Lisa Sprinkles - Senior Executive Assistant at JLL Technologies

Lisa · 0:00

Hi, my name is Lisa Sprinkles, and my favorite quote is from John C. Maxwell, Leader knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.

Speaker 3 · 0:15

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

Jeremy · 0:31

Everyone is talking about NOVA Chief of Staff, and it's no surprise when graduates walk away with huge benefits, like greater confidence and the validation that they can do the role. There are over 300 students in the NOVA Chief of Staff Certification course, many of which are growth-minded executive assistants like you. Many of the Leader Assistants taking the course aren't necessarily looking for a promotion, they simply want to become more effective, strategic, and game-changing assistants. Over 18 countries around the globe are represented by students in NOVA's course, so I highly recommend you join the club. Visit leaderassistant.com/nova to learn more about this amazing professional development resource. Hey friends, welcome to the Leader Assistant Podcast. It's your host Jeremy Burrows and welcome to episode 273. You can check out the show notes for this episode at leaderassistant.com/273. Today I am very excited and energized because I'm speaking with Lisa Sprinkles. Lisa is a senior executive assistant with over 17 years of experience and currently serves in a vital role supporting and reporting to the CEO of Work Dynamics Technology. It's a Fortune 500 company, I believe. So Lisa, welcome to the show.

Speaker 4 · 1:55

Thank you.

Lisa · 1:57

Thank you for having me.

Jeremy · 1:58

And what part of the world are you in?

Lisa · 2:01

I am in Missouri on Table Rock Lake.

Jeremy · 2:05

Oh, nice. Are you from Missouri?

Lisa · 2:07

I am not from Missouri. I am originally from Indiana, but I've moved around a lot, but I've been in Missouri for almost eight years, which is the longest I've ever stayed in one location in my whole life. So I love it here. The goal is to create a life you do not need a vacation from, and I think I've almost nailed it.

Jeremy · 2:29

Yeah. Table Rock is beautiful. I haven't really been able to go in a while, but we were talking about it the other day, maybe doing a quick couple day trip down there. But I'm in Kansas City, so not too crazy of a drive to make it down that way. But it's always great to talk to a fellow Missouri assistant. And now what's interesting, though, is you've been at your current role for, what, a few years now?

Lisa · 3:04

Yeah, about two and a half years. I work for Jones Lang LaSalle Technologies, which is part of JLL, and the division I work in is the Work Dynamics Technology that I support the CEO of.

Jeremy · 3:17

And where are they headquartered?

Lisa · 3:21

So the JLL headquarters is in Chicago, and the JLL technology is in San Francisco.

Jeremy · 3:30

Okay.

Lisa · 3:30

With overall Chicago.

Jeremy · 3:32

Nice, and then so obviously, you're in Tapir Rock Lake in Missouri. How did that work out? Did it start off as a remote role, or did it kind of convert to remote role during COVID and stay that way? Tell us about how that transition worked.

Lisa · 3:50

Sure, absolutely. So I started here during COVID. I was working for Oracle at the time, and I had been at Oracle two stints over about 11, 12 years, and I had someone reached out for me on LinkedIn from Jones Lang LaSalle Technologies, and they were interested because I had a little bit of a background with facilities at the beginning of my stint at Oracle, but I think what they were interested in is I had been a remote assistant for that whole time that I was at Oracle and had experience. So even though many of us now have had experience working remote because we had to quickly, they were trying to ramp up quickly because it was right in the middle of COVID, and they were trying to get somebody in that had experience being a remote assistant. So when they reached out, I'll be honest with you, I was not really interested in the role, but the more they talked about it, I was like, well, it doesn't hurt to have a conversation. And as the conversation went, I was very excited about the role because it was in the China division. And so I was like going to be number two employee for heading up JLLT China. And then I was also going to support the corporate development and corporate strategy team at the time. So it was kind of something different than I've done before. So I decided to go ahead and go with the interview.

