Wesley Tran on Seeking Learning Opportunities as an Assistant

Wesley · 0:00

Hey everyone, I'm Wesley Tran, and today's leadership quote comes from Kobe Bryant. The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they do.

Speaker 2 · 0:10

Thank you.

Speaker 3 · 0:17

The Leader Assistant Podcast exists to encourage and challenge assistants to become confident, game-changing leader assistants.

Jeremy · 0:32

Calling all Executive Assistants, are you looking for a way to elevate your skills or earn that promotion you've been eyeing? Nova Chief of Staff's Online Certification Course provides you with the knowledge and confidence you need to stand out on the job. Whether you want to land your dream position or level up in your current role, Nova's self-paced course gives you hands-on practice doing what Chiefs of Staff do every day. Visit leaderassistant.com/nova to learn more and secure your spot. That's leaderassistant.com/nova. Hey friends, welcome to The Leader Assistant Podcast. It's your host Jeremy Burrows here and it's episode 265. I'm really excited to have you listening right now and you can check out the show notes for this episode at leaderassistant.com/265 and today I'm speaking with my friend Wesley Tran. Wesley is an executive assistant, executive coach and longtime subscriber of The Leader Assistant Premium Membership and for those of you listening who don't know what The Leader Assistant membership is, we do regular ongoing coaching session, group sessions with executive assistants from all over the world and we do different topics, cover different topics and have discussions and support each other and then we record those training sessions and put them in our members only library and then we also have a private group chat for reaching out and supporting each other and then we also provide discounts on one-on-one coaching, discounts on live events and then you get access to our online events like our Administrative Professionals Day event that we have every year and we do an AI event online. So lots of fun, fun benefits to the Leader Assistant membership and so you can check that out at leaderassistant.com/membership, leaderassistant.com/membership to check out the annual subscription for that if you're curious but Wesley will tell us a little bit more about that as we get into his story. But first of all, Wesley, thank you so much for joining and tell us where you are at in the world.

Wesley · 2:59

Hey everyone, happy to be here on this podcast and I am talking from San Jose, California.

Jeremy · 3:08

Love it, love it. And are you from that area? Where are you from?

Wesley · 3:14

So I was born and raised in San Jose, spent the first 18 years of my life there. And then I went to college called Point Loma Nazarene University down in San Diego, lived there for about five years and then moved back to the Bay Area and I'm currently based here since then.

Jeremy · 3:34

Sweet. And let's just jump right into, well actually before we get into your professional career, what do you like to do in your free time?

Wesley · 3:44

Yeah, so I like to say I pick up a lot of hobbies. And so something I picked up last year has been social dancing of picket learning, west coast swing, salsa, and bachata. But I have so many. I do yoga, boulder, surfing, basketball, a lot of athletic activities. And it's just a way for me to socialize with people. I'm quite a social athlete in that way.

Jeremy · 4:13

Nice, nice. And on the dancing side, was that a social thing? Or do you enjoy dancing? Did you have to kind of push yourself outside of your comfort zone to get into the dancing part?

Wesley · 4:28

Yeah. So I was invited by a friend initially, and I just was not confident in what I was doing. I was like, man, I just don't know the steps. But it just wasn't until after attending my first class, I really became comfortable of failing, of just everyone here is at the same place I am, and we're all learning together. And that's what just really made it fun for me is I can be myself and mess around and still have fun. But I'm learning something. I'm learning how to lead a follower and just be comfortable with dancing. And I just stuck it out and pushing myself even though I can't identify as a dancer, just because I'm doing so many different things. But that's something I've picked up recently.

Jeremy · 5:22

Nice. And I think that as assistants listening, we are often curious and like to learn. And there's even the term generalist that can often be synonymous with assistants because we maybe aren't specialists in many areas, but we can do a lot of things. And because we have to figure it out as we go. So that's that's cool. A little backstory there for your from your personal life. So then tell us, how did you end up becoming an assistant?

