The Founder & The Force Multiplier: How Entrepreneurs and Executive Assistants Achieve More Together

by Adam Hergenrother

You need a Founder, aka an Entrepreneur, a visionary, a driven, growth-minded leader who will reignite your passion for your career, challenge you to think bigger, and allow you to use your project management and leadership skills, along with your business acumen, to help create the foundation that will allow you both to build a life and career without limits.

Behind every leader is a Force Multiplier.

The power of the partnership only works when you are both committed to challenging each other and growing together every day.

I stopped letting other people dictate who I should be. From that moment on, I was determined to never let anyone put a limit on what I could do or who I could become. I was writing my own story.

Today’s EAs are business-savvy leaders and are not content to sit on the sidelines. They want in on the action. They want to know that what they are doing is a value-add to their Executive and to the business as a whole.

I would caution leaders from assigning C-suite or even VP/ Director titles when you’re a small organization, unless you plan to stay small. If you do plan on growing, I would encourage you to think about being conservative with the job titles so that your staff has somewhere to go and somewhere to grow, as well as allowing room to bring on other team members at various levels, without disrupting the commitment and loyalty of some of your original staff. Clear titles can eliminate unnecessary internal conflict.

Who are you? Who do you want to become? Who do you need in your life to help you get there?

Hallie pisses me off almost daily, but that is a good thing. If you don’t have someone you trust who is challenging your thinking and pushing you to be a better leader, then it’s probably not the right relationship.

Cultivate a culture of great questions and allow your team to push you and challenge your thinking. The vision might be crystal clear in your mind, but you’ve got to slow down long enough to explain your vision so that your team can put it into action.

As a leader, setting the direction and keeping your team focused is your job.

Read, journal, exercise, meditate, attend conferences, teach. Do whatever you need to do in order to grow and to keep making your world bigger so that your team and others continue to see you as a vehicle for their success.

Executive Assistants are the ultimate force multipliers and project managers. Their project just happens to be their Executive.

Executive Assistants are problem-solvers and fixers.

They are some of the most resourceful and connected individuals in your organization.

Executive Assistants are leaders, and seeing them as anything else is a complete underestimation of their ability and a disservice to the Executive and the company.

An Executive Assistant manages the people, details, timelines, etc., to make an idea come to life.

It is the EA’s job to ensure that promises made are promises kept.

Don’t forget, the art of the handwritten note is not dead! Incorporate handwritten notes into the correspondence with the Executive’s VIP list. It could be one of the most impactful ways to maximize the Executive’s reach and build relationships.

To really maximize the company’s reach, the EA should write thank-yous and general notes to vendors or, for example, to the concierge who went above and beyond to help book a massage for the Executive when he arrived at their hotel. The more relationships that the EA can form, the better; this will only help her help the Executive. You never know when a kind word or just knowing the name of the right person at a restaurant will come in handy. Provide value, expecting nothing in return, and it will be returned tenfold.

Executives, you must give up control in order to allow your EAs to shine. Believe me, you definitely can not do it better than a great Executive Assistant.

If you don’t give up control over every email, every meeting, every marketing piece, etc., then 1) You are the assistant and should not have made a hire in the first place, or 2) Your assistant will leave and find an Executive who will allow her to do her job and do it well!

By keeping your commitments, delivering projects before their deadlines, and keeping your boss and other stakeholders in the loop about the progress you’ve made on various projects, you are establishing yourself as a leader.

“Our work, our relationships, and our lives succeed or fail one conversation at a time. While no single conversation is guaranteed to transform a company, a relationship, or a life, any single conversation can.”

Just as discipline equals freedom, so, too, does structure equal freedom.

Do not keep your assistant on the periphery, assigning tasks that have no context or meaning. She will be far more invested in your success when she is a part of the entire process, and eventually part of the decision-making process or even making decisions on your behalf. When you bring your assistant into your inner circle, everyone wins.

Ask questions, be engaged. Be ready to lead and ready to follow. That means you must be incredibly resourceful and able to handle any task that is thrown your way, no matter how big or small. You must be confident in the fact that you don’t know everything, but you can figure anything out. Because you can. Knowledge is power.