Jeremy · 5:13

Wow, that's great. So it's a Fortune 500 company. How many employees overall?

Lisa · 5:23

I would say it's about 87,000 employees globally. It's a commercial real estate company and we work in the technology vision of it.

Jeremy · 5:34

How many assistants overall do you think the company has?

Lisa · 5:38

That's a good question. We've kind of tried to number that. I would say maybe 300 or more. There's a lot and it varies because there's so many different divisions within JLL. As we've got to know, I think I'm still learning of all the different pillars and kind of diving in and how to find out how many there are.

Jeremy · 6:05

That's awesome. So 80,000-plus employees, so a small little company, what kind of resources or team connections do you have with the other assistants in your company? What's it like working with a team? Even if it's not directly day-to-day, do you check in once a month or once a quarter with the rest of the assistant community at the company?

Lisa · 6:37

Yeah, so there's a lot of resources. When I first started, I had set a goal because I'd been at a company, Oracle, for a long time, so I felt like I'd made a name for myself. So I knew a lot of assistants. I had the networking. And then when you start new, it's like, oh, how do we start over? And the executive assistant that worked for, that was our head, I would call the lead assistant, she sets up direct monthly calls with our whole team in the Americas. And so we kind of, I got plugged in that way. And then there was also different regional areas that within the different silos that I talked about. And so I just honestly started plugging in, putting executive assistant, you know, and looking for the roles and then just started reaching out. When I started, my goal was to meet with 50 assistants in the first three months. And I did achieve that. And that helped out tremendously to start it. But I did have the fortunate of having, you know, that head assistant kind of plugged me in to people that have been there already.

Jeremy · 7:43

You said 50 assistants in a couple months, a few months?

Lisa · 7:48

Three months.

Jeremy · 7:50

So just a bunch of calls, quick calls, like 15 minutes.

Lisa · 7:56

Yep, 15, 20 minute calls. And I kind of looked at the different roles of, you know, as I learned, you know, working with my executive at the time and all the people he started to meet with. I looked at their assistants and then kind of went down the line. And then I started looking at the org chart. And I set goals in different areas. And being a global team, it was from all over, even though I was, you know, our team was in China, the one I reported to directly. So I started there, then met assistants in the UK, Singapore, and really all over the globe. And it was a really great way to get to know different roles. Just as everyone knows who's been a seasoned or been an assistant for a while, whatever company you work at, we all do different things.

Jeremy · 8:41

Right.

Lisa · 8:42

And so it was kind of really cool to meet each person, not only learn the culture and but also learn what they did. And that kind of helped me start learning about what do I want to do because my role, even though I had replaced somebody, it was changing. So I had a chance to kind of define my role and that kind of helped in meeting those other assistants.

Jeremy · 9:05

That's great. What was the, you know, for assistants listening, they're like, hey, you know, I'm starting to reach out or I want to start reaching out to assistants either in my city or in my company. What was maybe like a good icebreaker question or a good even just practical agenda to kick off those those touch points?

Lisa · 9:29

Yeah, no, great question. So it kind of depended. I kind of started out with a little template of just introducing myself that I was new or you know, I wanted to learn about their roles specifically. So that was the first thing. But I started to ask them about themselves personally. So I so when I did send the note, it was I would like to get to know you a little bit better. How do you tackle your role day to day and then tell me a little bit about you and just kept it simple?

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Jeremy · 10:42

Keep it simple, especially when you're trying to meet that many people in a short amount of time. Yeah, exactly.

Lisa · 10:49

When you're meeting them, take lots of notes of who they are and, you know, and remember their faces. Try to remember something about them as you learn. Nice.

Jeremy · 10:59

So tell us then a little bit more about working remotely. You've been a remote assistant for, I think you said, 14 years. And what has been maybe the best and worst parts of that remote work lifestyle?

