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Welcome to The Admin Avenues Podcast!
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Hello and welcome back to the Admin Avenues Podcast for season two.
We're very excited to announce that we have a new sponsor for season two, which is made box. And if you haven't heard about them, they're hampers curated from small batch Australian makers, including indigenous owned businesses and social enterprises, and made box offers a more thoughtful alternative to generic hampers designed for organizations that value, quality, impact, and ease.
, So today. Very special guest. We're back to our winners of the 2025 A O Awards and I have very special guest today. Lindsey Davies. Thank you for joining us.
Thank you, Candice. Great to be here
And we're gonna be chatting about innovation in action, redefining administrative excellence with Lindsey Davies of Atlassian.
so, Innovation isn't just for tech or product teams, even though you do work in tech, it's thriving right in the heart of the admin profession. So today's guest is proof of that.
She's the winner of the 2025 AOP Innovation in Administrative Excellence Award. , and Lindsay has reimagined the way her business operates, her business being Atlassian, she owns it. She's now. Third founder, uh, introducing smarter systems, streamlined processes, and new ways of working that make a real difference to efficiency, collaboration, and results.
So, Lindsay, welcome so much to the Admin Avenues podcast. I'm so glad you can join us. Uh, it must feel like a hundred years ago since we actually, uh, got to celebrate for the awards. But one of your, your moments when you came up. I remember as he walked up to the stage and I, I was just a crybaby that night and just kept flooding, tears of everything.
But I remember you came up the stairs, and you looked up and I just, my eyes just swelled up and you just gave me this look of like, I'm good, I'm good. And I was just like, go girl. And I could see Giselle just like pumping your arms in the back, like the, it was just such a beautiful moment. So does, does it feel like a hundred years ago now or does it feel, can you still, still live the moment?
Oh, thank you, Candice. I can still live the moment and there's, there's like. Maybe two moments that stick in my mind and they were so special. So I happened to be there with Giselle that you just mentioned. She was, she nominated me. , Giselle used to be my manager with, we still work at Sian together.
She's kind of like my unofficial coach and mentor I'd say. And then I had one of my teammates, Kelly, with me as well that day. And when the innovation award was being read out, I happened to be sitting in between Giselle and Kelly and both of them without talking, without telling me. They both grabbed a hand each.
And so I had both of them holding my hands as we,, got ready to, to hopefully hear my name or if not, probably give each other all a big hug. So that's one thing that really sticks in my mind. The, the love that I felt was, it was just beautiful. And then, , the other thing I can remember, like stepping up on stage.
That was exciting. And then after that it's a bit of a blur.
yeah, yeah. Can completely understand that. I completely understand that. I mean, it's just such a nice way to be recognized. Like we know that we do good work. We, you know, get compensated for it. Our managers re appreciate us, but to actually have a moment where. It's been recognized publicly recognized by the Australian Institute.
It's just such a nice feeling and I'm just so glad we've been able to bring back the awards to this, level and be able to bring back The glamor to it as well, like the, the, like, the fact that there were so many people that made such a big effort that night and it was so good to like, see everyone out of their work clothes and in like looking gorgeous and had wearing that dress, found a reason for wearing that dress.
And it was just so nice to see everyone. Everyone had such a good time and excited for everybody. Like nobody was upset on the night. Everyone was just like. Clapping and it was just
They were,
can't wait to do it again. Isn't that the message?
Yeah. Yeah. It was so special to be able to, to celebrate our work with each other and we all know how hard it is or how hard we work behind the scenes and how hard it is maybe to explain what we do or show the impact. So, um, there was also like a, a lot of love in, in that room that night.
It was, it was great to be part of it.
yeah. That's so lovely. So. Be recognized nationally for your innovation and administrative excellence. How does that feel to you? Like was it a surprise that you were nominated for that particular category or,
I think so, because I think sometimes innovation can sound like a, something really big and scary. It's like, oh, I'm not innovative, but, um. it felt amazing that I got recognized and I got recognized by my previous manager. I mean, not, not many people can say that, that they, they still have their manager, looking out for them and their best interest even when they're, they're not officially like, you know, um, in, in their care anymore.
So, I feel hugely thankful to Giselle for just keeping her eye open and looking for ways , to help me get recognized.
So what does innovation mean to you in the context of the admin or the executive support space?
