• “We should revisit this next week.”

• “I assumed that had already been picked up.”

In work environments, the most reliable individuals generally become the default owners of unclaimed work. They pick up tasks, close gaps, and ensure continuity. While this behaviour is often rewarded in the short term, it creates a long-term dependency. The organisation begins to rely on informal intervention rather than formal accountability. How many times have you thought “this place wouldn’t run without me”?

Executive Assistants are particularly susceptible to this dynamic. You effectiveness, responsiveness, and cross-functional visibility make you a natural point of escalation for unresolved work. Over time, you become the informal operating layer of the organisation - coordinating, clarifying, and progressing activity that has no clear owner. You become the glue holding everything together.

How Ownership Gaps Manifest in Practice

The consequences of unclear ownership are rarely abstract. They appear in consistent and recognisable patterns across organisations. I’ve seen it time and time again.

Meetings are scheduled without defined objectives, and preparation becomes an afterthought (if done at all!). In the absence of a clear owner, the responsibility for shaping the meeting - its agenda, its participants, and its outcomes - falls to whoever is closest to its logistics. In many cases, that is the Executive Assistant. What begins as a scheduling task evolves into end-to-end ownership of the meeting’s effectiveness, or “cat herding”.

Projects exhibit similar patterns. Workstreams are initiated without clear accountability for progress. Updates are inconsistent, deadlines shift without acknowledgement, and risks are surfaced late. To compensate, someone must create visibility: tracking status, consolidating updates, and identifying blockers. Again, this responsibility frequently sits with the Executive Assistant, not because it is formally assigned, but because it is necessary. How many times have you become the default PM for something you weren’t even involved with at the start?

Even routine operational activities, such as travel coordination, reveal the same dynamic. Without clear ownership of priorities, preferences, and constraints, planning becomes reactive. Changes are managed in real time, information is held informally, and efficiency depends on individual memory rather than system design. Over time, you become the repository of operational knowledge and the de facto owner of its execution.

Across each of these examples, the pattern is consistent. Work expands until someone contains it. In the absence of defined ownership, containment becomes an informal responsibility.

From Absorption to Ownership

Addressing this issue does not require working harder or setting arbitrary boundaries.

Firstly, you need to stop unconsciously absorbing work that lacks clear ownership. This does not mean refusing to engage, but rather recognising when responsibility has not been defined and resisting the instinct to compensate immediately.

Secondly, begin deliberately owning specific operational domains - those that create clarity, consistency, and momentum across the organisation.

This distinction is critical. Attempting to disengage from all unowned work is neither practical nor effective. However, selectively owning the right areas enables Executive Assistants to move from reactivity to proactivity.

Ownership Creates Leverage

The most effective Executive Assistants do not attempt to own everything. Instead, they focus on the operational layers that enable the organisation to function coherently. Which is easier said than done - if you’re like me, you just take on more and more because you know if you don’t do it, no-one will.

One such layer is the meeting operating system. When ownership is established at this level, meetings are no longer isolated events but part of a structured approach to time and decision-making. Objectives are defined in advance, agendas are standardised, and actions are tracked consistently. The result is not simply better meetings, but more effective use of executive time.

Another critical layer is decision tracking. In many organisations, decisions are made but not documented, leading to repeated discussions and inconsistent execution. By introducing a lightweight system to capture decisions, their context, and their owners, continuity is established. This reduces rework and reinforces accountability.

Project visibility represents a third layer of leverage. While project management may sit elsewhere, visibility often does not. Creating a single source of truth for status, ownership, and risks ensures that issues are surfaced early and addressed proactively. Your role as EA in this context is not to manage delivery, but to ensure that delivery is visible.

The executive operating cadence is equally significant. Without a structured approach to priorities, time allocation, and follow-up, even senior leaders default to reactive behaviour. By establishing a consistent cadence - weekly priorities, aligned calendars, and meaningful check-ins - you can enable a more strategic mode of operation.

Finally, information flow underpins all other activity. In environments where communication is fragmented, clarity is compromised. By structuring how information is shared, summarised, and accessed, you can reduce noise and enable more effective decision-making.

Each of these layers shares a common characteristic: they do not rely on authority, but on consistency. They are systems that, once established, reduce dependency on individual intervention.

The Strategic Shift

When ownership is applied, your role evolves.

The focus shifts from responding to issues as they arise to designing environments in which issues are less likely to occur. Work becomes more predictable, accountability becomes clearer, and the organisation becomes less reliant on informal coordination.

This is the distinction between being busy and being effective. It is also the distinction between operational support and operational leadership.

However, this shift requires visibility. Many EAs are already performing elements of this work, but in ways that are informal, undocumented, and therefore fragile. Without explicit ownership, these systems depend on individual effort and are difficult to sustain or scale.

Formalising ownership - naming it, defining it, and making it repeatable - is what transforms isolated actions into organisational capability.

How to Fix Ownership Without Becoming “Difficult”

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But that’s not what a lot of assistants are experiencing in practice.

