Administrative Staff and their Professional Development

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• Administrative Staff and their Professional
  Development

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• Fiona Rowley
• FOI Officer and PA to the
• Director, Business Systems
• Carol Burnett
• Manager, Business Systems User Integration

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Women in Leadership

• There seems to be a good deal of research into
  this topic.
• There is also research and policies at most
  universities for gender balance in leadership
  positions.

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BUT -

• What if I dont want to be a leader?
• What if I just want to move into a supervisory or
  management role?

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So how do I get into Management?

• Most support staff positions are essentially dead
  ends.
• The scarcity of higher-level positions and
  opportunities for promotion ensures that merit
  and initiative, although components of
  advancement, are insufficient by themselves, and
  career progress often remains beyond the
  influence of the administrative staff for years.

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AVCCs, ACTION PLAN 1999 TO 2003

• For women employed in Australian universities.
• Existing research points to evidence that
  cultural and structural barriers continue to
  limit the career paths of women in universities.
  The next stage is to examine the precise nature
  and dimensions of these barriers to identify and
  put in place mechanisms to remove or counteract
  their impact more directly and effectively.

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Stereotypes

• Are women in administrative positions viewed as
  incapable of moving to management position?

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What about men?
Do they have the same barriers to overcome moving
from administrative work to management?
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Case Study

• In groups, lets discuss a Case Study and attempt
  to answer the
• questions posed.

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Critical Barriers

• Inhospitable corporate culture
• Exclusion from informal networks
• Stereotyping preconceptions
• Not in pipeline long enough
• Lack of general line management experience
• Findings from Research conducted by the New
  Zealand Institute of Management.

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What next?

• Two major areas
• Own your career
• Core functions of career development

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Owning your career

• Mentor
• Audit
• Develop skills
• Re-skilling
• Job market

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Career Development
Performance appraisals self help packages
Job maps information interviews
Career planning, workshops counselling
Action Plan
Assessment
Options
Core Functions
Skills development
Job access
Secondments, vacancies lateral moves
Education, training, networking mentoring
Core Functions of Career Development by Tricia
Jackson in Career Development, 2000.
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In conclusion
Customer service Technical skills
Negotiating Communicating
Tacit knowledge
Interpersonal skills
Administrative staff
Managers
CEOs Directors