So I think that, I don't think you have to necessarily invent something groundbreaking. It, it's, it sounds, a big word, a big scary word, but I think in a support role, it, it doesn't need to be that way. And, and I don't wake up trying to innovate every day, but, , I do notice. When I'm at work, if something feels clunky or harder than it should, and I suppose then I start thinking about why does it feel like this way and how can it be better?
And also if, if I'm feeling this way about something, a, a process or, I know a tool, then, then maybe others are feeling that same way too. And so then I suppose I'm thinking, is there something I can do about improving it? So that's where it begins for me.
Yeah. Was there a particular challenge or a frustration that sparked your drive to find these doing things? I know that Atlas does breed a culture of. Trying things, failing in things and trying again, I think you have a director of failings or something, isn't it? is that Steven Bartlett
that could be Steven Bar.
of, of trying different things and failing in it to, realize like you have to fail
several times at things to get
Yes.
take away this, the scary aspect that we, we, we think about failing, especially as EAs Oh my word. We don't wanna fail. We wanna be perfect all the time. And we, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to, to make it right. so I don't think there was, like, there wasn't a particular dramatic moment that I remember .
That suddenly made me look at things differently, but I, I think maybe it's more like a mix of different things. So I do
I was,
Yeah.
yeah, I was always one of those people as well. That was like, if we, if we can find a better way of doing it or we can
Hmm.
You know, we obviously didn't have AI back then, but like, if we can find a way that can do things better, like why wouldn't we? Like when, when Excel came out and it could do the formulas for it, you weren't like, no, no, I'm gonna sit here and do it longhand.
Like, of course you wanna find ways that can save us time and whatnot. But I remember just getting a lot of like pushback on, on a lot of things. Like, no, this is the way we do it.
Hmm.
I understand Atlassian doesn't breed that culture. They're, they're like, try it, see what happens.
That's right. You'd probably be, you'd probably be encouraged to, to. Not keep that kind of, um, that way of thinking because all around us, people are trying to do their, their best work, but we also need to move quickly. So we, we don't want to hold up progress by being too slow. And if we make a mistake, then, then that's okay because it's a way of, of learning and then moving on.
And that probably become, that might happen more because we're a technology company, so. Even though I am an EA within a technology company, there's still some of, , I suppose the technology processes that we bring into our work. So we might, for example, we, I've started doing retros, now retros happen in engineering teams, and there'll probably be a, a lot more of a in-depth process than what we do.
A retro in our EA teams can just be a matter of asking some questions. You know, what worked well, what do we want to do better next time? And so it's just all the time getting feedback and trying to do better.
Yeah. That's really cool. It often starts small. So do you, have you had anything where you've had a process for designing and testing these kind of new approaches?
Like, one of the things I love about Atlassian EA is, Darren was, telling me about how you guys do your feedback and your, your kind of review System, and, it was just so comprehensive and evolving and I just loved it. I was just like, I, I reckon I got five minutes where they sat down and said, yeah, you're doing a good job.
Keep going.
Yeah.
Whereas you guys seem to have just such a great way of being able to. I know I get the wider group to also contribute with it, but for you to also, I don't know, it's, I know you can't speak all about what, what it is with Atlassian, but I just felt like that was really innovative of the way that they have for you to show your best self in how you're doing your role.
Because they're all such, you are all EAs in the tech world, but you all do very different roles.
Yeah. Yeah, you are. Right. And I suppose it's the same in other companies as well as in we, we all have EAs, we have our leaders, but we're doing different things., I think what makes Atlassian different for me is that.
They don't necessarily treat EAs differently to any other role in the company. And in my last company, I did get treated differently.
I was in the admin part of the company and so therefore I wasn't eligible for, I'd know certain benefits or a proper review and things like that. And that doesn't happen. Atlassian, everyone goes through the, the formal. Perform annual performance review, and we all have to write a self-assessment. And we, they want you to ask for feedback.
That's the only way we can get better and grow. It's hard to spot our own gaps, but, hopefully other people can, and,, we get training on how to give feedback to make it useful. But yeah. It's something we're all part of, and there's definitely a, a team culture, not only just in our EA org, but across the company as well.
We're all there to help each other get better.
How. Leadership. Leadership, especially like if you wanna make a change in anything really, like time, budget, shifting, old habits, anything like that. Is there is, is there quite a good communication line to be able to say, yep, I wanna try this. Give me a whirl.