What’s actually happening is that the work hasn’t disappeared, rather it has been duplicated. You are still doing the original task, but now you are also prompting the tool, reviewing what it produces, correcting the tone, fixing inaccuracies, and reshaping the output into something that is actually usable in a real business context. That additional layer is rarely acknowledged, but it is very real.

I think of it as having an intern working with you. It’s all well and good having the additional person power, but they need help, support and guidance - you can’t just ask them to do a task and expect that it will be perfect.

Take something as simple as drafting an email. Previously, you would write it, refine it, and send it. Now, you may start with AI, but you also need to sense-check the content, adjust the tone so it reflects your executive properly, remove anything that feels generic or slightly off, and ensure that it aligns with the broader context of the situation. In many cases, this takes as long - if not longer - than writing it yourself. At the very least, you will ask AI to re-draft several times.

This is where assistants are feeling the impact first, and most acutely. By the nature of the role, you sit closest to executive communication, stakeholder management, and anything that requires a level of polish or discretion. That means you are not just using AI outputs - you are responsible for making them accurate. When something is sent to a client, a board, or a senior stakeholder, “good enough” is not good enough. It needs to be right.

As a result, assistants are quietly becoming the quality control layer for AI adoption within organisations. You are the person who spots when something doesn’t quite make sense, who corrects tone before it lands badly, and who ensures that outputs are aligned with how your executive actually thinks and communicates. That is valuable work, but it is also additional work, and in many organisations it is being absorbed without any formal recognition or adjustment to workload. If anything, you are being asked to do even more with this “help”.

This is why the narrative that AI simply “saves time” feels increasingly disconnected from reality. In environments where AI is introduced without clear guidance or changes to process (which is most places at the moment), it often increases the cognitive load instead. You are switching between tools, reviewing more content, and making more judgment calls, all while still being expected to move faster.

That said, there is a genuine opportunity here for assistants who choose to lean into it properly. The individuals who can prompt effectively, assess outputs quickly, and apply sound judgment on top are not becoming redundant. They are becoming more valuable, because they are able to bridge the gap between what AI produces and what a business actually needs.

The difference is that this does not happen by accident. It requires a level of understanding that goes beyond simply “using the tool” and moves into knowing when to trust it, when to challenge it, and how to shape the output into something that stands up in a professional environment.

And crucially, it requires you to be honest about whether AI is actually helping you, or instead increasing your workload.

Because once you can see that clearly, you can do something about it.

(Inside the paid section, I’ve included a simple scorecard you can use to assess exactly where you sit - and how to fix it.)

If you are going to be the person your executive turns to with “can you just run this through AI,” it is worth making sure you are equipped to do that well.

There is an upcoming AI-focused session from EA How To as part of their CTRL-ALT-ELITE series on 1st May, which is designed specifically for assistants navigating this shift.

👉 Join the AI session here

It is exactly the kind of session that helps you move from reacting to AI requests to actually understanding how to use it in a way that strengthens your role rather than complicates it.

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I simply do not see that reflected in reality.

In fact, the opposite is often true. Many of the most capable operators I know started their careers as Executive Assistants (including me!). They now run operations teams, lead transformation projects, manage entire business units, or sit in Chief of Staff roles. And when you look closely at their trajectory, you start to see a pattern.

The skills they built as assistants compounded. This was certainly the case for me.

We EAs develop an unusually powerful mix of operational awareness, commercial judgement, and leadership proximity. We sit close enough to strategy to understand how decisions are made, and close enough to execution to see what actually works in practice. Over time, that combination becomes incredibly valuable.

It is one of the few roles in an organisation where you see the entire system.

You see which projects stall and why. You see how decisions are really made when the meeting ends. You see how leadership teams behave under pressure. You see the gaps between strategy and execution long before anyone writes a slide deck about them.

If you stay curious, that vantage point becomes your career accelerator.

What many people underestimate is just how transferable the EA skillset really is. The ability to manage competing priorities, structure ambiguous problems, anticipate risk, and coordinate senior stakeholders are not administrative skills. They are operational ones.

Those same capabilities sit at the heart of roles like Head of Operations, Programme Director, and Revenue Operations leader, and I say this not theoretically, but from personal experience.

I started my career as an Executive Assistant. Over time, that role expanded into running large projects, leading operational improvements, and eventually moving fully into commercial operations and strategy roles. None of that happened overnight, but every step built directly on the capabilities I developed as an assistant. I still lean on those skills to this day.

The assistant role gave me something many early-career professionals never receive: a front-row seat to how organisations actually work. I didn’t start at the “bottom” - I had a front row seat at the top.

The assistants who progress the fastest are usually the ones who treat that seat as an education.

They pay attention to the patterns behind decisions. They notice which leaders create momentum and which ones create noise and what happens to them. They watch how budgets are negotiated, how priorities are set, and how influence flows through the organisation.

Over time, that observation turns into instinct, and it’s that instinct which separates operators from administrators.

