Why Admin Titles Matter

Is it time to move beyond the title “assistant”? We talked to Candice Burningham about why new titles for EAs and admins are worth exploring.

Recorded at APC 2024 and produced by the American Society of Administrative Professionals - ASAP. Learn more and submit a listener question at asaporg.com/podcast.

Leah Warwick: Hi, everyone. I'm Leah Warwick, and you're listening to "The Admin Edge." There are hundreds of titles held by administrative professionals today, as we document in our annual ASAP State of the Profession Report, and our latest research into the state of executive administration. Our guest today, Candice Burningham, went viral on LinkedIn for a post about the title "assistant," and so here we are at APC 2024, diving into that topic and so much more.

Hi, I'm Leah Warwick, Editor for ASAP, and my guest today is Candice Burningham, Founder of Admin Avenues, and a speaker at this event, APC. Welcome to the podcast, Candice.

00:00:50                     

Candice: Thank you so much for having me. And thank you everybody behind the scenes who have put on this incredible event. There has been so many email, so many plans, so many everything. So thank you – thank you everyone at APC.

Leah Warwick: It's a pleasure to have you here. It's so exciting. You were great on the panel we had this morning, and we got a little into this topic – we'll get more into it here – on titles for admins. So you had a post go viral this summer that focused on the word "assistant" in admin titles. This was on LinkedIn. You said: "To elevate our profession and be recognized as experienced leaders and strategic partners within the corporate world, it's time for a change. We need to move behind the title of assistant, and adopt new titles that truly reflect our value and contributions, titles like: executive business partner, strategic operations lead, chief administrative officer, manager, executive support." Is "assistant" an outdated term?

00:01:51                     

Candice: In my personal opinion, yes, because the role has changed. We're no longer assisting. Yes, there is assistant roles and they should remain assistant. An admin assistant, that's what you're doing; you're assisting with admin. But there are so many different people with different levels of executive assistant, as we were discussing in the panel. You can be a senior executive assistant and you're doing strategic, chief of staff type responsibilities, or you're a senior executive assistant in a medical practice and you're doing medical bookings. They're completely different roles, but you've got the same title.  So I just think there needs to be a complete overhaul of titles in the profession in general. I think we need a whole, big PR campaign around it, to be honest, because it's not just us that we have to convince. We have to convince business leaders. We have to convince recruiters. We have to convince talent – they used to be called HR talent – all those kinds of roles – of what we actually do, because they just still look at us like secretaries.

00:03:00

We haven't been secretaries for such a long time. You guys need to learn what it is that we do and why we are worth the value that we're expecting.

Leah Warwick: Yes, we talked about this a bit on the panel. There's very outdated perceptions of the role beyond – the people in the roles know what they're doing, but nobody else seems to. And we did see in our State of Executive Administration research [that] there are executive assistants, let's say, as an example, that are doing – I think a better term for "assistant," personally, is something like "coordinator." So they're doing a lot of coordination tasks. They're doing the schedule. They're doing the emails. Their role is reactive. They're taking what's coming in and they're doing the work that they need to do, and there is a need for that.

And then as you move along, though, you're starting to do more high-level support work that's more strategic. You're starting to become a partner, where you and, let's say, your executive have a partnership together. You are not assisting them anymore; that's not how you would describe the relationship. 

00:03:54                     

Candice: And if you are perceived as that as well – for me, if my executives/CEOs/presidents were ever not able to attend a meeting, be it in person or online or on the phone, I would step in. If they just think, "Oh, that's just her assistant," they don't give you the respect that you deserve. They don't think that you have the knowledge that you have. They don't think that you can speak on behalf of these people on these particular issues, that perception of "that's just the assistant."

Leah Warwick: How have you seen the administrative profession evolve since you began your career?

Candice: Gosh, I've literally done from office junior all the way through to executive officer of the CEO's office, so I have done every role along the way. Some of the admins that are going to be coming through will never do the roles that I did because they've been wiped out by AI. Level I and Level II are slowly being wiped out – and I think that's a good thing, because that was the minutia work, and so if you can focus on actual value work, then great. If you can have tech do that for you, amazing.

00:05:02

But I was left there doing – counting this and filing that and doing that. And now Copilot does it for me. I'm like: Put it all in this file. Do this. It saves so much time. Then I can focus on something that actually matters. But these were always tasks that just needed to be done. The role has evolved so much from even – like I went from a receptionist to a C-suite assistant, which is not a normal jump, and I remember my boss at the time – his name was David Hampton. We worked together through three different companies and we're still great mates. He said to me, "Do you think you're ready to just jump from a receptionist to a C-suite assistant?" And I was like, "Yep." He was like, "Okay, well, I'll give you a shot." 