Lisa · 11:20

I would say the best part is the flexibility. Being able to be at home. Sometimes you can set your own hours. I mean, in the sense of I don't have to get up and get in the car, right? So you have some flexibility there and doing that. And I also like having the ability to get more things done. I feel like working remote, you have an opportunity to plan your workout and focus on the work and the tasks that you want to complete or the goals that you want to achieve for the week. I know that the difference, but when you're in an office, I remember there was a lot of distractions. People coming up, hey, how are you doing? And I guess that's the good part of it and the bad part of it. Because I do miss the camaraderie of somebody coming in the water cooler chat. I miss that. But it sometimes, though, I think it has helped me to work more efficiently working from home. So I think from there, it's how do you achieve the water cooler talk and still be remote? How do you build those relationships? And that was the first thing to try to tackle when you start working from home.

Jeremy · 12:38

Yeah. What's your favorite routine thing to do? I know some people are like, well, I work from home and I want to make sure I go for a walk and take a shower and put some work clothes on and do this whole routine. Or I want to make sure I shut my laptop at the end of the day so that I don't just mosey on over and keep working after dinner. So do you have any sort of work from home routines that you stick to? Sure.

Lisa · 13:08

Well, that took a while to learn. When I first started working from home, you kind of get this concept of, oh, yeah, I can just roll out, get my pajamas on, I'm just sitting here, up top, look good and things like that. But then you found yourself kind of sitting here, not actually setting a schedule or routine and that after about three or four months and I thought, oh, this is great that I'm working from home, but I need to take it seriously and really plan my day out. So now what I do is I, as a routine, I usually wake up in the morning, I get up and take a shower or workout and take my shower, then start going through emails. I sat down and just have coffee and do the emails just on my phone. So I sat on the couch, go through everything that I can answer right away. And then once I do that, then I kind of take a little bit of break and grab something to eat if I haven't grabbed anything to eat. And then I probably sat down at my desk, maybe like an hour later. But I think it's important too that I always make sure that I open up the windows, have some sunshine, go and light some candles and kind of have your desk in order, everything in order to put yourself together as well to get started.

Jeremy · 14:29

Yeah, good tips. Good tips. Yeah, I kind of I go throughout different phases. I think there are seasons where I do certain routine and it's like helps me and then I have to kind of change it because it gets too monotonous or whatever. And so yeah, it's and it also depends on the weather too. Like if the weather is nice and I'm like, oh, I'm going to go outside and walk around for 20 minutes while I'm on a call or whatever. Whereas if it's freezing cold, maybe I stand up on use my stand up desk more often. Stuff like that.

Lisa · 15:08

No, that's great. I do have a stand up desk. And it's funny you mentioned that because I think it was about two years ago, I got the stand up desk and it's on wheels. And so when it's warmer outside, I do roll it outside and I put a little umbrella up and we have a lake front house or we have a view in the backyard. So I just go outside, pop it up, the umbrella up and just start working and enjoy the sunshine.

Jeremy · 15:34

Love it. Love it. So what's maybe something that you want to chat about as far as the executive assistant role? You shared a couple of ideas. I'd love to just hear what topics you're passionate about or what you wanted to share with the assistants of the world listening.

