I have been involved in mentoring over the last couple of years in some form or another. Having over 20 years administration, secretarial and PA experience, I am on many London PA networks and have recently discovered the Essex PA Network so I wanted to share my experiences with you all.
“The definition of mentoring is when someone shares their knowledge, skills, and experience with another person to help them to progress. So, if you've shared any knowledge, skills, or experience with another person or had another person share this with you, you've been involved in mentoring.”
I currently work at London South Bank University (LSBU) and have done for five years. I am in the Executive Administration Team but sit in the People and OD Team. I am EA to the Chief People Officer, Director of OD & EDI, Director of People and Deputy Director of HR Services.
I have always been interested in helping others within the administration sector so when a request was sent to my team in November 2020 for a mentor, I signed up! It was an informal mentoring process, to assist a new PA in another University. We met throughout lockdown on MS Teams and shared tips, processes, connections and ideas to help her in her new role. We are still in contact today and I recently met up with her in Greenwich and another PA, where we continue to share knowledge and ideas for events.
Since then, we have some new PA’s at LSBU who I have regular ‘buddy’/’mentoring’ sessions with, to review processes, share tips and talk about how they can make their roles their own (testimonial below):
"It's been a pleasure to meet with Natalie monthly, as she has provided a safe space to talk about myself in my work situation, without having to explain the context, or be judged.
Natalie has impressed me greatly, when I hear all that she has achieved and continues to achieve in her career as an EA. Best of all, she doesn't gatekeep! Natalie regularly sends us emails of PA events that she finds that we might be interested in, and awards that we can apply for or nominate others.
Natalie is genuinely great encouragement."
Being a member of many PA networks, I came across the World Administrators Alliance. They held a Global Summit which I attended in October 2022 as a delegate for the UK. This bi-annual, two-day working meeting brings together industry leaders from across the world to discuss and act on issues that affect administrative professionals. They hosted 56 delegates who collectively represented over 130,000 administrative professionals from 25 countries, along with 24 observers.
One key area to share with you today from that Summit included mentoring. Along with presenting their Global Skills Matrix https://globalskillsmatrix.com/ and having a ‘Career Behind the Job’ initiative, we set up some task force working groups on their goals in their ‘Administra’ Plan. I am participating in a working group on Goal 3 – Develop a mentoring framework.
To date, our working group has created a draft framework for review, along with applications forms, agreement, contract and other documents. I presented these back to a recent WAA meeting and these will be shared once approved on their website, to give the global community the same access to this wonderful initiative that others have.
“I find mentoring to be rewarding and if you help one person improve just one aspect of their role, then it’s definitely worth it. If you would like to have me as a mentor, please do reach out – I am always happy to help” 😊
Natalie Richardson
Other useful links that may have courses or information on Mentoring but also general PA information that I find invaluable are listed below.