Yes, I think definitely at, certainly Atlassian, they, they want to promote and encourage people to share an idea and if you want to get involved in something, then put, put up your hand and, reach out to someone and, and say, you know, you're interested. I think for me, When I'm hoping to get other people's buy-in or input into an idea, then I, I really value understanding the why behind things.
And I try and weave that in, into how I work, especially when needing help from others, which is, most of the time when you're an EA you can't do a lot on your own. So, there was one piece of, work, , an idea I had, that needed like 12 different EAs, , help that I needed answers about their leaders.
And I didn't have those answers myself. And so when I introduced the idea, I didn't just share an idea and talk about it. I. I had an idea for a, a new page to collate and explain what our CTO's leadership team did because when I first joined the CTO's team, I couldn't understand anything about his, leaders or what their roles did or were responsible for, and that's
What all the acronyms are.
that's right. There's so many acronyms or just team names I hadn't, hadn't heard of before. And so that made me think, oh, if I'm feeling that way, maybe others are too. So I did some detective work. I talked to some of , the EAs and they were really knowledgeable about their own leader and that space they worked in, but they didn't necessarily know about what their EA teammates did or what those leaders did.
And so I suppose that's where I saw the opportunity to create something that us as EAs could fill a, a knowledge gap. We could start learning about what each other's leaders did, and that would also help future EAs when they came to start in our org. But then I could also get excited about the bigger picture,
if it could help us, then it could also help nearly anyone else in engineering or even anyone else in the company that was interested in, in who these senior leaders were and what they did.
So I suppose I tested the idea first. I asked a couple of managers if they thought this was something we could, we could work on because it was gonna take extra time. We're all busy. We, we've got full roles all the time. But if we're gonna try and. Make this project happen, then it's gonna take a bit more extra work. So made sure that management could see the benefit, and then when they could, and I got their buy-in, then the next step was to talk to the EAs and pitch my idea to them. And so. I'm a big fan of visuals and showing something, not just, you know, talking about it. So, , one of the Atlassian tools that I used is called Loom. And now that lets you, , record your screen, but then also. Talk about what you are sharing and what people are seeing on your screen. So I recorded my Loom and I had created a bit of a template so people could see or get in an idea, a bit of a flavor, what I had in mind.
And then I talked through my idea so they could see the page and then hear my voice and probably hear my excitement too. And that was me pitching the idea and saying, this is how it could help us, but help others. You know? Are you, are you up for having a go? That's how it started.
And did you hit any roadblocks along the way where people were like, nah, this is dumb, or, I don't wanna do it, or, this isn't necessary, where you were like, Hmm.
Yeah, I was lucky.
Yeah, I was lucky everyone was on board straight away.
That's
but the biggest, the biggest challenge is time and how long it takes. And when you have an idea, you're like, Ooh, this is gonna be done in a couple of weeks. And it doesn't work that way. So, um, I mean, it probably took about three months, all in all, and this was.
Extra work that I was asking, you know, 12 EAs to do on top of their already full roles. And so during that time we had, say, team members on holiday or one EA even left the company during the project. So momentum slowed at different stages. And I kind of overcame those challenges just by lots of encouragement.
I would share out a weekly update to show people how the page was, was forming and coming along. And then each time an EA completed their leader section, then I shared about it on Slack channel and gave them a shout out. So lots of positive encouragement. And I suppose kind of then That also meant there was a bit of, I suppose, gentle reinforcement and encouragement because those EAs that hadn't done it, they knew it was still outstanding and we knew we'd all agreed to it.
So that helped it kind of put friendly pressure on all of us. Accountability Yes. To, to, let's get this finished and done.
Yeah, do, do you feel like there was a measurable impact, like something where you can say, Hey, this has now saved a huge amount of time and efficiency's gained, we've improved the team experience. Like do you feel like you were able to kind of show an ROI off that?
Yeah, I feel that we could, and that was what was gonna be exciting as well, when we were first thinking about the idea that we, we would be able to see if it had impact. So we knew it could sit in our EA space and that the EAs would all benefit from it. But to really get big impact, I decided I wanted it on the company-wide onboarding template.
So, and that was for all senior leaders.
Yeah.
So, so to get there, there was probably a few steps in between. So I made sure I shared the page with several of our engineering HR business partners, and they loved it. And none of them were new, but all of them still found it really helpful. So once they had them on board, it was then, uh, an easier step to ask them.