Read more

Before we go any further

Before you read the rest of this article, pause for a moment and ask yourself whether any of the following situations feel familiar:

You are the person who quietly connects teams that should already be speaking to each other. You remind executives about decisions they have not quite made yet. You notice operational problems long before leadership sees them coming. You keep projects moving that technically belong to other departments. And you often know - sometimes weeks in advance - which initiatives will actually happen and which ones are quietly going to disappear.

None of this appears anywhere in your job description.

But if you stopped doing those things tomorrow, the organisation would begin to wobble. Decisions would slow down, communication would become messier, and projects that once seemed to move effortlessly would suddenly stall.

If that description sounds uncomfortably familiar, there is a good chance you are operating in a role that does not officially exist.

I call it the Invisible COO.

The role no one assigns

A good Chief Operating Officer performs a very specific function inside an organisation. They translate strategy into execution, ensure teams are aligned around shared priorities, and they notice operational risks before those risks become expensive mistakes.

Now think about the best Executive Assistants you know.

They remind executives about decisions that still need to be made, they connect people across departments who need to align with one another, and they notice when projects begin to drift and quietly steer them back on course.

None of those responsibilities appear in a formal job description. Yet if you remove those actions from the system, something interesting happens.

The organisation slows down. Decisions take longer. Communication becomes fragmented, and projects that once seemed straightforward begin to stall.

In other words, someone was quietly doing the work that kept the organisation’s operating system functioning.

Why assistants end up here

This dynamic is not accidental.

Assistants sit in one of the most unusual positions inside a company. You are close enough to leadership to understand strategic priorities, yet you remain connected to teams across the organisation. You see both the executive view of the business and the operational reality on the ground.

Most people inside an organisation only see one slice of the system. Assistants often see the entire map.

You notice when two teams are unknowingly working against one another. You hear the conversations that never make it into official meetings. You see when leadership decisions are likely to create operational friction further down the line.

Over time, you begin connecting the dots - and because someone needs to keep things moving, you step in. Not because it is written anywhere in your role description, but because without that intervention, things quietly break and you likely know what those repercussions look like.

The moment many assistants recognise themselves

At some point in their career, many experienced assistants have a slightly uncomfortable realisation. People come to them (possibly you since you are still reading!) when they want to understand what is actually happening inside the organisation. Not because they are the most senior person in the room, but because they are the person who sees how everything connects.

That is usually when the “ah-ha” moment lands. You are the glue that holds things together, and the cog that keeps things running.

The problem with invisible influence

The difficulty is that this influence is almost always informal.

You may be coordinating work across multiple teams, but you rarely have formal authority to direct anyone. You may be shaping executive decisions, but you are seldom recognised as part of the leadership structure. Your role expands, but the recognition rarely does.

Assistants end up carrying genuine operational responsibility without the title, authority, or compensation normally associated with leadership roles.

In effect, they are doing elements of a COO’s job while still being treated as administrative support, and because so much of this work happens behind the scenes, organisations often underestimate how much stability it actually provides.

The real question

Whenever I discuss this idea with assistants, the same question comes up: “How do you know whether this is actually happening in your role?”

Sometimes it simply feels like you are busy. Sometimes it feels like you are constantly firefighting.

But those two things are not necessarily the same as operating at a strategic level inside the organisation. That is why I built a simple framework to help assistants answer that question in a practical way.

I call it the Invisible COO Diagnostic (I know, catchy!).

🔒 Paid subscribers can access the full diagnostic below.

The worksheet allows you to calculate your Invisible COO Score based on five dimensions: strategic access, decision influence, cross-team coordination, operational foresight, and executive dependency.

Most assistants who complete it discover something surprising: they are already operating at a much higher level than their job description suggests. You’ll likely already know this, but being able to see it on paper can be a real help.

If you’ve not already used your single-use free article yet, you can use it here!

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He sent psychologically healthy people into psychiatric hospitals claiming they heard a single unfamiliar voice. They were admitted, and once inside, they behaved entirely normally. They stopped reporting symptoms, they followed routines, and they engaged in rational conversation.

However, this behaviour did not make any difference.

Everything they did was interpreted through the lens of the diagnosis they had been given. Their note-taking became “compulsive writing behaviour.” Standing near the cafeteria before meals was described as symptomatic. Ordinary behaviour was reframed to fit the label.

The diagnosis shaped interpretation, and even cold, hard evidence did not override it.

If you have worked as an Executive Assistant for any length of time, you have likely experienced a corporate version of this.

The EA Label

Most Executive Assistants are hired into roles that are categorised as “support.”

This is the case, even when the job description says “strategic partner.”, when you sit in board meetings, and even when your executive publicly describes you as indispensable.

Support remains this dominant mental category.

Over time, many EAs evolve far beyond that frame. You influence hiring decisions, shape investor materials, manage sensitive internal tensions, and frequently act as an informal Chief of Staff. Yet when a formal leadership role opens - Chief of Staff, Head of Operations, Programme Lead - something shifts.