Lisa · 16:00

Yeah, I have several things to talk about. One of the things I think is top of mind for me is brand, executive brand, your brand, personal brand, and how do you relate it to your role. And this is fairly new to me over the past maybe five, six years. I was at Oracle at the time and they were doing a reorganization. And there was a VP that came to me and said, they're about to do a reorg, I always come to the employees that are do a good job and want to make sure that you have all your ducks in a row. And I was at first I was like, oh, nervous. Am I on the chopping block? What's going on? And she said, no, not at all. But it's just something that I wanted to teach you, if you don't know, is talking about how do you promote yourself? How do you get ready for transitions, whether it's life changing, work changing? And I kind of paused for a moment of not really understanding what she meant. And she said, your successes, how do you promote yourself? And I said, well, and I kind of started naming things off and she said, no, no, let's stop. She said, I want you to stop, go get a PowerPoint and I want you to write out all the things that you do. Then you give that to me and we'll look at it. And she didn't give me any instructions. So I think it was kind of a stretch goal for me because it was a new concept of, I mean, we can talk about as assistants what we do all day, you know, oh, I do this and do this. But how do we promote ourselves in two minutes or how do we promote ourselves, especially if all of a sudden we're like just in two minutes? So I stopped, I got this PowerPoint out and I started putting buckets together. I said, admin projects, employee success, compliances, you know, and I put all these random buckets. I wasn't really even sure where to start. So then I started putting all the things that I did and then I took it back to her and she said, great. So how does what you stand for and who you are as a person, how does that equal your successes? And then I thought, oh, OK, I don't know. And she said, your brand, what's your brand? And I've heard of brands. OK, we know brands, craft brands, Mars brand, you know, that kind of thing. But I hadn't really thought of it in terms of personal brand and relating it to my role. So as I started thinking about what brand means is, you know, it's our reputation. It's what we stand for, our values. And I started thinking about that and how our expertise, how do we want to portray ourselves? So as I kind of started going through what my brand is and what I want to stand for is as an assistant or as a person, I think about confidentiality, loyalty. I like follow ups as an assistant. I think follow ups is just really important. Growing yourself, which is one of JLL's values. Something I earned early on in my career that I say this a lot is measure twice, cut once. An executive said that to me and every time I start to do something, I'm like, okay, wait, because I'm an A-type personality, I like to do fast, get it going, let's go. So it's like, take your time, slow down. I like to stay positive. So I kind of put Mary, the two together, and I came up with this PowerPoint that I in two minutes could talk through myself. As that resonated to me, it really hit home of supporting our executives. I think we, as when we start with a new executive or we get transferred or just any time that you come in contact with a new executive, it started thinking about what is their brand personally and how can I, as an executive assistant, help them take their values and marry those together, incorporate those into what their role is. And then that was a foundation for me to helping support them in looking at their priorities and how we want to go from there. And it was just a different way of supporting them and getting to know the executive from there.

Jeremy · 20:03

Interesting. So you, how did they, so you're developing and cultivating your personal brand and professional brand. Did they also, did it translate back to like helping your executives do the same?

Lisa · 20:24

It did because when I started talking about in that language, I would say many of them, when I said, what's your brand, they paused, they said, I don't know what that means, you know, I mean, I know just like what we talked about, right? And then I said, what I want to know is, you know, this, take your brand and think about it. And it was a good thought provoking. And each person that I have reported to or, you know, supported since then had taken the time to talk about their brand. And really, what does that mean? And how do we want them to show up? And that show up means how do I want to, when I'm supporting them and I'm talking to other people, what is the message that is important to them on how I respond to meeting requests? How do I respond to LinkedIn messages on their behalf? How do I help them on town halls? You know, how do they show up? What's important to them? One of the things that I did early on in my career is I tried, I learned a lot of things and I tried to put the way I learned into the executive. And as I've learned, you know, with time, you can't always do that. It's good. We want to manage up. We want to help our executives. We want to point out when they're not looking at the camera and they're not smiling or, you know, giving tips and tricks to the executive. But we really want them to be themselves and we want to help them be successful the way they are. And then how to take the things that they're not good at and how do we make good out of it? Right. And that's part of this branding of learning that. And then portraying it to someone else, you know, within the company or within the, you know, however you represent your executive.

Jeremy · 22:12

Yeah. And I like how, you know, it's like complimentary. So your brand is this, their brand is this. And there's like hopefully a synergy and a complimentary nature to it.

Lisa · 22:27

Yes, absolutely. And you do you tweak it to how can you, you know, like you said, the synergies to go together to create kind of a partnership, this, you know, partnership that you do with your executive.

Jeremy · 22:44

Cool. Well, what is maybe the most or one of the most challenging times or projects or executives you've had to you've had to work with? Let's share a little bit about over your 17 years of experience, a challenge that you faced in your time as an assistant. Sure.