Okay, then can we get it linked into the onboarding template to help all others?
So by that point, it was pretty easy because the the page was created. They could see the visual, they could immediately see how helpful it was gonna be. So,
someone like me, I am a visual person. I don't take in people talking to me. I don't, I have to see it.
Mm.
To, for my brain to compute what it is like. , That's why I'm old school with writing with a pen and paper because if I can see what I'm writing, it goes in better.
Yeah, I do love a
when you're dealing with people, there's like a picture.
This is this person, this is who you speak to. Like, especially for newbies, like that'd just be so helpful.
So helpful, EV We had pictures, we had,, information about the leader. We had maybe a podcast or, a video or a Zoom recording that they'd been on to really help, you know, bring all this information and, and these teams to life. And
so good.
Thank you. So the page, you know, exists and if I, I just checked the number the other day.
We have 500 unique views on the Confluence page, but then we've got, actually, yeah, it's amazing. But then we've got 1500 total views, so that shows how many times people are coming back to the page to check things, and those numbers make me really happy. Yeah. It just shows that the impact we're having across so many people.
Yep. And that just came from how do we make this better? This has not been a great experience for me. How
can I make it better for someone else?
yeah, I don't understand it and I, I need, and that doesn't make me feel good. And so how can we, how can we fix this?
And as you say, innovation or innovator, people go, oh, you have to be like a Einstein. No, you just said you'd have the mindset of someone who had a frustration, and that is like, there's gotta be a better way of doing this. So brings me to the next part, which is the mindset of an innovator. You. Many people associate innovation with tech, obviously.
But it really is about mindset. How do you stay curious? How do you spot opportunities? Where are you seeing room for improvement? you know, What advice would you give to people? Particularly, obviously I've been professionals who wanna innovate but don't feel empowered to make change.
Hmm. That's good. I think maybe there's two, two parts to that. If I'm. I think about how I stay curious, then for me it's about building habits and small habits and they build up over time. If I give you an example, one of my favorite podcasts is called Squiggly Careers.
And it gives career advice. And one idea I love from them is keeping a to think list. So as an ea I have a very long to-do list, but I also keep a separate notepad just for thinking. So when I have an idea, I don't forget about it. So that's something that I do. I keep it just next to my desk, something pops in, I'll write it down and come back to it another time.
And then another idea that the squiggly careers give
and a phrase they like to encourage is borrowing someone's brilliance. And I love that concept. It means we don't have to, yeah, we don't have to be brilliant ourselves, but we are gonna see brilliance in other things and in other people. And so I pay attention to. , In meetings, you know, on Slack messages, on Confluence pages.
How is what the information they're giving me, how does it make me feel? Does it energize me? Do I want to bring some of that into the work that I do and into like my own working style?
So. That's how I stay curious. Oh, and I read a lot of books about work and the communication and I try out like little, small adjustments and in my work and, and see how they land.
Sometimes they're good and then sometimes they're not. But it's just about testing. Yeah.
It's, it's trial and error, seeing what works, what doesn't, what's. Making progress, what stalled? Like, I, I really don't like the stunted mentality or being told apart from being told no, which I'm really not good at being told,, is this is how we do it,
this And it must be so,
yeah, it must be so frustrating to hear that. And I, I
can, it, it will be in lots of workplaces and, and I've had it too. And I think maybe as I've got a bit older, I'm a little bit more. Confident or able to try other things. So sometimes, I suppose when we are here, no,
Yeah.
can feel like, well that's, that's one door closed.
You know, I can't possibly do anything now because they've said no. But I would ask people to maybe think about something that they can change. Maybe don't start with something big, start with something small that. You can change that you own, that you have power over. So let's even just say it's one-on-one that you have with a teammate.
Just try something different next time. I think I would say start small and then notice what feels good when you start changing things and ask for feedback, and then build your confidence from there. And then over time you might feel brave enough to ask your leader about changing something a bit bigger, but by that point, you've already done it two or three or four times with other people so that you know what's gonna work and what and what isn't.
That's great advice. Really good advice, especially for people starting out that just don't have that confidence to jump in. Feel like they're disrupting. Just do little changes, little bits, see how you go. And then trial. Trial as you get more brave with things and also more opportunities to do things, you know, you don't need to start a new job and be like, right, I'm doing it this way.
You know? You find
Please definitely don't do that.
Yeah.