You are praised for being exceptional in your current role. You are described as invaluable. You are told the business needs someone with “direct experience” at that level. The organisation does not necessarily question your capability. It questions your classification.

I’ve previously thought that this is because they need someone in your role and it’s easier to hire for one, than to move one and hire a second.

Proximity Does Not Automatically Equal Authority

There is a persistent myth in our profession that proximity to power converts into progression. It does not.

Proximity gives you context. It gives you insight into decision-making. It often gives you informal influence. But unless the organisation consciously redefines your role, proximity rarely becomes authority.

If you are categorised as support, your strategic contributions are interpreted as valuable input rather than leadership ownership.

You can shape conversations, but you are not seen as setting direction. You can challenge assumptions, but you are not perceived as accountable for outcomes. You can influence decisions, but you are rarely named as the decision-maker. You are not given the required mandate that would see you responsible for these things.

Organisations associate leadership with ownership and visible accountability. If those markers are not attached to your name, your ceiling becomes perceptual long before it becomes structural.

The Comfort of Keeping You Where You Are

Promoting an EA into a senior leadership role disrupts hierarchy. It challenges traditional career pathways and forces others to re-evaluate how value is assessed.

Hiring externally feels cleaner. The title arrives pre-validated and the narrative requires no explanation. Boards and investors understand it immediately.

“Promoted the EA” often demands a justification the organisation does not want to spend political capital providing so the business chooses narrative simplicity.

And you remain indispensable - but contained.

When the Story Hardens

The longer you stay in one category, the more difficult it becomes for others to update their mental model of you, like a typecast actor.

You may already be operating at a higher level in practice. You might be running cross-functional initiatives, owning complex projects, managing senior stakeholders and effectively performing elements of a senior operations role.

But when the formal opportunity appears, you are told you lack direct experience.

You cannot get the title without the experience, yet you cannot get the experience without the title.

The Rosenhan experiment showed that once institutions commit to a narrative, they struggle to reinterpret evidence that contradicts it, and organisations are no different.

I experienced this very clearly just a couple of years ago when I was temping as an Office Manager while simultaneously running my own consulting business. On paper, in that particular building, I was the Office Manager. I was arranging suppliers, sorting facilities issues, and supporting the day-to-day operations of the company. I was treated accordingly - junior, operational, administrative.

What most of the people in that office did not know was that outside those hours, I was delivering fractional COO contracts. I had already led commercial operations for an aerospace company. I was advising founders on revenue systems, building operating models, and restructuring processes at a strategic level. I was doing this role as a favour to someone who had a client in need of help.

The capability did not change when I walked into that building, but the label very much did.

In that environment, my suggestions were interpreted through the lens of “Office Manager.” In a different room, I was introduced as a strategic operator and treated as such. The only variable that changed was context and title.

It was a live demonstration of how powerfully institutions categorise people. Once someone is mentally placed in a junior or support frame, their experience outside that frame becomes almost invisible. The environment filters it out because it does not match the story.

That is what makes this dynamic so insidious. It is not always that people doubt your competence. It is that the setting determines how your competence is perceived.

The Diagnostic: Capability Gap or Categorisation Trap?

Before you assume you are being unfairly labelled, you need to assess the situation clearly. Not emotionally, but strategically.

Read more

Every organisation has them. The steady pair of hands. The fixer. The person leadership relies on when something is politically sensitive, urgent, or complex. They are trusted, respected, and often described as “indispensable.” On the surface, this looks like success.

Underneath, it is often something else: a hidden tax.

I call it the Loyalty Tax. It is the cost paid by high performers who repeatedly absorb inefficiency, smooth over dysfunction, and stabilise chaos without demanding structural change in return. It does not show up on a payslip or in a job description, but it shapes careers quietly and decisively.

It shows up when you are told you are “too valuable where you are” to be moved (how many of us have heard that!? 🙋). It shows up when your remit expands informally but your authority does not (think: more projects to “help you”). It shows up when you are invited to contribute to decisions but not empowered to make them. It shows up when you are trusted with risk but excluded from strategy.

The Loyalty Tax feels like integrity. You care about standards, you do not want projects to fail, you do not want customers impacted, and you do not want your executive exposed. So you step in to fix the brief, chase the decision or rewrite the messaging. .

No one explicitly asks you to subsidise the system, which is what makes this so insidious. Organisations optimise around what works. If you make broken structures function, the structure learns it does not need to change.

Indispensability, in this context, is not freedom. It is containment. Have you ever been turned down for a promotion or different role because you’re too valuable where you are? This is likely why.

The longer you compensate, the more your competence becomes infrastructure. You are no longer simply delivering outcomes; you are carrying design flaws. You are doing structural work without structural authority. You are literally holding up the company, and to move you would be to remove it’s foundations.

And that is where the Loyalty Tax compounds.

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A lot of senior Executive Assistants aren’t burned out. They’re boxed in.

Burnout is depletion. Being boxed in is containment. Burnout says, “I have too much to carry.” Being boxed in says, “I’m not allowed to carry more.” On the surface they look similar: fatigue, frustration, disengagement. But they require completely different responses.

