Virtual Marketeers

(My Journey Part 5)

Within probably one and a half years of my commencing in the admin position within the Ministers Office there was a major restructure in government and I was moved back to the department to work with the person who was my supervisor to start with.  Although I went back to the same supervisor, everything was different as the actual department had undergone a major restructure previously as well, which I had actually seen the beginning of before I started in the Ministers Office.  I was not only in a new place, but I was also provided a whole new job description to when I had left.

I didn’t mind one bit, as I was given a really good mix of financial support, admin support and human resources support / liaison which was unique to this particular division – plenty of new things to learn and do!  Again I learned so much from this job and from the people who surrounded me and I grew immensely in my skill set and as a person at the time.  I learned so much more about database management, about human resource management (at a basic level), accounts and admin support. I provided support to the personal assistant to the director once again and was actually asked to fill in for her while she was away.  I was asked to fill in for other personal assistants within the department and I, at times assisted the personal assistant to the CEO of the department by filling in for the receptionist while she was on leave.

If my memory serves me correctly I also completed my first minutes of meeting while I was in this role, although these were probably pretty average and I needed a fair bit of practise in order to bring me to the level I am now with minutes of meeting and transcription.  I have to say that providing a comprehensive and accurate record of minutes of any meeting can be quite difficult, especially when you have not yet developed the skill set needed to do this.

This experience actually helped me in refining my skills even more, as I basically created this as a new position myself, including setting the processes and procedures within this position.

Short Term Contracts

Next I took on a couple of short term contracts.

Initially these contracts were for 6 months, but both were extended.  I had kind of figured out somewhere along the line that I really did thrived on knowledge, I would do my best work when I was in a new place, learning lots of new things.  The first contract was with the financial services division of a government department and I provided admin support to the division and was the Personal Assistant to the Director there.  I learned even more about the reporting process and how it works, and learned about other various different things in my time there.

But then a new person stepped into the position of Director, and the position outline changed changed – the work slowed because the new Director wasn’t as big a delegator as the previous Director.  At about the same time as this happened I noticed a job advertised for an Admin Officer, it was in the town that my husband and I were building a home together.  I applied for this job, another Short Term Contract position.  I won this position and commenced fairly soon after.

This new position was very different as it was working in more of a rural type office setting.  The office was a central office where landholders and environmental community groups would come for information, to liaise with each other.  Some of the staff provided seminars and educational tools for landholders and environmental groups, others met with landholders and environmental groups to figure out solutions and ways to make the environment in which we are blessed with more sustainable.  The main two things that stood out in this position in particular was it:

1. Provided the opportunity to provide admin and secretarial support to a very large Committee I was required to undergo the whole process from setting up the meeting dates, to coordinating, collating and sending out a very thick hard copy agenda to members on the committee and then of course sitting in on the meetings and taking minutes of meeting and then updating the action list to send out to members.  This whole process was almost daunting at first, but I again loved this new learning curve.; and
2. Offered to me the opportunity to manage all aspects of admin for the centre, including organising communications (telephone), security, changing things in order to make money savings or to support the environmental ethos of the centre etc.

While I was in this position it was unfortunate that I lost three babies through miscarriage and as a result of this, there was a change in the air…

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