Accuracy is the bedrock of secretarial courses – an example.

Secretarial courses must focus upon accuracy in every respect states Pitman Training Hammersmith .

Attention to detail pervades every aspect of a secretary’s role. For example, at Pitman Training in Hammersmith, the touch typing course emphasises accuracy above everything else. Usually, the secretary will focus on one thing: how many words they can type in a minute. However, a secretarial course at Pitman Training Hammersmith emphasises one important goal: accuracy. Develop accuracy first, speed later.

For example, if a secretarial course produces a secretary who can type extremely quickly but inaccurately the secretarial course will have been worthless. This is because the finalisation of the document has been deferred whilst corrections are made wasting both time and money.

So what can secretarial courses do to ensure a secretary makes less errors. The answer is simple: encourage, through their secretarial course, accuracy above speed. All secretary courses provide candidates with keyboard development drills so that accuracy and speed are developed.

The secretarial course can also encourage the secretary to proof read their work before returning it to the drafter. Further, secretary courses must continue to suggest strategies which the secretary can use so that interruptions, e.g. the phone ringing, do not result in typing errors.

Thankfully, secretary courses generally encourage accurate typing above speed to begin with. Once the student has built up their accuracy, speed is then developed.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course.

For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.

The modern secretary’s mantra: Always Achieve Accuracy even in a telephone message!

There is no doubt that accuracy in document production is one area which each secretarial course should encourage, mainly because, if achieved, it justifies the role of a secretary in an organisation. If the document is correct in the first instance, it can be finalised and sent and the drafter moves onto the next document.

In a previous article, the need for secretarial courses to focus upon accuracy during atouch typing course was highlighted. However, it is not just touch typing where accuracy is required. Each aspect of a secretary’s role requires accuracy.

An example of the importance of accuracy is demonstrated through the taking of a simple telephone message. Secretarial courses often emphasise the need for accuracy when taking a phone message. To record an accurate message, the secretary must ascertain and record accurately the key information from a telephone call. If this task is done correctly, the manager will be in a position to prioritise the message taken and the necessary action required.

A secretarial course or diploma encourages the use of a prescribed format when recording a telephone message. The popular secretary courses ensure that the future secretary ascertains and records the answers to the five W’s. For example, who the caller is, when the message is taken, what is the message, where the meeting is to take place and how the process/transaction is to work. Granted, not all of these will be relevant for each caller, but the secretary needs to follow this prescribed format for each call and use their discretion as and when required.

Often, a secretary states that the above is obvious or common sense, however, mistakes are still made in this area. Especially as the demands on secretary’s grow.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.

Accuracy – friend or foe of secretary courses?

Secretarial courses often focus on developing accuracy in touch typing courses and document production. However, whilst accuracy is a friend of secretarial courses, the quest for accuracy is only started during a secretarial course, as soon as the secretarial course is completed, the candidate must constantly seek to develop accuracy themselves. The learning process never stops.

Secretary courses often focus upon the key skills of proof reading a document before submission. The rational is obvious: proof reading leads to accuracy; it saves everyone time and contributes to a more efficient organisation and ultimately a more profitable one for everyone.

Proof reading strategies are numerous. Secretarial courses suggest a number of methods. However, if accuracy is to be achieved, secretary courses must encourage the use of tried and tested proofing strategies so that accuracy becomes the friend of a secretary and not their foe!

Strictly speaking, proof reading is about checking against an original document handed to the secretary. However, equally important are the ‘proofing’ strategies which a secretarial course teaches a secretary to use when checking a document, such as a letter, which is typed from an audio cassette.

Secretarial courses encourage, firstly, a dispassionate reading of the document. This means a slow reading of the document without any intonation or punctuation, without attributing meaning or taking account of sentence structure or punctuation. Each word is read with the same pace and emphasis as every other word. Some secretary courses even suggest reading a document backwards! Other common strategies include reading the document at a sound level audible only to the reader so that the ears proof the document as well as the eyes.

A secretarial course emphasises many such strategies. Ultimately, it is for the secretary to decide upon the strategy which produces the best result for them so that accuracy in document production does not become a secretary’s enemy but, instead, their friend.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.