Wesley · 6:03

So it started from my college journey of I didn't really know what I wanted to do. I entered college as a managerial and organizational communication major. And that major just sounded super cool to me. I was thinking communication because it was just broad enough to go anywhere I want to go. And I kind of fell into that generous generalist role of I'm pretty good in a lot of areas, yet I don't specialize in any things. And so even just through the classes I took, there were just so many different classes of communication, business, and the liberal arts university too. So so many different courses on top of that. And I was just bombarded with decision fatigue of not knowing what I wanted to do. And so by the time I graduated, I was just trying to get a job to stay in San Diego. So I bounced around a lot of different jobs of entering a roofing company to during a summer in San Diego, going on top of roofs and fixing them of working sales for this one small business owner, worked at a nonprofit in San Diego called the San Diego Rescue Mission, where I helped people experiencing homelessness get back on their feet again. But then the pandemic hit. And I wanted to be closer with my family. And I moved from San Diego to San Jose to just simply be with my family. My parents were hitting the age of retirement, and I'm the oldest of four children. So I wanted to be there for my younger siblings when they became adults, especially because I had such life experience in me now to be able to guide them and teach them all the mistakes and what I've done well. So I quit my job and sent San Diego Rescue Mission, moved back to the Bay Area. I had to look for a job. And for the first few months, I was struggling. It was hard. I didn't know what to do because I've worked so many different jobs in the past that I hired a resume writer to really compile everything I had together. So I picked an administrative assistant position. I chose it because it seemed broad and general enough for me. And I felt like if I can get my foot in the door of a company, I can work my way up and succeed from there. And so this resume writer tailored my resume just the best way to describe myself towards an administrative assistant position. And I applied through LinkedIn and got a role at my current workplace, which is Nova Measuring Instruments. And so Nova Measuring Instruments is a leading provider for advanced process control for semiconductor companies. So that's a lot. We supply wafer fab equipment. So that's how I got my position as an administrative assistant at Nova. So when I was first hired, I was thinking to myself, man, what is an assistant? What do I do? Like it was a receptionist position, but I wanted to be more than that. So I went to Amazon to look for assistant books. And one of the top search results was the Leader Assistant. So I purchased it. And the Leader Assistant book for me was such a great guide as someone stepping into that world for the first time of here is a framework of how to really be a proactive assistant. And within that book to Jeremy laid out really great examples of what a not leader assistant looked like compared to what a leader assistant can be like. And so that was really empowering to see that I can be proactive, I can solve problems before they arise, and just really be a leader. Because sometimes the word assistant means you're under someone. But I really think that's kind of where my purpose comes in. And it took me a while to figure out, but I'm really here placed on this earth to empower people. And that's where I felt like this role thrived. So that was a long explanation of how I finally reached, put my foot through that door, started way back in college, of just not knowing what I wanted to do, and coming into an administrative assistant role.

Jeremy · 10:52

Nice. Awesome. So we, yeah, so you found my book, we connected. Trying to remember, you know, I know you went to one or two of my events in the area in San Jose, San Francisco area, became a premium subscriber, you know, a few years ago, and we started doing some one-on-one coaching, you know, honestly, I can't remember when we started. But, you know, you reached out wanting, I guess one of the things I want to say is, Wesley, like to everyone listening, there's a certain skill set that isn't very common these days, it seems. But it's this idea that there's always something that I can learn. You know, there's always, there's always something that I can take away from a situation or from an experience or from another person that can help me be a better a better assistant, be a better person, be a better employee, be a better friend, etc. And so you've always kind of had that, that learning mindset. And so that's one of the things that I've enjoyed in coaching you is that you're like, I want to learn, I want to do, I want to, I want to do this, I want to learn this, what else should I learn, you know, and just kind of a sponge. And so tell us a little bit about, you know, what prompted you to jump into, okay, I'm going to join our Leader Assistant Premium Membership community. I'm going to go to these events. You know, you obviously you mentioned reading the book and finding the book and, you know, I want to I want to get involved in some coaching, one-on-one coaching, like what has been your mindset, you know, from the beginning and then also as you've gotten into more and more experience, you have more coaching experience now. What is your continued mindset, if that makes sense as well? So kind of what started you, what kickstarted the whole thing and then what keeps you curious and keeps you hungry for more?

Wesley · 13:26

And so I think that all traces back to just my student mentality. And I still think it's just coming off of college, of the world is my oyster and I have so much to learn. And if you've ever taken the Strengths Finders test, one of my top strengths is input, which really is just data collection. I love learning. And I've learned how I learned to, which helps me become a great generalist of picking up new things. And that student mentality has really just kept my hunger alive. That hunger to learn and know has always been there, which comes from a combination of just one, I hate making mistakes. And two, I really love the feeling of doing a good job. And so when I first entered my role as an administrative assistant, I wasn't really too sure if this role was right for me. Or, well, it was just stepping into a brand new role for the first time. And so just being a student of wanting to absorb everything came from the fact that I was already there in the door. So I had to do my absolute best job. So that was my mentality. I wanted to take in everything I could, which is why I picked up a book, why I attended live training sessions, and why I attended one-on-one coaching. And so I briefly mentioned about the book on how it just was a visual framework for me to be able to make sure that I was avoiding doing the bad things and doing the good things that a good leader assistant can do. The live trainings were very specialized, too, of one, just meeting other assistants. And I think that was very important for me, too, just as someone still brand new, just only knowing other students at the time, or young adults that worked in different industries. But actually, meeting someone in your profession was quite different of seeing their struggles, of seeing their successes and really learning off of them. So that was a game changer for me. And the specialized classes, too, or the trainings in of itself were awesome. I remember I went to one in Denver, Colorado with Monique Hellstrom, was talking about how to give feedback and receive feedback, which I think just as human beings, that's very hard to do. And so for topics like that, it was amazing for me to absorb because it was all brand new information that I've never thought about that I get to use not only my professional life, but also my personal life. And then the one on one coaching was a huge game changer for me, too, of just really having a tailor made experience for whatever I was struggling with. Whenever I had a disagreement with my manager at that time, I can have a tailor fit answer for my specific situation for that. Or if there were projects that I were working on that Jeremy with his 15, 20 plus years of experience has knowledge to give me tips about. And so all of that just really helped me with my career and helped me propel from not just an administrative assistant, but to now where I am as an executive assistant within Nova.