If you misdiagnose containment as burnout, you’ll reach for rest. What you actually need is repositioning.

The Competence Trap

There is usually a point in an EA career where growth slows, not because you’ve plateaued intellectually, but because you’ve mastered the existing scope.

Early on, everything stretches you. You’re learning the politics, the systems, the personalities, the rhythms of the business. Then one day you realise you can run your executive’s world without conscious effort. You anticipate problems before they surface. You manage stakeholders instinctively. You can stabilise chaos quickly.

You are operationally excellent, and that’s precisely where the risk begins.

Organisations optimise around reliability. Once you become the stabilising force in a system, the system reorganises to depend on you. Your executive builds their operating model around your competence. Teams rely on your consistency. Processes start to assume your involvement.

You haven’t stopped growing. The system has stopped stretching you.

That’s the competence trap. The better you are, the more valuable you become exactly where you are, and is why I’ve been told several times in my career that I wouldn’t be getting a promotion into a larger role because I was needed where I was. This isn’t the compliment it feels like initially - it’s laziness on the part of your company or manager - because if you moved, they would have to replace you.

The Myth of Being Indispensable

We’ve been taught that being indispensable is the goal. It sounds like power. In reality, it often becomes containment.

If the business genuinely cannot function without you in your current seat, moving you feels risky. Promoting you feels disruptive. Expanding your remit requires redesigning something that currently “works.”

So instead of structural progression, you get reinforcement:

• Pay rises instead of scope shifts

• Praise instead of redesign

• More responsibility inside the same box

This is rarely malicious. Your executive probably trusts you deeply. They may even think they are protecting you. But if your value is defined purely by operational stability, the organisation will optimise you for continuity, not expansion.

Most EA roles are built to absorb complexity, not redesign it. If you do not deliberately push against that design, the role will quietly shrink your ambition to fit its original boundaries.

Why This Feels Like Burnout (But Isn’t)

Over time, containment starts to feel like exhaustion. You feel flat. You feel irritated more often than energised. You fantasise about leaving without being able to articulate exactly why.

The workload might be manageable. The pay might be good. The relationship with your executive might be solid, and yet something feels off.

That “off” feeling is often underutilisation. It’s the frustration of knowing you can operate at a higher level but having no structural pathway to do so.

If you treat that as burnout, you’ll try to reduce effort. But the real issue isn’t overextension. It’s compression.

How to Reposition Your Value

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I think just about everyone has known that one person in an organisation who seems above their station, yet for some reason the CEO hangs off their every word.

EAs tend to learn this instinctively, often long before anyone else. We see who gets listened to and who gets indulged. We notice whose opinion lands even when it contradicts the plan, and whose carefully prepared input disappears without comment. We observe who can delay decisions without consequence, and who is punished for doing the same. None of that is accidental.

But seeing power and understanding it are not the same thing.

Many EAs mistake proximity for influence. We are close to senior leaders, trusted with information, present in moments of tension and decision-making. That closeness feels like power, and in some ways it is. But proximity only matters if it converts into protection or leverage. Without that conversion, it is simply exposure, which is worthless in comparison.

Formal Power vs Functional Power

Formal power is what appears on slides and organisation charts. It is visible, documented, and easy to reference. Functional power is harder to see. It belongs to the people who shape outcomes without needing to be named in the decision.

Functional power sits with those who:

• control information flow

• frame problems before they reach the room

• influence interpretation after meetings end

• remain untouched when plans fail

These people are not always the most senior. They are often the most connected, the most consistent, or the most strategically placed. They know when to speak, when to wait, and when to let others take the heat.

EAs are often adjacent to functional power without being included in it. We may hear the conversation, but we do not get to shape how it is remembered. We may understand the nuance, but we are not asked to define it. Over time, this creates a dangerous illusion: that being close to power is the same as having it.

It isn’t. Trust me.

Influence Is Revealed After the Meeting

If you want to understand where power actually sits, don’t look at who speaks most in meetings. Look at what happens afterwards.

Who reframes the decision in follow-up conversations? Whose interpretation becomes the accepted version of events? Who gets to say “that’s not quite what we meant” without being challenged?

Power reveals itself in the aftermath, not the moment.

EAs often do a significant amount of invisible work in this phase. We clarify, smooth, reword, and contextualise. We ensure alignment where none existed. We stop misunderstandings from escalating. But in doing so, we may also be masking where influence truly lies. The organisation experiences coherence, but it does not see the effort required to maintain it, and because that effort is unseen, it is so rarely protected.

When Power Shifts, It Rarely Announces Itself

Power shifts are rarely dramatic. They do not arrive with announcements or updated org charts. They show up quietly, through changed behaviour.

Suddenly someone else is looped in first. A meeting you always attended now happens without you. Decisions feel pre-made. Your input is acknowledged but not acted on. None of this is framed as exclusion. It is framed as efficiency, focus, or “just for now.”