Lisa · 23:10

So I've worked with so many different executives and different personalities. And one of the things that I've learned over the course of the 17 years is if you have an executive that is when you first start with them, they say, I don't really know what to do with you. Or I don't know how to work with an assistant at first. You're like, oh, no, they don't get me. They don't know, you know, that kind of thing. So it's a challenge of doing that. But I did have a situation where I worked with an executive, and he said, I think I'm good. I don't really know. I don't know, just figure it out, do that. And I was like, OK, yeah, I don't know what to do with that. So I kind of thought about it, and I thought, OK, I got this, I can do this. So I decided, as I started working with him, that he was good. But how can I help his team? How can I show the value of that? So the first thing I did was I set up meetings with all of his team. And I asked, what is it that you're working on? Tell me all your projects. So I started each day going through all their projects. And it took me about three or four weeks to go through all the team, all the projects, and I put together a spreadsheet. After I put together the spreadsheet, I thought, you have six directs and they're working on 35 projects. That seems like a lot, right? And so I kind of went through this priorities and I looked at this and I sent the spreadsheet to him and he didn't look at it right away. He didn't even see it. But you know what, each week I went. For about three or four weeks, I still met with his team. I updated it, said, what are you doing now? How's that working? What's the updates? Updated it. And then one day he calls me and he said, Lisa, what is this that you just sent me? And I said, this is all your projects that you've been working on with your team for the last six months. Well, that's a lot. And then he goes, I don't know that we need to be working on those. I said, great. I said, he goes, let's use this on our next team call. So we got through it and we ended up going through all of it. And it was great because as time went, I built the relationship and showed my value in a different way within the team, which opened the door for him to kind of have a trust and build that trust with him. To the point as I worked with him, he ended up being my biggest fan. He has told me many times, Lisa, you should be doing this. You should do that, you know, and just really encouraged me along the way to kind of keep following my passions and not give up. So, you know, you took a challenging situation and ended up being great. And I still talk to him to this day, gives me a lot of advice, just a great soul, you know, of a person. And really just I've learned a lot from him.

Jeremy · 26:06

And that's one of the best parts, I think, is, you know, when you get into the real world, the quote unquote real world, and you have those challenges, you have those setbacks, you have those speed bumps, you start to realize at first it's frustrating, and you're like, okay, what's the deal? Why does it have to be so hard? And then you realize, okay, this is actually a learning opportunity, and this is the chance to grow and learn about this executive, this organization, this situation, my skill set, and how I can bring value to this partnership. So yeah, that's great. Thanks for sharing.

Lisa · 26:55

Yeah, absolutely. I love those too. I feel like that as I, and now I get excited about those challenges. People are like, oh, that seems impossible. I'm like, yes, put me in, let's go. You can do it, you know, and it gets you excited about it, because if you can, you know, if people say it can't be achievable and you're willing to jump right in and do it, then it does, it grows you, right? It stretches you.

Jeremy · 27:17

Yeah, and it's like, you know, when you've done the role for so long, part of the reason I've been an assistant for over 17 years as well, part of the reason I still am an assistant is because it just, there's never a dull moment. Like, it's always something interesting happening. There's always changes. And like you said, it's like now you look forward to those challenges. You look forward to those projects where your executive's like, hey, we want to try to do this. And you're like, really? I don't know if we can do that. But if you want to try this, have this audacious goal, and you know, want to see if we can make it happen, it keeps things interesting.

Lisa · 27:56

For sure.

Jeremy · 27:59

Awesome, Lisa. Well, thank you so much for being on the show. Kind of to wrap things up, one thing that I like to ask lately to my guests is, you know, if you had a billboard, you put a big old billboard on the way to Table Rock Lake for all the assistance, vacationing, or you wanted to take, you had all the money in the world to spend $3 million on a Super Bowl ad, what would be the message or the, what would the content be? What would you want assistance to take away from your billboard and or Super Bowl ad?

