What's the difference between an Executive Secretary & an Executive Assistant ?

Executive Secetary is the employee who will conduct all the necessary documents and file them in a very organized way and managing all futures events, plans and follow up process so that whenever the manager ask for some information or feedback s/he will be ready to provide to required document or information.

Executive Assistant is better because s/he is more engaged with the work flow, as s/he is already aware about what is going on at work and sometimes if the manager forget about something s/he will remind him about it, so to make it simple assistant is taking the initiaive and much more productive than secretary.

 

Executive secretaries are responsible for managing all the administrative formalities of management. They can be associated with one person, usually a director or executive, or, in small companies, serve all the executives. Executive secretaries need to be able to carry out all their managers' requests. Often considered the last barrier before the director's office, executive secretaries must act in accordance with the trust placed in them by the former. They are privy to confidential matters, but must be discreet at all times.   An executive assistant devotes his or her career to aiding a corporate official, usually by providing a combination of professional advice and administrative support. While the responsibilities associated with the work vary depending on the culture that prevails in a given company, there are a few basic tasks that all assistants perform. Most of these are related to secretarial work, scheduling, and contacts management. Many executives treat their assistants as their go-to people for ideas, recommendations, and confidential help, and they assist with everything from photocopying to press briefings.

Executive Assistant has more power and authority over the Execusitive Secretary. Executive Assistant can act on behalf of Director/Manager when not available. 

EXECUTIVE : one who has the executing power among others

 

Differentiate between:

             Director and Executive Director

            Director has the power, but the Executive Director has the final executing authority!

similarly; 

  Assistant and Executive Assistant

Personal Assistant  or simply ASSISTANT  is a common word for the one who assists (Everything from lighting cigarette to arrange movie tickets for boss) the CXO's ( Chairman, CEO, CFO etc) -  but the Executive Assistant ( EA) is the one who has decision making ability to handle the CXO's Office for running the office. Assisting the boss in his domain, whether sales, operation, etc; no limitation. Another nomenclature is Executive Aide – (also EA)

Similarly,

Personal Secretary or simply Secretary is a common word for the one who does secretarial work like drafting, business correspondence, organizing meeting and minutes, database of filing, retrieving of originals, itinerary management, public relation management, total productive maintenance of the appliances like fax machine etc; some conglomerate may have2 or more secretaries; in that only one will be the EXECUTIVE SECRETARY who knows how to execute things and have decision making capacity with sound personal judgment! 

Company Secretary  is completely different and an  higher position than Executive Assistant and Executive secretary, since the company secretary will take only board meeting minutes, assure legal compliance, corporate governance, share capital and securities etc;

Hierarchy

lower level

1. Assistant

2. Personal Assistant 

3. Secretary

3. Executive Assistant

4. Executive Secretary

5. Company  Secretary

 

 

the expectd duties of an assistant are more varied and demanding

Executive secretaries are responsible for managing all the administrative formalities of management. They can be associated with one person, usually a director or executive, or, in small companies, serve all the executives. Executive secretaries need to be able to carry out all their managers' requests. .  

 

An executive assistant devotes his or her career to aiding a corporate official, usually by providing a combination of professional advice and administrative support. While the responsibilities associated with the work vary depending on the culture that prevails in a given company, there are a few basic tasks that all assistants perform. Most of these are related to secretarial work, scheduling, and contacts management.

 

In an simple way,

Executive secretary ---> administrative work &

Executive assistance ----> technical work

An Executive Assistant can be defined as deputy of the person s/he is reporting to where as in case of Executive Secretary is more or less the job of a typical secretary albeit with bit more flexibility / space.

The Exicutive secretary is an employee who can manage the company documents and up to date files and when Manager aske about file , he can find out  a Special code in a simple way. The Exicutive assistant more powerfull than Exicutive secretary which can be  handover from exicutives and giving assistant to top level manager. 

I see the difference between them is the duties that each one has .but still the executive assistant has has many important task than the executive secretary

The company's department structure will be the basis for this... next is the job description.

Executive Secretary may also be the Executive Assistant but the assistant is more fitting to be referred as the Personal Assistant as well or Executive PA.

 

Therefore, we can't follow any hierarchy but mere literal meaning of the title itself what is fitting or not. But of course, if we talk of the title "manager", we all agree that "asst. manager" is lower (smiled).

 

For "secretary" titles, the "executive secretary" is higher since the word executive means he/she serves the executive office or management office of the company. And the "secretary" serves the mid-management office.

 

Hope this helps a lot!