Two major reports dropped in April 2026 that every Force Multiplier, Executive Assistant, and administrative professional needs to read — and every Founder, leader, and HR professional who works alongside one should pay attention to as well.
The Global Skills Matrix 2026 from the World Administrators Alliance and The 2026 State of the Administrative Profession Report from the American Society of Administrative Professionals paint a very clear, very compelling (and honestly, a little uncomfortable) picture of where the profession stands right now. And I’m here to break it all down for you.
Let’s get into it.
The Role Has Changed. The Way We Talk About It Hasn’t.
For years — decades, actually — administrative work has been described as a “support function.” Listen, I’ve done it too! And while that framing may have made sense in a previous era, the Global Skills Matrix 2026 is here to formally retire that narrative.
The most consistent finding in the Global Skills Matrix isn’t that administrative professionals lack capability. It’s that there has been a systemic misunderstanding of what the role actually is.
Here’s what modern administrative capability now routinely encompasses:
- Workflow orchestration across functions
- Executive time management
- Project and operations management
- Governance documentation and preparation
- Digital and AI integration
- Early-stage risk identification
- Cross-functional priority alignment
These are not peripheral activities. They influence organizational stability and decision sequencing. Full stop.
But here’s what I think gets missed most often in that list: Executive Assistants and Force Multipliers are the connective tissue between strategy and execution. They sit at the intersection of leadership and the team — translating the vision, priorities, and decisions coming from the top into coordinated, implementable action on the ground. Without that translation layer, strategy stays in the boardroom. It doesn’t actually move.
The Global Skills Matrix 2026 reframes administrative contribution not as assistance to leadership — but as capability embedded within leadership systems. That’s a big shift. And it’s one that’s long overdue.
After all, administration is a core business function. The work you are doing not only multiplies the impact of your Executive, but drives decisions, projects, and outcomes for the entire organization.
Many people earn a degree in Business Administration, yet there’s rarely a job title called “Business Administrator.” Instead, we see CEOs, Office Managers, Executive Assistants, Directors of Communication, Chiefs of Staff, Human Resource Managers, and more take on the responsibilities of business administration – roles that require strategic thinking, resource management, communication, and organizational leadership.
Force Multipliers live in this space every day. They impact leaders (and companies) by managing priorities, communicating vision, overseeing cross-functional work, and driving initiatives forward.
Administrative professionals align people, processes, and priorities so that leaders can lead, teams can thrive, and the company can scale. They manage the internal mechanics that keep the business running smoothly – from communication and planning to culture and strategy.
As routine tasks become automated, the value of the role increasingly shifts toward interpretation, prioritization, sequencing, alignment, and risk awareness. The report puts it plainly: where this capability is clearly structured and aligned, executive performance improves and organizational stability increases. Where it remains informally defined, contribution is misclassified and leverage is reduced.
Read that again if you need to.
This Is Core Infrastructure. Not a Support Function.
I want to stay here for a minute before we get into the data, because this framing matters.
Think about the way your organization talks about its product engineers, marketing executives, or HR professionals. There’s an understanding that these are talent investments — roles that require development, growth pathways, intentional hiring, and strategic management. They are seen as people with specialized expertise who are essential to the organization’s ability to perform.
Now think about how your organization talks about its Executive Assistants and administrative professionals.
If there’s a gap in those two mental models — you’ve just identified the problem.
The shift from thinking of EAs and Force Multipliers as a resource to thinking of them as talent is not just a feel-good reframe. It’s a structural one with real organizational consequences. Talent gets developed. Talent gets invested in. Talent gets managed strategically and positioned intentionally. Resources get allocated and depleted.
Executive Assistants are some of the most adaptable individuals in any organization. They carry deep organizational knowledge, exercise real decision influence, navigate complex interpersonal dynamics, and operate at the intersection of leadership, operations, and execution — often simultaneously. They enable information to flow. They protect leadership’s time and clarity. They don’t just manage the calendar; they manage the conditions under which great leadership happens.