Lisa · 28:39

That is a very good question. Well, I would say two things. One is be bold. I wish I would have been bold early on, and I've been to a lot of trainings lately. You know, you can never stop learning. I've read, well, your book, and I read several other books that encouraged me on the trainings, and you keep learning. But just be bold. I think we get afraid to take those steps, and we get nervous. Oh, we overthink what it's going to do, but just be bold. And my tagline that I always put in every email is keep dancing, not take it too serious, keep walking around and going back and forth and having fun, and not take it too serious. I think so many times we talk about work-life balance, and it's just balance in general. It's just life. And you've got to put your priorities where they are, even though we love our jobs and we do it, family and our faith and things are the most important things in our life. But how do we encompass in the two of them? And I think don't lose yourself. Don't change who you are. And that's what I would probably say is don't change who you are. Just learn how to be your best self when you show up.

Jeremy · 29:53

Well said. Now you just need the budget for the Super Bowl ad and you'll be good, right?

Lisa · 29:57

Yes, I love it.

Jeremy · 29:59

So, okay. So actually, there was one more thing I wanted to ask because we had talked about this right before we hit record. You said you read my book and there was a couple of things in the book that stood out to you. So would you mind kind of sharing what that was?

Lisa · 30:14

Yeah, absolutely. One of the first things, and it was funny when I moved from Oracle to JLL, that's when I reread your book. I read it a while back when it first came out, and then I reread it when I came here, but it's to be humble. I think when you're working as an assistant, sometimes you feel that you don't get the pat on the back and you don't, you know, some of those things. And my, you know, I don't define myself by my role or who I work for or things like that. And I think that in the, in your book, you talk about Rick Warren of think, think, what was it? Do not think less of yourself, but think of yourself less.

Jeremy · 30:59

There you go.

Lisa · 31:00

You got it. I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was something like that. But it really, it kind of, you know, hit home for me because I think sometimes we, we take things too personal and we get, you know, worried. And I think that the book reminded me of that, being staying humble, you know, in our roles. And the other one is professional development, which it kind of hit on a little bit. You talk about, don't be afraid to ask for this training dollars. And, you know, at Oracle, they did do trainings, you know, but it was limited to so many assistants that could join a program. And when I moved over to this new role, that was something the executive, not that I'm supporting now, but at the beginning. And even, you know, at JLL, they're very big on our value, is grow yourself on trainings. But in your book, you talk about asking for those dollars, even if you, hey, start big and you talk about going small and, you know, hey, start here, ask for the moon and go down, you know. And I love that because I think sometimes we people will say, oh, well, our budget's tighter. It's this or that. And I've learned, you know, and looking through that, what you said is, you know, the answer's already no. Why not ask, you know, and give yourself a chance? So thank you for your book. I think it's helped so many people. I've given it to several people, especially new assistants starting. It's a fantastic book. So I do recommend it to everyone that is in the EA role, even seasoned and getting started. It's a great, great place to start or even, you know, end. Because I still reread it and get new topics. What did he say about that? Meetings, getting organized. I need a refresher on that.

Jeremy · 32:40

Awesome. Well, thanks for the kind words, Lisa, and thanks for sharing. I always love to hear which portions stick out more than others. So I appreciate you sharing that. And yeah, thanks again for being on the podcast. It's great to finally meet you and have you on the show. What's the best place for people to reach out if they want to say hi and connect?

Lisa · 32:59

You can reach out on LinkedIn.

Jeremy · 33:02

Perfect.

Lisa · 33:02

Happy to connect with anybody who would like to connect.

Jeremy · 33:05

Awesome, Lisa. We'll all put your LinkedIn URL in the show notes at leaderassistant.com/273. leaderassistant.com/273. Thank you, everyone, for listening. And thank you, Lisa, for being on the show.

Lisa · 33:19

Thanks, Jeremy. We appreciate it.

Speaker 3 · 33:31

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