For EAs, these moments are often the earliest signals that influence is moving elsewhere. The mistake many people make is assuming these shifts are temporary, or purely situational. Sometimes they are. Often, they are not. They might not always involve you either. It’s not uncommon for EAs to witness this shift from one person to another with the company. Quite often because of a falling out or disagreement and then there’s suddenly a new person involved for seemingly no reason.

Power consolidates quickly once it starts to move. And it rarely moves back.

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But trust is not the same thing as safety, and it is certainly not the same thing as power.

For EAs in particular, trust can be one of the most precarious positions to occupy. It brings access without authority, responsibility without protection, and proximity to risk without any real influence over how that risk is handled when something goes wrong. Most people only realise this once something shifts. By then, trust has quietly turned into exposure.

Trust and power are often spoken about as though they are interchangeable. They are not. Trust determines who is looped in early, who carries context, who absorbs complexity, and who fixes problems quietly. Power determines whose version of events becomes official, who is shielded when something fails, who is given grace during disruption, and who is actively defended when narratives start to shift.

Many EAs hold extraordinary levels of institutional trust while sitting outside the structures that distribute power. We are relied upon to keep things running smoothly, but are rarely positioned to shape how events are explained once they are over. This is not accidental. It is structural.

Trust feels like safety - until power moves.

This becomes most visible after a senior exit. The EA is still “trusted”, still asked to keep things steady, still holding context. But the room has changed. Meetings begin to happen without us. Decisions are referenced after the fact. Our proximity remains, but our influence has quietly gone. By the time roles are reviewed or responsibilities reshaped, the story has already been written - and the EA was never part of the rewrite.

In practice, trust often turns EAs into custodians of organisational memory. You remember why decisions were made, which compromises were intentional, and what was happening behind the scenes at the time. You hold context others no longer have, or no longer want. But institutional memory without authority is not an asset. It is a liability. When leadership changes, organisations rarely preserve context. They rewrite it. And the people who remember too much are not usually invited to help shape the new version.

Many EAs also function as emotional and operational shock absorbers. You soften difficult messages, intercept tension before it escalates, protect your executive from reputational fallout, and fix problems before anyone else notices they existed. Over time, the organisation stops experiencing the friction you are absorbing. The cost of that work becomes invisible. When no one feels the impact, no one feels urgency to protect the role that prevents it.

Shock absorbers are designed to take impact so others do not have to. They wear down gradually and invisibly. And when they fail, they are replaced rather than defended. This is one of the least acknowledged risks of being indispensable.

Trust also pulls EAs into volatile spaces. You are present during sensitive conversations. You see indecision, misalignment, and power struggles up close. You are often closely associated with leaders whose influence may be growing or quietly diminishing. But when outcomes are discussed later, you are rarely in the room. You do not get to frame intent, contextualise decisions, or clarify what actually happened. Proximity without narrative control is exposure, and exposure does not require wrongdoing. It only requires change.

Many EAs assume that neutrality will protect them. We stay out of politics, avoid conflict, and focus on supporting the role rather than aligning with any particular agenda. But neutrality does not exist in systems shaped by power. When power shifts, everyone is re-evaluated. Silence is not interpreted as objectivity; it is interpreted as alignment with the old order. You do not need to be political to be affected by politics. You simply need to be nearby when the ground moves.

There is a question most EAs do not ask until we are forced to, and by then it is often too late. If your executive left tomorrow, who would actively protect you? Not who likes you, and not who says they value EAs in principle. Who would advocate for you when budgets tighten, roles are redefined, or narratives are rewritten? Who would explain your value when the person you were closest to is no longer there to do it?

Most EAs only start thinking about this after a change has already happened. By that point, the window to reposition has usually closed.

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This is particularly true for Executive Assistants, operations professionals, and anyone whose work sits across functions rather than neatly within one. These roles are visible in outcome but often invisible in narrative, which makes progression feel simultaneously obvious and elusive.

The gap between effort and advancement is rarely about capability. It is about how risk is perceived.

Promotions are not rewards for performance

Organisations do not promote people to recognise past contribution. They promote people because they believe the risk of placing someone in a bigger role is acceptable. This risk calculation includes far more than technical competence. It covers judgement, discretion, decision-making under pressure, and the ability to operate without constant validation.

High performers are often surprised by this. They assume that consistently exceeding expectations will naturally result in progression. What they underestimate is how much weight organisations place on trust, particularly when a role involves greater autonomy or exposure.

From the organisation’s perspective, the question is not whether you can do the work. It is whether you will make the right calls when the work is unclear, contested, or politically sensitive.

They also need to balance the risk not only of having you in the new role, but also not having you in the role you would be leaving.

Internal promotions are decided long before they are advertised

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And then there are the promotions where nothing looks different at first, except everything is.

You’re managing the same people you were working alongside last month. The same people you used to message privately after meetings. The same people who know your habits, your strengths, and the things you quietly roll your eyes at. You earn yourself a promotion and you are suddenly managing your peers.