We have something, something at Atlassian we call lots of new starters. Um, even EAs we, we, we would encourage a listening tour we call it. So get to know what's, what's already happening and what may be other frustrations are out there and what people may be doing already. To fix things. ' cause that's another thing.
You don't wanna start fixing something that's already on someone else's radar. So, um, if you're new to somewhere, I'd, I'd definitely encourage doing a listening tour, getting to know people and getting to know what works and what doesn't. And then building, building from there.
That's a great idea. 'cause then you might hear, hear of something that you can even just join. You don't have to do the project yourself. Like if you hear they're doing a update of the intranet, you could be like, oh, could I possibly get involved with something like that?
Yeah, that's great
to lead the project.
You can
You don't have
of something.
That's it. And I think that's a great
I love that idea.
as well. Being a team member, seeing how someone else does it. They might not do it perfectly, but that's giving you information and data that I would probably do it differently so that when, when, and if you do get a chance to lead a project, you've already got some ideas of how you want to approach it.
And it's okay to have different ideas on things. Not everyone's gonna agree with you. Not everyone's gonna be on board with things, but if you can articulate what it is that you're trying to do and the reason for it, and the ROI for it, people are gonna listen.
Most definitely. Yeah. And that's,
So how do you.
thing.
Yeah, it's because there's so, like the possibilities are endless, particularly in this new space we're working into. Like so many people are trialing new bits on AI and they're like, oh, I just did this with my home email, and it's been amazing. You know, we can. Do this, do that, or I can get it to summarize this.
And depending on what platforms you lose use and they bring it into their workplace and they're like, try this. Someone else will try it. And they're like, oh, that's amazing. Let's just cut down this. And there's just so many hacks and saves and stuff that people are sharing now that I'm like, we need to just like have a EA file on the AI inter web
Yeah.
to say, what are all your hacks, everyone?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, most definitely. And then I, something that we do at Atlassian, and I, I hope other EA teams do it as well, we just try to share all the time what we're when, when we have a win. And it can feel uncomfortable and you can feel like, oh, I don't want to share, or I might be sharing something everyone already knows.
But it's likely that one person doesn't know this thing that you've done. And so I'd really, that's another way to, to help the innovation, is to have a small win and share it, and then start encouraging that amongst each other.
That's such a great idea. That's a really good idea . Do you have, you work off Slack, don't you?
We do, your main, you're not email driven, you're,
No, in my previous company we were all about emails and telephone calls and moving to Atlassian is very different. Yeah. All about Slack
So you have like an EA channel.
Yeah, lots of them. So we have like our main team channel where we might ask questions or we need help from each other, or we might also share some information that we think is gonna help.
Someone each other, help each other. And then we have like our social channels where we're just messing around and sharing funny pictures and things.
Love that.
there's more, there's even more channels after that.
Excellent. But it makes it so much easier to be able to dip in and out of that. Like I, I thought if I could ban email, I would like, just as you clear an email, it just seems to pop up again. Just like, where does that go? What is that? Ugh, I can't wait for the day. When we're not, we don't email anymore. It's, it's not gonna be in my lifetime, but you know. How do you balance being quite a detailed orientated and process driven person? Obviously a lot of EAs are with still leaving room for your creativity and experimentation.
Hmm. I think, I think firstly, like if you'd asked me a few years ago if I was creative, I'd have said, no way. I, I would've associated creativity with artistic talent. But my definition has definitely changed over the years. And so when I think about creativity, I think it's looking at something with fresh eyes and being curious and not asking yourself if this thing is perfect, but more, could it be better?
And, and what would that look like if it was better?
And I don't necessarily think detailed oriented and creativity have to be opposites. They sound like they should be, but I think
the structure gives me the framework to build around and then within that I can start experimenting.
Yeah.
But don't get me wrong, I do love details and it is my happy place, but I do have to remember as an ea not everyone feels the same way, and I don't always have to share all the details all the time.
So there's a balance there.
Creativity. You are, you are a creative person. I would've said, no, I'm not, because I'm so detail orientated. I'm a control freak. I'm all about lists. And, and, but I, how it kind of flipped the switch in my mind was, I was watching my nephew, he's studying, engineering and he's all numbers, like he's, he brain works in numbers.