That’s not a support function. That’s core infrastructure.
And the data in both the Global Skills Matrix and the ASAP report confirms it. The question is whether organizations — and the professionals themselves — are ready to own that identity.
The Five Shifts You Need to Know About
The 2026 State of the Administrative Profession Report — based on responses from over 5,500 professionals including administrative professionals, executives, and HR leaders — identified five core shifts reshaping administrative work right now. Here’s my take on each one.
Shift 1: AI Adoption Is Outpacing Training and Support
The numbers here are staggering. In 2024, 26% of administrative professionals reported using AI in their daily work. By 2026? That number jumped to 76.9%. AI adoption has nearly tripled in two years.
But here’s the catch: adoption doesn’t equal proficiency.
While 76.9% of admins are using AI tools, only 47.2% feel confident actually integrating AI into their workflows. And just 59.7% feel confident enough to teach AI tools to others. That’s a meaningful gap — and it creates real risk.
AI adoption without clear pathways to professional development creates inconsistent output quality, invisible strategic contribution, and erosion of perceived value. The organizations that formalize AI development turn their administrative teams into operational intelligence assets. The ones that don’t? They’re going to see uneven results.
Here’s the bottom line: AI is no longer the differentiator. How it’s used is. And 53.8% of administrative professionals want to develop at least one AI skill in 2026. The desire is there. The structure needs to catch up.
This is also why AI integration needs to be explicitly embedded into role design — not treated as a nice-to-have or left to individual initiative. When it’s built into the role, it becomes a competitive advantage. When it’s left informal, it stays task-based instead of transformative.
If you’re looking for ways to increase your AI acumen, check out these two programs:
Shift 2: Strategic Expectations and Skill Development Are Misaligned
This one hit me. Executives and HR leaders were asked to rank the most important capabilities for administrative professionals. Their top three? Data visualization, risk mitigation, and corporate governance.
Quick aside: Corporate governance refers to the systems, processes, and rules that guide how an organization is directed and controlled — think board reporting, compliance documentation, structured decision-making, and ensuring the right information gets to the right decision-makers at the right time.
For an administrative professional, it shows up practically as things like:
- Preparing board meeting materials and minutes
- Tracking action items and accountability across leadership
- Managing compliance-related documentation
- Supporting structured reporting processes for executives or boards
It’s essentially the behind-the-scenes infrastructure that keeps leadership accountable and decisions well-documented.
Now here’s where it gets interesting — and where the gap becomes impossible to ignore:
- 60.8% of executives rank data visualization as most important. Only 25.4% of admins report proficiency. That’s a 35.4-point gap.
- 63.8% of executives rank risk mitigation as a high priority. Only 39.4% of APs report proficiency. That’s a 24.4-point gap.
- 49.2% of executives rank corporate governance as a high priority. Only 31.7% of APs report proficiency. That’s a 17.5-point gap.
And before you point fingers — this isn’t solely on the administrative professionals. The report is clear: when strategic priorities aren’t clearly embedded in role definitions, expectations become ambiguous. Ambiguity creates friction for everyone — executives and admins alike. If no one is telling you that data visualization matters most, why would you prioritize developing it?
The misalignment is a structural problem, not a personal one. But it is one that we can each decide to get ahead of individually, even while the organizational structures catch up.
And for leaders — this is exactly why the capabilities that define strategic contribution need to be clearly articulated and embedded into the role from the start. Decision influence, analytical thinking, AI integration, problem-solving, time and clarity management for leadership — these can’t live in the margins of a job description. They need to be front and center.
Shift 3: Perceived Value Is Falling Behind Contribution
I’ll be honest — this one stings.
Between 2025 and 2026, the percentage of administrative professionals who feel valued dropped 5.6 percentage points. Today, only 62.2% of admins feel valued — down from 67.8% just one year ago. And this decline happened even as 70% received salary increases and AI adoption surged by 24 points.
Pay and technology alone are not enough. Recognition matters. Strategic involvement matters. Professional development matters.