Nothing really prepares you for how hard this is.

Managing your peers isn’t just a leadership challenge. It’s an emotional one. And in admin, ops, and EA teams, where trust and informality are often the glue, it can feel especially uncomfortable.

(⬇There’s a practical 90-day checklist at the end of this piece for paid members, covering what to focus on in your first three months so you don’t default into survival mode.)

The part no one says out loud

Most people stepping into their first peer-management role feel a strange mix of pride and guilt.

Pride, because you worked hard for the role.
Guilt, because you’re suddenly “above” people you respect, and in some cases, people who wanted the job too.

I found myself in this exact position a few years ago and I felt a mix of guilt, pride and impostor syndrome.

So you try to be careful. You soften decisions. You keep doing all the same tasks. You avoid difficult conversations because you don’t want to make things awkward.

On the surface, this can look like kindness, but in reality, it often creates confusion and can make the transition harder in the long run.

Your team doesn’t know where they stand. You don’t know where the line is. And slowly, the role starts to feel heavier than it should. You are trying to balance still being everyone’s friend, whilst trying to guide and direct people at the same time.

This isn’t because you’re doing anything wrong. It’s because managing peers requires a different kind of confidence that takes time to develop.

The temptation to stay “the same”

One of the biggest traps in this transition is trying to prove you haven’t changed.

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Do a regular office walk-through if you’re office-based. Check lights, loos, shared equipment, exits, and obvious hazards so small issues don’t escalate.

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Everywhere you look, someone is telling you what you should be doing by now - what habits you should have formed, what goals you should have set, what version of yourself you should already be halfway towards becoming. New year, new systems. New routines. New standards. New expectations.

And if you work in an administrative or support role, there’s an extra layer to this noise. Because January isn’t just about your fresh start - it’s about everyone else’s.

New strategies, new priorities, new ways of working. Executives returning with energy (or overwhelm), teams re-calibrating, projects restarting mid-sentence. You’re not easing into the year; you’re often catching it as it’s already moving.

So let’s be clear from the outset: this is not an article about “reinventing yourself”. It’s not about becoming more productive, more visible, more impressive, or more resilient than you already are.

This is about setting direction calmly, deliberately, and without turning January into a performance.

I’ve put together a download to go with this - something to sit with rather than rush through. It’s waiting for you at the end of the article. If you’re still a free member, you can either upgrade, or use your free trial to access it.

Why resolutions don’t work for people like us

Traditional New Year’s resolutions assume a level of control that simply doesn’t exist in many roles like ours.

They’re usually built around outcomes: achieve X, improve Y, deliver Z. But if your work is shaped by other people’s calendars, decisions, moods, priorities, and last-minute changes, outcome-based goals can quickly turn into frustration.

You can set the most thoughtful intention in the world, but then someone else’s urgent request blows it out of the water by 9:17am on the first Monday back.

This is why January resolutions often fail not because you lack discipline, but because the framework is wrong.

They also tend to add pressure where none is needed. Many EAs and office administrators already operate at a high level. You are organised. You are capable. You are solving problems most people never even see. Piling on ambitious resolutions can quietly turn competence into self-criticism.

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Not everything you did in 2025 will be visible.
Not everything will be remembered.
Not everything will be rewarded in the neat, linear way we’re often told it should be.

And yet, virtually all of it mattered.

This final Extra Wrap of 2025 isn’t about setting goals, choosing a word for the year, or rushing headfirst into a shinier version of yourself for January. It’s about recognising the work that didn’t make the highlight reel. The judgement calls. The restraint. The invisible labour. The things that didn’t blow up because you were there.

Because whether or not anyone ever names it, that work is shaping you. And you’ll carry it forward.

The fires that never made it past your desk

One of the most skilled things an experienced assistant does is stop problems before they become problems.

The meeting that happened because you quietly intervened.
The misunderstanding that never escalated because you reframed it carefully.
The senior leader who arrived calmer than they would have, because you’d already absorbed the chaos upstream.

None of that appears in a project plan. None of it shows up in OKRs. And yet, the absence of disaster is often the clearest indicator that someone extremely competent was involved.

This year, you likely spent a lot of time:

• Preventing rushed decisions from becoming reputational issues

• Preventing tension from becoming conflict

• Preventing overload from tipping into failure

That work leaves no footprint. There’s nothing to screenshot or summarise for your Wins Folder. But it builds something internal instead: instinct, and confidence in your own judgement. You’re faster at sensing when something’s about to go sideways now. You trust yourself sooner. You intervene earlier.

That didn’t happen by accident.

The emotional labour you didn’t sign up for, but still carried

Let’s name it plainly: 2025 asked assistants to absorb a lot.

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And yet, every December, many EAs glide straight past this point without stopping to acknowledge it. The final sprint creeps in: the reports, the reforecasts, the budget questions, the travel changes, the year-end reviews, the “just a quick alignment call” requests. The diaries swell. The inbox tries to stage a coup. You cling to the hope that someone - anyone - will remember to say, “You’ve done well this year.”