He looks at things that he can solve, math equations like nobody's business. But when he looks at something, his creative brain. Goes into how did that, how was that made? did you do that? And he will just look at it or pull it apart and figure out how it was made and how, how it works. I was like, well, that's creative.
you're allowed to be a numbers person and detail oriented, and I really hope engineers are. But you're also able to look at things and be like, well, how did that work? And how did that get in there? How did that fit? And I was like, okay, maybe I can be as well because. I've created this event space and podcast space out of nothing and nowhere.
But yet I can still be the detail orientated task master that I am,
Yeah, and I love that. And, and it's amazing to have like both skills and know when to use which hat. And so I guess at the start, you, you are being creative when you were thinking about what the podcast might look like or the feel of it or the kind of people you wanted on it. And then once you've got that settled in your mind, then you can then start digging into to all those details.
Yeah, I just think there's a big, there's a big, as we just said before, the word innovation, the word creativity, we put so much on it. That is what we expect it should have to deliver, but they're actually very. Fluid words on, on where it sits as to what it can be. I say don't be afraid of these words.
Don't be afraid of, especially when the, nominations open for the AR awards for 2026. Uh, don't be afraid to be looking at these titles on the awards and thinking, oh, but I'm not like that. You, you are, you absolutely are. And you should be looking at, at ways to celebrate these kind of skill sets. So your innovation. Do you think it's changed the way your team collaborates and communicates? Like, do you feel like it's a, since you've done things like that, people feel more open to do kind of project? Well.
Yeah, I definitely do. And I think over the last year I've had the opportunity to lead several EA projects and. I think having my EA team members see how I lead those kind of meetings, that's really helped. So when I, when I decided that I wanted to lead a couple of different projects and I, it was suddenly like up to me to make sure those meetings ran smoothly and they had goals and we had momentum and we were going places, then I also had to.
I also realized I needed to learn how to design and facilitate brainstorming sessions properly because I had never done that before.
Mm-hmm.
So I watched a lot of YouTube videos and I read a lot of facilitation guides and I started experimenting with ideas with, with my friends at work and. And asking for feedback.
And then with the projects, I chose Confluence whiteboard as the tool to run our brainstorming sessions. And I think that really shifted the dynamic because lots of EAs don't like talking in front of each other or they get a little bit nervous, or even just bringing in a brainstorming meeting is not something that we usually do together.
So by using a tool that we could all collaborate on at the same time and interact with, but we didn't necessarily have to talk. I mean, you can, but you don't have to. Then, then that kind of really built up people's confidence in using those tools and seeing the value that you can get out of them. And so from these projects, Some of their team members recorded their first looms or created their first Confluence whiteboards because of these projects they were in and just building up confidence about using our own tools. So that, that makes me really proud.
Yeah, and great way for them to learn products made by Atlassian as well.
Yes, For those that dunno what Confluence is, what's your, what would you say? What's the easiest way to describe it?
I think we, I think Atlassian, we might use it more intensely than other people. I would say it's Confluence is where all the company information about anything lives. And you can spin up a page, that's the phrase we'd use, will pop it on a page or spin up a page and you create a page with the information you want to share.
And then you can decide who sees it. There's permission, there's, uh, settings around permissions, so you can decide if it's just like an EA group or if it's the whole company that's gonna have access to this page. But what's amazing is like just that knowledge can live on. you've probably been in companies I have where you've started and you made sure you talked to the person that had been there the longest.
'cause they knew all the information, they knew how things were done. Suddenly when it's on Confluence, you can search for things. So. It doesn't matter that my onboarding didn't happen in an office. We're a distributed company. I work from home. I can find out most information I need to by just searching Confluence and digging around and working out myself, what's happened previously, or how we might approach things.
So it's, it's, it's a pretty amazing tool too.
Yeah.
Be sharing information and learning from each other.
I, I love the idea of that e ease of finding things, uh, bring it on. If I can just type in something and it can pop up, winning, don't try, don't have me trudging through files and trying to find things. It's just, oh, those days are over. Um. Oh yeah. And the beauty of it is people have to do it online because you are a virtual business.
Like you can't say, oh, I've left it in the filing cabinet at work. It's like, Nope, you've gotta
Yeah, that's
tech and you've all gotta use it. And it, it's for the best. It's,
Mm.
I know so many people that are still like, no, no, I have my files here. And it's like, why? Why wouldn't you put in the cloud? You can access it from anywhere.
It's just.
Yes, most definitely. It's again, about just encouraging, like sharing of information. We, we, we, um, by default, we, we want pages to be open so therefore other people can, can learn from that or take inspiration from it. And we're a distributed company, you know, we're worldwide, so.
