First-Line Supervisors of Office and Administrative Support Workers
43-1011.00
Bright Outlook Updated 2024

Directly supervise and coordinate the activities of clerical and administrative support workers.

Sample of reported job titles: Accounting Manager, Accounts Payable Supervisor, Accounts Receivable Manager, Administrative Supervisor, Customer Service Manager, Customer Service Supervisor, Office Coordinator, Office Manager, Office Supervisor, Staff Services Manager

Occupation-Specific Information

Tasks

  • Supervise the work of office, administrative, or customer service employees to ensure adherence to quality standards, deadlines, and proper procedures, correcting errors or problems.
  • Resolve customer complaints or answer customers' questions regarding policies and procedures.
  • Provide employees with guidance in handling difficult or complex problems or in resolving escalated complaints or disputes.
  • Review records or reports pertaining to activities such as production, payroll, or shipping to verify details, monitor work activities, or evaluate performance.
  • Discuss job performance problems with employees to identify causes and issues and to work on resolving problems.
  • Prepare and issue work schedules, deadlines, and duty assignments for office or administrative staff.
  • Recruit, interview, and select employees.
  • Interpret and communicate work procedures and company policies to staff.
  • Evaluate employees' job performance and conformance to regulations and recommend appropriate personnel action.
  • Train or instruct employees in job duties or company policies or arrange for training to be provided.
  • Research, compile, and prepare reports, manuals, correspondence, or other information required by management or governmental agencies.
  • Implement corporate or departmental policies, procedures, and service standards in conjunction with management.
  • Compute figures such as balances, totals, or commissions.
  • Coordinate activities with other supervisory personnel or with other work units or departments.
  • Participate in the work of subordinates to facilitate productivity or to overcome difficult aspects of work.
  • Make recommendations to management concerning such issues as staffing decisions or procedural changes.
  • Develop or update procedures, policies, or standards.
  • Maintain records pertaining to inventory, personnel, orders, supplies, or machine maintenance.
  • Consult with managers or other personnel to resolve problems in areas such as equipment performance, output quality, or work schedules.
  • Develop work schedules according to budgets and workloads.
  • Analyze financial activities of establishments or departments and provide input into budget planning and preparation processes.
  • Design, implement, or evaluate staff training and development programs, customer service initiatives, or performance measurement criteria.
  • Keep informed of provisions of labor-management agreements and their effects on departmental operations.
  • Coordinate or perform activities associated with shipping, receiving, distribution, or transportation.
  • Monitor inventory levels and requisition or purchase supplies as needed.
  • Plan for or coordinate office services, such as equipment or supply acquisition or organization, disposal of assets, relocation, parking, maintenance, or security services.
  • Arrange for necessary maintenance or repair work.
  • Plan layouts of stockrooms, warehouses, or other storage areas, considering turnover, size, weight, or related factors pertaining to items stored.
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Technology Skills

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In demand
In Demand skills are frequently included in employer job postings for this occupation.

