Many assistants don't often get a lot of recognition or encouragement from their bosses all that often. If you're running someones professional (and personal) life and receiving little or no positive reinforcement from day to day it's easy to become disheartened or even a little bitter.

I read an interesting post on Joan Burge's blog about this topic and thought I'd share it with you:

'First and foremost, don't expect to hear thank you verbalized often.  But here are other forms of communication that say, "I think you are great!  I trust you.  You are my business partner.  You are doing a terrific job, so I want to bring you into my world more."

•   When your manager shows confidence in you, that is a compliment!
•   When your manager shares confidential information with you, that is a compliment!
•   When your manager asks for your input on a project or your insight as to what is happening in the department, that is a compliment!

And the list goes on and on.  So I want to encourage you to look for the non-verbal signs of appreciation.  Those will make you feel good about yourself and the work you do.  You will also reduce any tension or resentment you might be feeling toward your managers because you are not hearing the words "Thank you." '


from: http://www.officedynamics.com/Blog/PostID/303.aspx

When you look at it from this perspective, being assistant seems a little less thankless. The fact that someone trusts you to run their life, parts of their business and even their family is a pretty big compliment and sign that you're doing a great job! How does your boss or business thank you for the work you do?

These five words placed at the end of your job description pretty much sum up the role of any assistant. Our roles are no longer closely tied to prescriptive set of tasks, and anyone who uses the excuse 'that's not in my job description' is bound to be in the market for a new role pretty quickly.

Over the years I've done some crazy 'other duties as required'; I've thrown a party for a car, hunted for joke gifts and fancy dress costumes, edited a book, babysat and even consoled an ex girlfriend of the boss! Despite all of these things being awkward, inconvenient and sometimes difficult at the time, each and every thing I've done that's 'outside my job description' has made me a better assistant. Being a good appointment setter, travel booker, typist and barista are all important functions of an assistant, but what makes you an exceptional assistant is your ability to make your manager's life easier through your flexibility and problem solving.

Over the years I've come to look forward to the 'other duties'. Not only are they usually an interesting challenge, they give me an opportunity to solve a problem and demonstrate just how much value I can add to the organisation.

Next time you're faced with a crazy sounding task try to use it as an opportunity to show off what you can really do (or at least as an opportunity to get away from your desk)!

I'm pretty sure we've all been asked this one in a job interview and that we've all got a pre-prepared answer ready to impress a potential employer, but what is the honest answer?

I've recently been asked this by a manager and automatically spouted out the job interview line, but it got me thinking about what actually does motivate me to do a good job, other than the desire to get paid...

It's pretty easy to see the external things that motivate us. Being praised, bonuses, pay rises and promotions are all rewards that drive many of us to work harder, but these are really only short term motivators - i.e. once the reward is achieved, the motivation tends to wain as the extra effort was only in order to receive the reward.

Intrinsic or internal motivators are a bit harder to pinpoint. If you are intrinsically motivated you work hard because you want to; because it's challenging or satisfying to do so. This form of motivation is usually far more successful and more likely to make you jump out of bed in the morning raring to go.

I think over the last few years I've become distracted with external motivators (although if my boss is reading this pay rises, bonuses and tickets to the races are always appreciated), and lost touch with what really motivated me to keep coming to work - I genuinely do find it challenging and satisfying to be a great 'right hand woman'.

So what motivates you at work - is it power, prestige, recognition, achievement, security, money or something else entirely?