00:05:44

I was ignorant. I assumed that executive assistant meant that I was an executive, so any meeting he was in, I would turn up. And they were like, "What's she doing here?" And he's like, "She's my executive assistant." And then slowly people started being like, "Hang on, that's really valuable having her here. She knows everything." They'd start planning and I'd be like, "No, no, that's when [MIP] comes on," or "that's when this is on." Or, "Oh, by the way, your wife's having a baby that month." And they'd be like, "Oh, my gosh. She knows so much. This is really helpful having you in meetings." 

And so that kind of stood on the perception of: "Hang on, we should all have our EAs in meetings," and so we started doing that. Nowadays, you wouldn't have a meeting without an EA being present and running things and having agendas and having outputs. It has changed so much. It's been a career – 

00:06:37

Look, everyone thinks I'm so against the word "assistant." I loved being an executive assistant. I used to look at executive assistant, particularly in my early career, and I'd look at them in their high heels and their pencil skirts (back then) and be like, "One day that's going to be me." And then I remember one day specifically walking through Sidney. I had on cheap high heels and they click-click-click-clicked, and I had on my first leather handbag, and I went, "I've made it," because I was an executive assistant. I would love that feeling for someone else, for them feel like that and be like, "I made it! I've got this amazing career. I'm respected. I make a difference. I feel important." 

It was a great career for 20-odd years. And then bozo over here goes and starts two admin businesses and then buys another one, so I can't escape it. It's going to be part of my life forever. 

Leah Warwick: Yeah, it's so great to hear you talk about that because it sounds like you were the right hand. You were an executive business partner. And that kind of leads to my next question about the future, because I don't think – you've seen [it] – this generation coming up is very keen on the assistant title. We actually have a catchall term here at ASAP here for anyone who works with executives directly: executive admin. That's the catchall term. There can be lots of different titles in that, but something like that.

00:07:55

And then, within that, depending on where you work, maybe there is a title that's appropriate, like executive business partner, like manager of executive support – whatever it may be. So what are you seeing there, and how do you feel about that? Most importantly, what would you like to see? What is the dream scenario? 

Candice: I would like to see the word "assistant" come out of leadership-type roles, so senior executive assistant. I believe "assistant" should stay for admin assistant and assisting roles, but I believe that we should be moving more towards executive business partner titles, operations, if you are actually doing these roles. You don't just get a title for the glory of it. Like we were discussing earlier, I had a job once where I was like, "I've hit the ceiling here. What else is there for me to do?" And my boss was like, "I'm going to upgrade you to a senior executive assistant." And I was like, "Great. I already am. What does that do, senior?" And he goes, "You can put 'senior' in your title."

00:09:00

No money, no nothing. It was just a complete rubbish promotion as such, putting [unintelligible]. And I remember not long after that I said, "Well, then can I have like three grand?" After tax, that's nothing. And he said no. And I was really disappointed. He then came to me and said, "Can you please organize a check for $10,000 for this person's brother?" And it had nothing to do with the business. And I went, "You want me to organize a $10,000 check for someone that has nothing to do with the business, but I've asked for a $3,000 investment in me, in the business, and you said no?" And he said – basically, saying like, "You're abusing your job or power because you have access to that information."

00:09:54

And I'm like, "No, no, no, no. I'm saying that you just gave me a false title, a made-up title with no…" So I left. And I was just like, "I can see that you don't value me." And then at the next place, I was like, "Okay, I want a senior executive assistant role, and I want it at this money." And he was like, "But you don't do a senior executive role. You're an executive officer of the CEO's office. That's what your title should be." And I was like, "You see my value?" And it was just such a massive money jump, too. I was just like, "Oh, my goodness. Thank you. Thank you. Someone sees me." And then that finally gave me the confidence to be like, "Actually, yeah, I do deserve this." 

And that's why I'm such a crazy advocate, because I've seen the light and I want to show others, too. I'm like, "You have value. Don't let them tell you, you don't." 

Leah Warwick: Yes! I love hearing that story from you and the good outcome because we go to HR events and we tell them that because if they don't feel valued, they will leave. If you're worried about retention and hanging onto good people – and we know admins run organizations, basically, and if you lose them everything falls apart. So if you want to keep them, you have to show them that you value them, whether that value is in a title that is appropriate – obviously, in compensation, but also in professional development opportunities, being able to go to events like these shows that I value you so much that I'm going to invest in your training so you can continue to add value back to me, back to the business, and back to yourself." That's going to keep an engaged employee a long time.

00:11:25                     

Candice: Yeah. And if they're smart, they will want to meet you after this and say, "Hey, let's go through what happened at APC. What have you got for me? What's everyone else doing? What have you learned? What's out there? What's new? What's tech?" If you are not taking the opportunity at these conferences – like I met a lady yesterday and I said, "Oh, let's connect." And she said, "I'm not on LinkedIn." And I was like, "Mistake. You need [to be]. Your network is your net worth. Not only just for jobs and everything like that, but if you need to ask a question, if you need help, these people will come to you in a second. They're an army of admins that will help you.