Let’s not leave that to chance.

This article is your permission slip to treat the close of the year as a professional practice, not an afterthought. It’s your guide to winding down intentionally, recognising what you’ve actually achieved (not just survived), and taking honest stock of the year, so you walk into January clear-eyed, not carrying twelve months of unsorted mental admin in your arms like a stack of precarious filing boxes.

Assistants do not merely “wrap up the year.” We architect it. And that architecture deserves examination.

So carve out some time, make a coffee (or something stronger), and let’s build a better year-end ritual.

Why Assistants Need a Year-End Review More Than Most

For many roles, success is visible and easily measured. For assistants, especially experienced, senior-level ones, the impact is often invisible by design. If you’re doing it well, chaos is prevented, friction is reduced, and leadership decisions happen more smoothly. But those aren’t always things you can point to in slide decks.

Which is why EAs risk ending the year feeling like they’ve “just kept things going” when in reality, they’ve held up entire organisations with their fingertips.

A year-end review isn’t indulgent. It’s:

• A rebalancing mechanism: you can’t plan your next level unless you’re aware of your current one

• A way to capture the narrative before someone else does.

• A moment to translate invisible labour into perceptible value, which is crucial for performance reviews, progression conversations, and strategic repositioning.

Most importantly, it’s a way to remind yourself that you’ve spent a year doing complex, impactful work that often doesn’t have a name until you give it one.

Start With the Full Picture (Not the Edited Version Your Brain Defaults To)

Our brains are unhelpfully biased. They’re excellent at remembering failures in HD but store achievements in low-resolution. If you’re a high performer, the effect is even worse.

So before you evaluate anything, gather the raw material.

Look at:

• Your calendar
  (Where did you actually spend your time? What themes emerge?)

• Your sent emails
  (Not to relive trauma—just to remind yourself how much you handled.)

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As we move into 2026 - a year set to be shaped by AI adoption, leaner teams, sharper expectations, and more cross-functional work - many of us are asking: What else could my skills unlock? And importantly: What paths exist beyond the classic Ops, HR, or Events routes?

Quite a few, actually.

Here are emerging, realistically accessible career directions for assistants who want something new - without starting from scratch.

1. AI Workflow & Automation Specialist

(aka: the person who finally makes processes… work)

This isn’t about being “technical.” It’s about understanding workflows - something we EAs already excel at. As companies lean heavily into automation, they desperately need people who understand how work actually happens, not how someone thinks it happens on a whiteboard.

EAs are natural candidates for roles like:

• AI Operations (AIOps) Coordinator

• Automation Specialist

• AI Adoption Lead

• Workflow Designer

You already map processes, spot inefficiencies, understand which tasks are critical vs noise, and know where handoffs fail. All of that is the foundation of automation design.

How to start:
Dip into Zapier, Make, or HubSpot automations. Volunteer to streamline one painful internal process. Learn prompt design fundamentals. The barrier to entry is lower than ever, and companies need non-technical people who can translate “how work happens” into “how work should flow.”

Hubspot has absolutely loads of free courses you can take - I’d start here if I were you (I actually have - I’ve done some of them!).

2. Internal Communications Strategist

(yes… your ability to write a clear email is a superpower)

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And somehow we do. So when we talk about happiness at work, we’re not talking about that glossy, rainbow-tinted version you read about in corporate wellbeing pamphlets. We’re talking about the gritty, resilient, still-smiling-after-three-meeting-reschedules kind of happiness. The happiness that survives Teams pings, forgotten attachments, heating systems with mood swings, and executives who occasionally look genuinely astonished by the contents of their own calendar. That kind. The real-life, office-survival happiness.

Before we go anywhere, it’s worth acknowledging - quietly, gently and honestly - that this job is, by nature, a little absurd. We’re adults who regularly find ourselves performing tasks no one warned us about. One moment we’re facilitating high-level strategic discussions; the next, we’re mediating an argument between two departments about who “accidentally” booked the meeting room with the “good” window.

Some days we’re running the organisation like a Swiss clock, and some days we’re trying to work out why the printer sounds like it’s possessed by a Victorian ghost child. The mixture is strange, and yet we rarely pause long enough to laugh at the absurdity of it. But humour, genuinely, is a form of happiness. Sometimes the most freeing thing is just to quietly recognise, “Yes, this is ridiculous,” and carry on with a small smile and a large coffee.

One of the biggest happiness-thieves in our line of work is the inbox. It whispers lies. It tells you everything is urgent, everyone is waiting, and the only correct emotional state is guilt. Your inbox will happily convince you that you are personally responsible for world peace, climate change, and the fact that Bob from Operations still doesn’t understand the difference between CC and BCC. It is surprisingly liberating to realise your inbox is not the boss of you. You are completely allowed to start your day without launching yourself directly into the swamp of unread emails. You can take five minutes to collect your thoughts, decide what you want the day to feel like, and begin from a place of intention rather than panic. It’s a tiny act of rebellion that pays off in emotional calm.

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