Occupational Requirements

Work Activities

  • Working with Computers — Using computers and computer systems (including hardware and software) to program, write software, set up functions, enter data, or process information.
  • Getting Information — Observing, receiving, and otherwise obtaining information from all relevant sources.
  • Communicating with Supervisors, Peers, or Subordinates — Providing information to supervisors, co-workers, and subordinates by telephone, in written form, e-mail, or in person.
  • Making Decisions and Solving Problems — Analyzing information and evaluating results to choose the best solution and solve problems.
  • Processing Information — Compiling, coding, categorizing, calculating, tabulating, auditing, or verifying information or data.
  • Analyzing Data or Information — Identifying the underlying principles, reasons, or facts of information by breaking down information or data into separate parts.
  • Documenting/Recording Information — Entering, transcribing, recording, storing, or maintaining information in written or electronic/magnetic form.
  • Coaching and Developing Others — Identifying the developmental needs of others and coaching, mentoring, or otherwise helping others to improve their knowledge or skills.
  • Evaluating Information to Determine Compliance with Standards — Using relevant information and individual judgment to determine whether events or processes comply with laws, regulations, or standards.
  • Identifying Objects, Actions, and Events — Identifying information by categorizing, estimating, recognizing differences or similarities, and detecting changes in circumstances or events.
  • Resolving Conflicts and Negotiating with Others — Handling complaints, settling disputes, and resolving grievances and conflicts, or otherwise negotiating with others.
  • Monitoring Processes, Materials, or Surroundings — Monitoring and reviewing information from materials, events, or the environment, to detect or assess problems.
  • Staffing Organizational Units — Recruiting, interviewing, selecting, hiring, and promoting employees in an organization.
  • Establishing and Maintaining Interpersonal Relationships — Developing constructive and cooperative working relationships with others, and maintaining them over time.
  • Guiding, Directing, and Motivating Subordinates — Providing guidance and direction to subordinates, including setting performance standards and monitoring performance.
  • Organizing, Planning, and Prioritizing Work — Developing specific goals and plans to prioritize, organize, and accomplish your work.
  • Developing and Building Teams — Encouraging and building mutual trust, respect, and cooperation among team members.
  • Judging the Qualities of Objects, Services, or People — Assessing the value, importance, or quality of things or people.
  • Monitoring and Controlling Resources — Monitoring and controlling resources and overseeing the spending of money.
  • Training and Teaching Others — Identifying the educational needs of others, developing formal educational or training programs or classes, and teaching or instructing others.
  • Updating and Using Relevant Knowledge — Keeping up-to-date technically and applying new knowledge to your job.
  • Communicating with People Outside the Organization — Communicating with people outside the organization, representing the organization to customers, the public, government, and other external sources. This information can be exchanged in person, in writing, or by telephone or e-mail.
  • Coordinating the Work and Activities of Others — Getting members of a group to work together to accomplish tasks.
  • Thinking Creatively — Developing, designing, or creating new applications, ideas, relationships, systems, or products, including artistic contributions.
  • Developing Objectives and Strategies — Establishing long-range objectives and specifying the strategies and actions to achieve them.
  • Performing Administrative Activities — Performing day-to-day administrative tasks such as maintaining information files and processing paperwork.
  • Providing Consultation and Advice to Others — Providing guidance and expert advice to management or other groups on technical, systems-, or process-related topics.
  • Interpreting the Meaning of Information for Others — Translating or explaining what information means and how it can be used.
  • Scheduling Work and Activities — Scheduling events, programs, and activities, as well as the work of others.
  • Assisting and Caring for Others — Providing personal assistance, medical attention, emotional support, or other personal care to others such as coworkers, customers, or patients.
  • Performing for or Working Directly with the Public — Performing for people or dealing directly with the public. This includes serving customers in restaurants and stores, and receiving clients or guests.
  • Inspecting Equipment, Structures, or Materials — Inspecting equipment, structures, or materials to identify the cause of errors or other problems or defects.

Detailed Work Activities

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Work Context

  • Face-to-Face Discussions — 96% responded “Every day.”
  • Telephone — 98% responded “Every day.”
  • Contact With Others — 74% responded “Constant contact with others.”
  • Electronic Mail — 89% responded “Every day.”
  • Work With Work Group or Team — 60% responded “Extremely important.”
  • Structured versus Unstructured Work — 48% responded “A lot of freedom.”
  • Responsibility for Outcomes and Results — 48% responded “Very high responsibility.”
  • Spend Time Sitting — 61% responded “Continually or almost continually.”
  • Importance of Being Exact or Accurate — 42% responded “Extremely important.”
  • Coordinate or Lead Others — 37% responded “Extremely important.”
  • Freedom to Make Decisions — 39% responded “A lot of freedom.”
  • Time Pressure — 37% responded “Once a week or more but not every day.”
  • Deal With External Customers — 60% responded “Extremely important.”
  • Frequency of Decision Making — 37% responded “Every day.”
  • Impact of Decisions on Co-workers or Company Results — 35% responded “Very important results.”
  • Indoors, Environmentally Controlled — 70% responded “Every day.”
  • Duration of Typical Work Week — 61% responded “40 hours.”
  • Letters and Memos — 33% responded “Once a week or more but not every day.”
  • Frequency of Conflict Situations — 41% responded “Once a month or more but not every week.”
  • Deal With Unpleasant or Angry People — 48% responded “Once a month or more but not every week.”
  • Spend Time Making Repetitive Motions — 36% responded “More than half the time.”
  • Importance of Repeating Same Tasks — 26% responded “Extremely important.”

