Introduction

Office Management and Effective Administration Skills is an exciting and interactive programme.  It  is designed to provide office administrators, supervisors of clerical and administrative staff, executive secretaries and personal assistants the opportunity to review and develop the interpersonal and professional skills they need to do their jobs effectively – thereby contributing to their own, their boss’ and their organisation’s success. In this programme participants learn how to:

• Manage a network of working relations
• Communicate effectively
• Manage time for yourself and others
• Manage the performance of admin staff
• Improve written communications
• Manage and present information
• Organise and improve office systems

Objectives

• Extend their understanding of their roles and the key contribution they make to organisational success
• Review their working relationships
• Review and develop their personal organisation, communication and interpersonal skills
• Develop an action plan to help themselves, their boss and other colleagues work in more effective and efficient ways

Content

Day One

Programme Introduction/Roles, Competences and Personal Effectiveness

• Programme introduction and objectives
• Action planning
• The ‘competence’ model of skills, behaviours and values
• Emotional and Chronistic Intelligence
• Personal competence review
• Time management constraints – resources, systems, other people and self
• Handling requests and conflicting priorities

Day Two

Team Working, Communication and Meetings

• Team working and team roles
• Briefing skills – giving, receiving and passing on
• Organising, and participating in, meetings
• Notes, minutes and follow-up

Day Three

Managing Working Relationships /Communication Skills/Supervising Admin Staff

• Delegation – giving and receiving
• Coaching and  training colleagues and staff – skills of on-job training
• Communication and listening skills – lessons from NLP
• Building rapport
• Developing a network of working relationships – influencing skills
• Assertiveness and conflict
• People problems and problem people
• Helping others perform – case study
• Practical motivation
• Criticism skills

Day Four

Managing Time/Desk Management and Office Technology/Writing Skills

• Planning and priority setting
• Office layout and ergonomics
• Managing the paper-load and developing paperless systems
• Getting the best from office technology
• Letter writing
• E-mail efficiency and etiquette
• Writing and editing reports
• Proof-reading skills
• Setting up/developing writing layout and style guidelines for the organisation
• Writing & designing presentation slides

Day Five

Managing Information & Budgets/Improving Customer Service and Systems

• Principles of information management – scheduling, filtering and digesting
• Interpreting & presenting statistical information
• Designing & using graphs
• Designing surveys, presenting findings and interpreting meaning
• Basic concepts of financial management
• Monitoring budgets and variance
• Improving  customer service and systems – continuous improvement
• Action planning