Fact: key proofing strategies are an essential part of secretary courses. They encourage accuracy.

Previous articles by Pitman Training Hammersmith have focussed on proof reading strategies which secretary coursesoften teach so that documents are produced accurately. This article focuses upon how secretary courses teach proof reading strategies once amendments to the original document have been made.

Each secretarial course encourages a secretary to check that the document is legible to them. If the secretary cannot read the amendment the only option is to use square brackets with questions marks in bold or their best alternative highlighted in bold. Every effort must be made to make legible the illegible but uncertainties must be highlighted so that the drafter is clear about the illegible amendment.

Secondly, secretarial courses often suggest using a finger to track words on the original document against the document on screen.

Thirdly, reading the amended document on screen in a voice audible to the reader in appropriate chunks and switching eyes to the original and repeating the chunk from memory is a good strategy and is often emphasised by secretarial courses. However, with this strategy, the secretarial course provider often sounds a word of caution. Everyone has a different auditory as well as visual memory and it is essential the secretarial course provider encourages the secretary to read and digest small chunks not whole paragraphs in one go.

Fourthly, secretarial courses often suggest checking each word in the original with the word on screen. Once again, this must be done dispassionately and punctuation must be voiced not intonated. For example, when coming to a comma, it must be read as ‘comma’, not inferred with a pause.

These are some of the proof reading skills which each secretarial course provider suggests to aspiring secretaries during their secretarial course.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.

‘Secretaries don’t need to proof, technology will do it for them!’ Wrong!!!

Secretary courseshave started to highlight how the computer can check one document against another and illustrate all the amendments. Arguably, proofing is much easier to see when the changes are highlighted. For example, secretarial courses teach the use of ‘tracking’ in MS Office Word or refer to the sophisticated document comparison technology used by law firms. However, it is contended by Pitman Training Hammersmith that proofing strategies should not be left solely to technology in this way.

Secretarial courses often state that relying on such technology is dangerous because such technology is often only useful when there are limited versions of a document. Using such software continually on a number of versions often causes the document to become confused and muddled.

Therefore a secretarial course seeks to make candidates aware of a document comparison system such as MS Office Word ‘Tracking’ but, simultaneously, encourages the use of good proofing strategies.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.

How do you become a secretary?

This question is asked by many candidates who aspire to become a secretary. The answer is simple: undertaking a secretarial course, dedication and a constant desire to exceed your own expectations is often a good start.

Secretarial courses offer a good grounding in key secretarial skills. For example, at Pitman Training Hammersmith there is a full and detailed secretarial course which has a number of modules aimed at teaching exceptional secretarial skills. The benchmark is whether the candidate can actually start work and add value from day one.

Kathy Connolly, Principal of Pitman Training Hammersmith , states that the principle of added value is what counts. Can the candidate add value from the first minute in the role? If they can, the secretarial course has fulfilled its role of producing a competent secretary for the work place.

In terms of skills taught, there is an extraordinary array of skills which are often taken for granted by employers. These include a range of good English skills, exceptional IT skills and possibly shorthand too. With such a combination of skills it is obvious to see why so many secretaries find work immediately after completing their secretarial course.

Some secretaries map their career in stages. For example, some start working for a charity in a voluntary capacity or undertake temping work during or immediately after their secretarial course to acquire the relevant work experience for the CV. This group then go onto employment as a secretary and upgrade to become a legal or medical secretary or even a PA.

Others are fortunate to already be in a receptionist role and wish to acquire the key secretarial skills from a secretarial course to become a secretary within their current organisation.

Another group have high aspirations to become Executive PA’s. The completion of a secretarial course is one step towards that end goal.

As with every career path, what is important is to start with some skills training by doing a secretarial course and then move steadily into the field with which you have been trained but, and it is an important but, the skills required in the work place are constantly changing. Even once your goal has been reached, secretarial training is a continuous requirement in the modern world.

Mike Connolly has written many articles on secretarial courses and the skills required to be taught as part of a secretarial course For further details on the skills required to become a secretary look at the course outlines on the Pitman Training Hammersmith website.