Yeah,
When I'm asleep, I want someone to be able to use a page that I've created and, and unblock them, and that's, that's what's so great about having that kind of information just available.
They're not waiting for you to wake up. They can find that like, you know, if they're based on the other side of the world, easy,
right. And what's also great is you can, you can collaborate on a page together. So just because I've created it doesn't mean other people. If I allow them, they can edit the page, they can add comments on the page. So that's what's really cool as well, that it, it's, once it's created, it's not fixed.
It can keep evolving.
Live. how do you continue to nurture that innovation? In the EA groups, do you try and like be like, okay now your turn or what have you done this week? Or try and like nurture that with people who are maybe a little less prone to. Telling their wins or saying what they've done or showing something, they might have a new process they might have built or something.
Yeah, we it's something that falls on your shoulders to, to try and bring that out of people and encourage them?
if I can, , but with gentle encouragement, let's say I am, I still, if I have a win, I'll share it in our channel and my hope is that by doing that, it maybe give someone else the confidence to share a win themselves.
Yep.
But also I think that it's about, you know, when you're chatting to people, really listening to, to what, what they're saying and are they complaining about something?
Is, is something not working that they wish it was? And, and if they are, then it's maybe giving them some encouragement to, you know, is that something they want to look into a bit more? I'll give you an example. Like I was chatting to an EA recently who was feeling a bit low and a bit disconnected from her teammates, and she'd said that she hoped there might be a regional catch up soon.
And so I asked her, you know, if you are feeling that way, maybe others are feeling the same way too. And, and they're wondering, well, I wonder when we're gonna have our regional catch up. And so I, I asked her how, what about if you started that conversation and you asked the question, you know, is anyone else up for, for meeting?
And and she did. And she felt so much better for taking the first step. So sometimes I just think it's about that. It's about listening to what. People are saying and, and giving them some confidence to, to take the first steps. one of our company values is be the change you seek and it's my favorite value.
Yeah.
So I think, you know, nurturing innovation can be about helping other people realize that, that they can be the change themselves. They don't have to wait.
Yeah, I really like that because you could have just taken that and been like, oh, okay, I'll start an email. But instead, you push the owners back on them and said, how about you do it? How about you bring it up? And that's gonna give them confidence next time to be able to do something like that.
Yeah. I hope so. Mm-hmm.
Yeah. You know, you start scared, but then you're empowered to do things and then you're like, oh, okay, that wasn't too scary and no one bit my head off.
That's right.
something else.
Yeah. Three people have replied they'd love a catch up and it, and it just, and it goes from there. Yeah.
Yeah. So what are you personally excited to explore next? You working on any new systems or tools on.
Well, it probably won't be a surprise, but I, I think it's all about ai and so for me, I just wanna keep getting better and refining how I use ai. And I'm trying to get my prompting really good so it doesn't take six attempts for me to get the answer that I wanted, first of all. So I, I think AI is an incredible opportunity, as in to help us grow and learn.
Like as a EAs we don't always get to attend lots of meetings or. See how our leaders perform in meetings or even just learn from others. Sometimes you're, that that's all happening in a different room without you, and so I think AI just gives us so much access to information and knowledge that we've, we've never had before.
Like if you want to improve something, AI can help you with that. Or if you want to come up with 10 different ways that you can use an icebreaker in a meeting, then AI can help you and you can learn from that. And so that, that's for me, that's what gives us a great opportunity. Learning new skills and then putting them into practice and testing them out
Sharing as you said,
you know, this is what I did. We had a, we had a offsite, we needed these icebreakers. I put in this prompt, it came out with some very specific prompts of what, what we needed. You know, try it for your next. Offsite, like sharing that kind of information. 'cause you sometimes you just don't even think of that.
You're like, oh, I'll just think off the top of my head. Um, oh, 10 things. It's like, why, why I spend the time thinking about that? Just pop it into ai. Get them to do it.
That's right. That's right. And if you ask for lots, if you ask for 10, then it's probably gonna be at least five of them that might spark an idea. They're not in you about what would work and what wouldn't.