Jeremy · 17:09

So I think one of the reasons that I wanted to have you on the show was, you know, there are a lot of assistants that are new in their career like you, you know, you're so how many years now officially have you been in three years since I've been an assistant total two years as an administrative assistant and coming up on my three years in March. Yeah, I think I just think there are a lot of assistants listening who are new to the space and you know, in the same boat, you know, like, do I really want to do this for a career? If not, what do I want to do? And I think that it's okay to not know. It's okay. A lot of times people, you know, talk about, oh, you know, you get it's a great career and you should be proud of it. And it's this is a trajectory for assistance and all that. And that's great, too. But not everyone is going to really want to be that for a career, essentially. And so I guess my point in all this long winded statement is if you're listening and you're new to the assistant role, or even if you've been an assistant for a while, but you're still not sure if this is your path, that's okay. Stay curious, keep trying out different things, learn more about different departments and divisions in your organization and your company, and really just test out the waters and do good work. Like Wesley, one thing I appreciate is you are, even if you're not 100% sure that you're like, hey, I want to be an assistant for a long, long time, you're not skimping out. You're working really hard and you're doing excellent work and you're learning and you're growing and you're just crushing it in your role. And so anyway, it's okay to wonder, it's okay to wrestle with, is this for me? Is this not for me? And, you know, maybe in a few years, Wesley, we're hopping on the podcast again and you're talking about how now you're leading a team of assistants and you actually want to do this forever. You know, maybe you're an executive coach and you're not even an assistant anymore, you know, it's okay to be in the process and trying to figure it out. And I like what you said earlier about how, you know, you're coming out of college, you're in this like learning mindset and always always be learning, you know.

Wesley · 19:53

Yeah, thank you, Jeremy. And I think if I had to give advice to new assistants as well is still just having that student mentality of taking everything in all that you can, because you're in a great spot. Even as an administrative assistant for me, I was learning from so many different departments, like the software team really wanted to bring me along and just learn from them. They reached out to me first, and I reached out to the project management team to learn more about project management. And so even if you're confused, you're in such a great place to be that sponge to learn from so many different departments. And now as an executive assistant, I really get that seat on the table. I get to learn from so many different departments and see the high level overview of everything that's going on. And even though I'm not satisfied with where I want to go, I'm still content with where I am. I love what I do. I love the fact that I get to empower everyone in my organization. And I humbly say that when people come up to me, they always ask me a question, and I can give them a really great answer right off the bat. And so I love where I am. For a new assistant, you're in such a great spot to learn. Doesn't even have to be the administrative route. You can learn from anywhere. But if you want to stick with the administrative route, that's also such a great option too.

Speaker 2 · 21:27

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Jeremy · 22:04

Yeah, well said. What's maybe one thing that you wish you would have done differently when you jumped into the assistant role? I know you're a few years in, but what's something that, you know what, if I could go back three years and start over, I would have done this differently?

Wesley · 22:32

Humbly. I say I did a lot of things correctly. I was just so empowered by all the resources that I had of an actual book of how to do a good job, of a community of people like sharing their mistakes and their successes, and just one-on-one coaching, that I'm just reflecting back on my three years of being an assistant. I just killed it. And I say this with such confidence that I can't think of any regret that I have. I know I've made some mistakes, but I don't regret those mistakes. I've learned from them. And I just say this humbly that I felt so empowered and that I have no regrets.

Jeremy · 23:22

Yeah. Well, I think that, you know, that's a good point in the sense of you weren't going in blind because you were soaking up all these resources and you had a community to, you know, hold your hand, if you will, to guide you through it. And you had a coach. And, you know, it's been a it's been an honor being your coach for the last couple years. And it's fun to see you grow and try things and explore what. OK, so I will have to I do have to ask this question because you're a male assistant and I'm a male assistant. And most assistants in the world, I think 94 to 96 percent of assistants in the world are not male. There are women are primarily in this role. And so has there been any interesting interactions? There have been any odd dynamics? Is there been any like, you know, email exchanges, awkward email exchanges, anything like that that's happened? What's it been like even when you go, even when you were going to these trainings, like you're going to these live events that we had hosted and the only guy there was me, you know, like what's what's been your experience being a male assistant in a female dominated role?