00:12:09

You need to have a network and it's easier to have it online. So join these communities. Join these LinkedIn groups. I cannot express how important it is to be part of these networks and attending these events and not hiding in your room. Come and talk to people at the mixers. If people see you're alone, go and talk to someone else alone. 

Leah Warwick: And then you come back next year and you have all these friends that you've made and all these connections. We've had people come back and say, "Because of this session last year, I was able to get a promotion because I had the tools that I needed." And that is the most rewarding thing that we can do for people is to help them grow.

00:12:51                     

Candice: I completely agree and I do believe you need to do in-person connection, even if you're an introvert. For example, my community, The Admin Collective, is a pocket of introverts, of very sensitive, neurodiverse – they're not good at in-person, and so we do coaching sessions where they're like, "This is what you should do. Here are some questions. This is how to prep yourself to go into these rooms," because it's completely overwhelming.

One of the things I was so impressed with here was – because I'm here with my podcast host, Jessica McBride, who is neurodiverse and ADHD, so she's overstimulated very easily. We went and found all of those breakout rooms. 

Leah Warwick: The Mindful Meadow.

Candice: Oh, my gosh! How good is that? There was quiet rooms. There was craft rooms. There was stretch rooms. I've never seen a conference do that.

00:13:44                     

Leah Warwick: Well, our conference attendees are extremely diverse, and that includes neurodiversity as well, so we want to make sure we're providing spaces for people to go to decompress, to do something that's a little outside of everywhere else, but you feel like you can escape a little bit, and then rejuvenate, recharge, and come back if you'd like.

We say about APC [that] it has something for everyone, and we really mean that. We have a session for everyone. We have a space for everyone here. 

Candice: And you've proven that because usually they would go hide in their hotel room because they need that time out; whereas, now, they can just go – and they might meet someone in that room and be like, "Hey, how are you finding it as well?" And then you've made a friend and then you two can go have drinks together – and it doesn't have to be alcoholic drinks, either. There's been plenty of options for people that don't drink.

00:14:20

It's been a really, really, really inclusive, lovely experience being at this conference. 

Leah Warwick: I'm so glad to hear that and I'm so glad you're here. Meeting you in person has been a delight for me personally, so thank you. I want to get into our listener question now. It was submitted by one of our community members and they wrote in: "Lots of people believe that admins deserve a better range of titles, but I'm skeptical that this will actually improve anything. Have you seen situations where getting the right title actually changed the way colleagues or executives interacted with an admin? Is there anything we can do, beyond advocating for title changes, to generate a shift in perception?"

00:14:56                     

Candice: This is exactly why it needs the PR campaign to be done outside of admin, because we can call ourselves whatever we want. We can be bakers, florists – we can call ourselves whatever we want. It's the fact that if we don't have the buy-in from the executives, from the talent, from the recruiters in particular – and I work with some incredible recruiters who are so pro-admin. They so understand what we do. They fight back. They're like, "Nope." This particular woman in Australia – she used to be an EA, of course – will not take on a job unless it fits the criteria. And I'm just like, "Thank you. Thank you for doing that." Salary has to be shown, exactly what's involved, everything that you need for that.

00:15:43

In 2025, you need to look at what your value is, what you're happy with, whether you can afford this new cost of living – all of those things – and then you need to be – journal it, do whatever it is that you do. But you need to make a plan for you. 

Leah Warwick: It's been such a wonderful time talking to you. I want you to tell all of our listeners where they can find you online and connect with you.

Candice: Lovely. I am on LinkedIn. I'm the only Candice Burningham in the world, so it's pretty easy to find me. Have a read of the post that originally this topic is about. It's pinned on my LinkedIn, and have a read of everyone's comments. There's very different comments. You're allowed to not agree with me. I am happy for people to have different opinions, but just keep it nice. We don't like bullying. Yeah, LinkedIn is my best. If not, I'm on everything else. You'll find me on Instagram. You'll find me on Facebook. You'll find me on everything. The Admin Avenue is the main one where you'll find me for everything.

00:16:42

But, yeah, it's just been such a pleasure to be here, and I'm just so glad I got to meet so many Americans. 

Leah Warwick: Thank you, Candice. I hope you meet many more throughout this event.

Candice: Thank you.

[music playing]

Leah Warwick: Thank you for listening to "The Admin Edge," produced by the American Society of Administrative Professionals, original music and audio editing by Warwick Productions, with video and audio production at our events by 5Tool Productions. If you like this podcast, please leave us a nice review, five stars, and subscribe. If you'd like to submit a listener question, you may do so on our website at ASAPorg.com/podcast.