Yeah. It's I love ai. I, I'm not scared by AI at all. I'm like, bring it. think it is such an incredible helper
Mm. Most definitely. Yes. It's like, I kind of think of it as my, my buddy at work, especially from working from home. It can get a bit lonely and I know, I can remember being in the office and wanting to wander around to someone's desk and have a chat and talk something through, . I can kind of do that on Slack, but also I could test out my idea or, you know, my problem with AI first and, and get a first step on, on where I could go with that idea or that, that situation.
Yeah, and it doesn't matter. Even when you have these, uh, brain ping at nine 30 at night, you can ask it. There is no.
Yeah.
Now let's talk about my holiday.
At all is
Nope. Yep. Which is absolutely great for people like me who are just like, , and sometimes I find it says, yes, we talked about this earlier. I'm like, oh, did we, oh, bring back those notes. What do we agree on?
Yeah.
Um, I ask others. . The power of innovation and shaping their careers and workplaces.
Hmm. I'd say that if there's something that feels tricky or hard or you don't like how it works, then pop it down on your to think list maybe don't try and fix it straight away, just. Think about it, just maybe give yourself 10 minutes a day to think this thing through a bit more.
That's the creative side. And then as you think about it more and start to form an idea on, on how it could be better or how it can be improved, then that's when you can bring in the details part of it. But I'd say notice how it feels. And why work out why it feels that way and what you think would be better.
And I say that innovation doesn't have to start with a really big solution.
No. can start just by paying attention to the things that are around us and you wanting to make an improvement.
Yes, yes, yes, yes. It does not have, that's, that's the biggest thing is people think there needs to be a, a big win or a big. Or no, it can be just making a process better. It could just be doing a cost saving. It could be something that just makes your life easier. Like
Yeah, most have to be a big thing. It can just be helpful.
That's right. Yeah.
Love that. Love that. Well, Lindsay, thank you so much for showing that innovation isn't just about tools or tech or anything like that. It's about vision, courage, and the willingness to challenge the way things have always been done, no matter how big or small. And there's some really good tips there for people to just trial, just to get their confidence up in those kind of things.
So thank you for sharing that. I'm also gonna put the Squiggly Careers podcast, if that, if that's what it's called.
That's the one.
I'll put that in the show notes as well, so people can also have a little looksie at that. Any book recommendations , that you read that you said you'd been reading
Candace, so many, and I, I too many lots. I, and I love a book that gives me practical information. I'm not, I'm not good with just random ideas or, or I'm not good with big ideas. I just want specifics. So, , let me give you three afterwards that I'll link to that. One's about Zoom meetings, and I thought I knew a lot about Zoom meetings working in a distributed company.
And this, this book is amazing. And there's a couple of others and I'll, I'll send you those links afterwards. My current
We'll put them in the links as well. We always love a book recommendation, even if it's nothing to do with admin or nothing to do. We just love a good book recommendation. So congratulations again on being named. 2025 aop Innovation in Administrative Excellence Award winner, uh, was so wonderful to be able to showcase what you've been doing and, and be able to be there on the night when you won, but it's also just like helping redefine what's possible for admin professionals everywhere.
So thank you so much for your involvement with them. We really hope that you can be part of the future of, of pushing people to, and,. Self nominate. As someone who's one, you know, you, you know how easy it can be. , So we really hope that we can get more people feeling like they fit in these categories.
'cause as you said, sometimes people look at these words and go, oh, this is big title and it really doesn't need to be. So, um, to learn more about Lindsay and connect with her, we'll put her LinkedIn on, uh, the show notes as well. But stay tuned for more stories of our aop, uh, winners from 2025 and, uh, other special guests that we have coming up for season two in the Advent Avenues podcast.
But as always, if you have any recommendations, if you have any suggestions, please reach out. We always love to hear from our listeners. So Lindsay. Thank you again for joining us today. It's been an absolute pleasure. , Any last, words of encouragement? Anything for our listeners?
I'd encourage everyone to be the change you seek.
Wonderful. Thank you so much for joining us, and we can't wait to see you at some of our events. We've got our Admin Professionals Day event coming up our lunch on the 1st of May, and then we also have the conference that's gonna be coming up again, , in September and October. We're still, we're battling it out with two venues , on who's gonna host hostess this year.
But, uh, hopefully we'll see you there again for that one. But yeah, we've got some exciting things ahead for
admin this,
year. So you work in admin, you
need to be connected. You
need to be knowing what's going on. It's gonna be fun. Alright, well thank you again. Hope you have a wonderful weekend ahead.
It's a Friday that we are recording. , And we will talk To you soon.