Leading yourself means committing to growing, and committing to the accountability to get there. Leading yourself can be more challenging than leading others. Master this and you’ve set yourself up for success.

Influential, not positional, leadership is what truly separates great leaders from average leaders.

If you argue for your limits, you’re going to get them. Keep telling yourself you don’t have any time, and guess what, you won’t. Make the time. Be conscious of the language you use around time.

Making sure you and your Executive stick to your scheduled time together is so critical. That is, hands down, the most important meeting of the week for both of you. It sets the tone for your Executive, for you, and for the organization. Make sure you clearly understand that week’s three to five objectives, because they often change week to week, especially in a startup or high-growth company.

Once it’s in your calendar, as long as you honor your commitment to yourself and do the “big thing” when it’s scheduled in your calendar, your results will be inevitable.

Check your energy and alignment. This is all about mentally and emotionally preparing to bring your best self into the office on Monday. Is there anything bothering you that you need to work through? Do it. Maybe that means doing an extra meditation session or an intense workout, journaling, or calling a trusted mentor. Make sure you are ready to show up and do work on Monday.

Plan your vacations a year in advance and work between vacations so you always know when your next recovery time is.

Sometimes, it’s better to act than it is to wait on one more piece of information.

You’ll have to analyze your percentage and weigh where you are at. If you’re at 20 percent, you have to get more information. If you’re at 80 percent, then you may have waited too long. If you are between 40 and 70 percent, then you and your Executive will have to rely on your intuition. That is where the most effective leaders are born. Executive Assistants can get the team and information to between 40 and 70 percent and then turn it over to the Executive to pull the trigger.

Decision fatigue is real, and small, inconsequential decisions are easier to push off.

Remember, your Executive should not be part of planning meetings (that includes with you). He needs to make decisions, not plans. Help facilitate that process and you’ll be one step closer to that strategic business partnership.

Self-care essentials include sleep, exercise, good food, relationships, hobbies, community, and spirituality.

Burnout doesn’t happen from the number of hours worked or even from the intensity of the work. Burnout happens for several main reasons: When you are not growing. When you are out of alignment with your natural behavior. When you are not having success for an extended period of time.

In my opinion, the fastest road to burnout is if people are in a company that they love, but a role they hate. If your team isn’t aligned with the mission or vision of the company or their leader, then burnout will happen much, much faster.

Help your team members get wins that they can build on.

Employee burnout can have massive financial repercussions for your company in the form of costly mistakes, missed opportunities, or having a skilled employee leave.

Turns out, I am much better suited to being in a leadership position than being totally in the details all the time. I know we have talked about this before: yes, Executive Assistants are leaders too! However, with the size and the scope of our organization, it was becoming increasingly difficult to handle all the personal items and the day-to-day operational responsibilities, as well as to fulfill the strategic, growth-oriented responsibilities that were part of my role.

If EAs don’t align themselves with a leader with a strong vision who’s driven to succeed, it’s just not going to be the right fit for these top-level EAs.

What are you doing every day to cause others to want to be led by you? How are you increasing your leadership lid daily? If you don’t have a personal and professional development plan in place, create one (books, journaling, fitness routine, meditation, conferences, etc.). The level of talent you attract is going to be a direct reflection of what kind of leader you are. You must lead yourself first before anyone else will follow.

You want them to know what they are getting into. Better yet, you only want applicants who are down with your idiosyncrasies.

It’s all about alignment. You never have the wrong person. Just the wrong job for the person at the time.

EAs also have the unique challenge of having to lead without a title. They must lead up to their Executive and they must lead out to their colleagues, to business partners, and to the general public, all without a formal title or perceived authority. They must be able to lead through influence.

Are they working on college credits or a certification? Having a thirst for knowledge and a desire to grow is going to be critical for a successful EA/Entrepreneur match.

We’ve seen amazing EAs struggle and eventually leave because they want more growth and opportunity, while their Executive is content with the status quo.