Secretarial professionals and professional development through transformational and lifelong learning

Abstract

Secretarial professionals are people who provide secretarial support in businesses but the professionals are part of the workforce for which there has been little consideration or activity to ensure there is a career pathway or professional development opportunities. This negative attitude most often come from within the professionals resulting in lack of value of self and the role. Organizational attitude to professional development for secretarial professionals is also another notable barrier as shown by researches. The lack of required professional development by Secretarial professional has contributed to the perception that this type of work (provision of service) is largely considered non-professional or even unskilled. Though there are courses which prepare Secretarial professionals for employment into any organization, there may still be a knowledge gap due to the nature of their various roles more especially where the professionals were not exposed to a wide variety of learning experiences. This paper aims to explore how those knowledge gaps can best be filled through professional development or transformational and lifelong learning.