What drives feeling valued? The data points to four things: competitive compensation, being engaged in strategic work, formal acknowledgment of contributions, and access to structured growth opportunities.
Here’s what I want you to hear in this: the work is getting harder, more complex, and more strategic. And yet many administrative professionals are feeling less seen for it. That’s a problem that sits at the intersection of organizational culture and individual advocacy — and it needs to be addressed from both sides.
Part of this is on organizational leaders to close the perception gap. But part of it is also on Force Multipliers to take up space — to make their executive presence felt, to be visible and articulate about the impact they’re creating, and to bring their analytical thinking to the forefront rather than keeping it behind the scenes. The role is notoriously underestimated. Some of that is a systemic problem. And some of it is an opportunity to change the narrative from the inside out.
Shift 4: Career Progression Is Constrained by Structural Ambiguity
The talent exists. The opportunity often doesn’t.
Despite experience and qualifications, a significant number of administrative professionals are still performing little to no strategic work. Growth barriers stem from unclear expectations, shifting definitions of what “strategic” even means, and development pathways that haven’t evolved alongside the role.
This is where the Global Skills Matrix 2026 does something incredibly important — it creates a shared language. The Global Skills Matrix defines five levels of contribution and capability (from Foundational through to Strategic Interpretation and beyond), and it makes a critical point: alignment to level should not be determined by the seniority of the executive supported, but by the scope of judgment, accountability, and organizational impact.
Administrative roles now appear under more than 187 different job titles globally. Same work, different label. The Global Skills Matrix cuts through that confusion and defines what level of contribution is actually being made — regardless of what the business card says.
This is the talent management infrastructure the profession has needed. A shared framework for development, promotion, and role design that reflects the actual scope of the work.
Shift 5: Strategic Capacity Is Underutilized
Here’s the hard truth to end on: highly experienced and educated administrative professionals continue to spend significant time in foundational tasks, leaving strategic potential untapped.
The profession has evolved. The structures haven’t always followed. And when strategic capacity is left on the table, everyone loses — the administrative professional who isn’t growing, the executive who isn’t getting the full value of their partnership, and the organization that’s leaving operational intelligence and efficiency on the table.
The role carries enormous organizational knowledge, decision influence, and leadership enablement potential. That capability doesn’t just benefit the individual. It benefits the entire organization. And right now, too much of it is sitting idle.
So, What Do We Do With All of This?
A few things, in my opinion.
If you’re a Force Multiplier: This data is your ammunition. Use it to have development conversations with your Principal and your HR team. Know where the skill gaps are (hello, data visualization and governance!) and start building toward them intentionally. Advocate for structured AI training. Be visible and analytical. Make your impact legible — don’t assume people see what you see. Don’t wait for someone to hand you a development plan — pitch one. And above all, own your seat at the table. You’ve earned it.
If you’re a Founder or leader: Take a hard look at how you’ve defined your Force Multiplier’s role. Is there role clarity? Are they engaged in strategic work? Are you formally acknowledging their contributions? Are you investing in their development the same way you would a product engineer or a marketing executive? The data shows that when administrative professionals feel capable but strategic expectations are unclear, perception gaps emerge — and over time, those gaps affect recognition, engagement, and how value is communicated across your organization. That’s a leadership problem, not just an HR one. Treat this role as the talent investment it is.
For everyone: The shift from “support function” to “operational infrastructure” isn’t rhetorical. It reflects where administrative judgment is actually being applied — and it’s being applied at the highest levels of organizational function. The question is whether the structures, titles, compensation, development, and recognition are keeping pace with the reality of the work.
The data says, not yet. But we have the roadmap. Now let’s use it.
The Global Skills Matrix 2026 was published by the World Administrators Alliance. The 2026 State of the Administrative Profession Report was published by the American Society of Administrative Professionals (ASAP). Both reports are worth reading in full — I’ve linked them below.
- Download the Global Skills Matrix 2026
- Download The 2026 State of the Administrative Profession Report
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