A company secretary plays multiple roles in the company. They are the advisers, diplomats, educators, problem solvers, record keepers, and communicators on behalf of the company. Due to their expected and listed roles, they have a long list of responsibilities and are expected to perform at their best at all times. A successful secretary also has the role and responsibility of acting as a liaison between the company and its employees.
Achieving all these roles and becoming the best at what they do requires companies to adopt various strategies to optimize secretarial functions and benefits. These strategies should focus on boosting their skills, providing resources to optimize their roles, and utilizing them beyond their duties and roles.
With these strategies, companies will have the best secretaries and optimally benefit from them
- Technology Adoption
Technology advancements are critical for boosting and optimizing every aspect of corporate duties, and roles such as secretarial roles are changing due to technology. In some countries, people are already discussing the concept of digital corporate secretaries. Before digital secretaries replace current systems, organizations can use the system for duties to optimize secretarial work.
Technology has various benefits for company secretaries, such as helping them to ease their jobs. The corporate secretary has a long list of documents, especially legal ones. Through secretarial work automation, company secretaries can save on time and cost to shift all their attention to essential matters while reducing errors and risks. It lets them keep legal and organized documents and track paperwork such as meetings, filings, and other approval documentation.
Secretarial software is available for secretaries; however, modern software should integrate different technologies to boost secretarial jobs. One of the contents to include in the secretarial software is AI to help in planning, reminders, research, and other secretarial duties.
Top-notch company secretarial service providers rely on technologies such as reliable software for various needs such as research to advise their clients, paperwork filing, planning for clientele meetings, and other activities. The role of technology is to save time, boost organization, and ensure the secretaries are always ready for the following meetings and activities.
Modern technology should be a bulk source of information about various aspects such as compliance, regulatory standards, and practices. Using technology for secretarial work enables them to access all the compliance and regulatory documents. Once the system is integrated with AI, systems such as Chat GPT can help the secretary get specific legal and regulatory documentation concerning the current case.
One of the duties of a company secretary is to communicate with the board members and company management; hence they need technology to streamline the communication process. The platform should also be secure to protect the communication between the secretary and other management teams to ensure confidential information such as bankruptcy should remain a secret.
- Skills and Competency Strategies
A corporate secretary must be competent and stay updated about current corporate practices. Therefore, qualified secretaries must always acquire new skills to meet all their obligations and other duties. Being a secretary in the present century requires a vast knowledge base, and one must master all these skills through training and attending additional studies in various fields.
A good secretary should be an excellent verbal communicator meaning they should have all the necessary communication skills and principles. First, they should have the best listening, presentation, negotiation, and argumentative skills. Their roles involve interacting with different people such as regulators, board of management, and corporate partners; hence they should have the best communication skills to interact with these teams.
A good secretary should have the best writing skills since they write emails, agendas, schedules, memos, and other documents. With good communication skills, they can write convincing documents and error-free and reliable training and documents. Secretaries are also involved in presentations such as advisory services, defending their organizations, and other activities; hence public speaking will be ideal for learning.
Secretaries also handle various documents, including filings, regulations, company financials, etc. All these documents may be overwhelming, and the secretary should always know their contents and whereabouts. Therefore, they should have an organizational system for their files, and one of the systems to use is a computer system to ensure all the data are virtually accessible whenever needed.
Other skills to learn include attention to detail, especially when writing confidential documents such as filings, memos, and presentations to the company management team. These documents and content shared by secretaries have a significant role in the company and regulatory bodies hence the need for critical thinking to boost decisions making efficiency.
- Company Secretary’s Four Lines of Sight
Corporate secretaries have specific roles, and sometimes their roles tend to be limited based on job descriptions and what companies specify; however, they can offer more to the company. The company should expand its roles and duties in the organization to provide more. Such strategies include oversight roles, making them part of the company risk management team to avoid issues and activities that may lead to errors or legal matters. They can oversee regulatory and compliance issues to ensure the company has suitable systems to ensure compliance and avoid specific errors.
Secretaries are part of the board of management team, and the company can expect their roles by using them for insight needs. This involves giving them access to the company’s financial and competitive edge to get their opinion about issues related to the regulatory and external environment. Their insights can help the company to be more objective, strategic, and focused on their primary duties.
Thirdly, the company can use them for foresight duties and roles, which means using them as part of risk assessment to avoid uncertainties and specific risks. Since they interact much with the external regulatory environment, their insight into the company’s operation can help the company see future risks and make necessary changes fast.
Conclusion
Companies can benefit more from corporate secretaries by implementing strategies to optimize the secretary’s performance and duties. These strategies should focus on making secretarial jobs efficient, saving time and costs, and enabling secretaries to focus on critical matters. With these strategies, they become an integral part of the company to help with duties such as insights, oversight, and foresight.
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