Wesley · 24:48

Yeah. So most of the reactions that I've received was, oh, you're a guy assistant. I'm like, yeah. And then that's just kind of that. No one really lingers on that fact. And we just kind of forget about it because we have so much in common of just being that assistant. And it's kind of interesting, too, because I am in the tech industry. Most of my peers are male because engineers are typically male as well. So I felt pretty fine, at least in my company, but also just even when attending these leader assistant lives where you and I are the only guys, I still felt at peace. It's just, at least for me, I really focus on our commonalities of what we have in common. And I know you and during one of your trainings, you mentioned the difference between kind of how guy executive assistants act and girl executive assistants act, which I believe was just kind of the female executive assistants tend to kind of backstab each other at times. Or I don't remember the specific words you used.

Jeremy · 26:04

Yeah, we've talked about it a few times. I know Al Hussein, Matt Haney has talked about that topic probably more than I have. But yeah, there's this general like, you know, when you I think one one example, I think I know what you're talking about. One example he would share is if your HR person, if you're if you're a woman assistant and your HR person is a woman, it can sometimes be harder to negotiate and navigate your compensation package and increase and increase in salary and all that because of that dynamic, versus if you're, you know, a male assistant and HR is a woman or the HR director is a man, and you're a female assistant. So there's just those dynamics that are unfortunate that they're there, but, you know, we can't just say they're not there. We can't just ignore them and be like, oh, yeah, that's not a thing. Unfortunately, they are. There are those dynamics that we have to navigate. And so one of those things that is unfortunate, it's like there's this dynamic, can be this dynamic of, you know, be feeling threatened, you know, you know, an HR director, maybe a female HR director might be threatened by a female assistant who's trying to get promoted and have a salary and having success in their career or whatever. And so I think that might be probably one of the examples. Yeah, that same story that you were trying to think of.

Wesley · 27:49

Yeah. And now that you bring that up too, there is with just being a male assistant comes with just a lot of privilege, being a male in the corporate fold in general. And I believe I may have benefited from that a lot, like with just negotiation. Well, especially with working with you in particular, just practice negotiating and asking for things. I felt extremely confident and comfortable. Even if I were to be rejected, I felt super comfortable just making the ask. And I think that is a privilege I have that I'm not conscious at times.

Jeremy · 28:30

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And I like to say, you know, when people ask me that question, what's it like being a male assistant in a female, typically female dominated role? I basically just my simple answer is I don't really think about it too much. And I get I do get those emails where it's like, oh, you know, copying my assistant. And then the person replies and says, OK, I'll be sure to connect with her. You know, like it's like that assumption. But I don't really care about it because I, you know, my thing is, you know, for me, I'm a I'm a white male in America that is basically not the minority in any other, you know, and I've got that privilege. I'm not the minority in any any area of my life except for the assistant world. And so I'm not going to I'm not I'm not too worried about it because I have like you said, I have a lot of privilege. And so anyway, yeah, it's a it's kind of an interesting conversation, but it's also for me, I'm just like, I it just doesn't bother me. What the big thing that has bothered me is that the assistant role in general does not get and has not gotten communicated to the world, if you will, as a career. And I think that that's part of why so many men didn't even think about the career as of an assistant, because they didn't see it as a career. And so I think that's slowly changing. And I'm trying to help change that, too, and just encourage people like, listen, this is a very respectable career.

Wesley · 30:22

And so, yeah, I think you've done a great job of advertising that, of showing just other assistants. It's possible to be an executive assistant and make six plus figures. It's possible to be an executive assistant and become a chief of staff, chief diversity officer, and so forth, too. And so I think you've done a great job of just showing that this is a valid career path. And there are so many doors that can be open or just even simply being an executive assistant.

Jeremy · 30:53

Mm hmm.

Wesley · 30:54

Yeah.

Jeremy · 30:56

Cool, Wesley. Well, I will really appreciate you again being on the show. I'll put a link to your LinkedIn in the show notes so people can reach out and say hi. I know you like connecting with other assistants of the world, leaderassistant.com/265, leaderassistant.com/265. So thank you so much for being on the show. What's maybe the phrase or short billboard that you would put on the highway if every assistant was going to drive by that billboard on their way to work every day? What's something you'd put on a billboard?

Wesley · 31:33

Trust the process. Even when things don't look clear now, trust the process.

Jeremy · 31:40

Nice. Love it. Well, thank you so much, Wesley. It's been great having you as part of our community, Leader Assistant Premium Membership and a coaching client. I appreciate you jumping on the show.

Wesley · 31:52

Thank you so much, Jeremy. I'm happy to be one of your clients and part of the community. Thank you again.

Speaker 3 · 32:08

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