Experience Requirements

Job Zone

Title
Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
Education
Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
Related Experience
Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
Job Training
Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Job Zone Examples
These occupations usually involve using communication and organizational skills to coordinate, supervise, manage, or train others to accomplish goals. Examples include hydroelectric production managers, desktop publishers, electricians, agricultural technicians, barbers, court reporters and simultaneous captioners, and medical assistants.
SVP Range
(6.0 to < 7.0)

Training & Credentials

State training
Local training
Certifications
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Apprenticeship Opportunities

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Worker Requirements

Skills

  • Active Listening — Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
  • Coordination — Adjusting actions in relation to others' actions.
  • Monitoring — Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
  • Reading Comprehension — Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work-related documents.
  • Social Perceptiveness — Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
  • Speaking — Talking to others to convey information effectively.
  • Critical Thinking — Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions, or approaches to problems.
  • Active Learning — Understanding the implications of new information for both current and future problem-solving and decision-making.
  • Instructing — Teaching others how to do something.
  • Judgment and Decision Making — Considering the relative costs and benefits of potential actions to choose the most appropriate one.
  • Management of Personnel Resources — Motivating, developing, and directing people as they work, identifying the best people for the job.
  • Time Management — Managing one's own time and the time of others.
  • Writing — Communicating effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.
  • Learning Strategies — Selecting and using training/instructional methods and procedures appropriate for the situation when learning or teaching new things.
  • Negotiation — Bringing others together and trying to reconcile differences.
  • Persuasion — Persuading others to change their minds or behavior.
  • Service Orientation — Actively looking for ways to help people.
  • Complex Problem Solving — Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.
  • Systems Evaluation — Identifying measures or indicators of system performance and the actions needed to improve or correct performance, relative to the goals of the system.
  • Systems Analysis — Determining how a system should work and how changes in conditions, operations, and the environment will affect outcomes.

Knowledge

  • Administration and Management — Knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning, resource allocation, human resources modeling, leadership technique, production methods, and coordination of people and resources.
  • Customer and Personal Service — Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
  • Administrative — Knowledge of administrative and office procedures and systems such as word processing, managing files and records, stenography and transcription, designing forms, and workplace terminology.
  • English Language — Knowledge of the structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.
  • Computers and Electronics — Knowledge of circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.
  • Personnel and Human Resources — Knowledge of principles and procedures for personnel recruitment, selection, training, compensation and benefits, labor relations and negotiation, and personnel information systems.
  • Economics and Accounting — Knowledge of economic and accounting principles and practices, the financial markets, banking, and the analysis and reporting of financial data.

Education

How much education does a new hire need to perform a job in this occupation? Respondents said:

  • 45%
     
    Bachelor’s degree required
  • 23%
     
    High school diploma or equivalent required
  • 20%
     
    Some college, no degree required

Worker Characteristics

Abilities

  • Oral Comprehension — The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Oral Expression — The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Written Comprehension — The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Speech Clarity — The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Speech Recognition — The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Written Expression — The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Problem Sensitivity — The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Deductive Reasoning — The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Information Ordering — The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Inductive Reasoning — The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Near Vision — The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Fluency of Ideas — The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Originality — The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Category Flexibility — The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Selective Attention — The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.

Interests

Interest code: ECS
Want to discover your interests? Take the O*NET Interest Profiler at My Next Move.
  • Enterprising — Work involves managing, negotiating, marketing, or selling, typically in a business setting, or leading or advising people in political and legal situations. Enterprising occupations are often associated with business initiatives, sales, marketing/advertising, finance, management/administration, professional advising, public speaking, politics, or law.
  • Conventional — Work involves following procedures and regulations to organize information or data, typically in a business setting. Conventional occupations are often associated with office work, accounting, mathematics/statistics, information technology, finance, or human resources.
  • Social — Work involves helping, teaching, advising, assisting, or providing service to others. Social occupations are often associated with social, health care, personal service, teaching/education, or religious activities.

Work Values

  • Support — Occupations that satisfy this work value offer supportive management that stands behind employees. Corresponding needs are Company Policies, Supervision: Human Relations and Supervision: Technical.
  • Independence — Occupations that satisfy this work value allow employees to work on their own and make decisions. Corresponding needs are Creativity, Responsibility and Autonomy.
  • Relationships — Occupations that satisfy this work value allow employees to provide service to others and work with co-workers in a friendly non-competitive environment. Corresponding needs are Co-workers, Moral Values and Social Service.

Work Styles

  • Integrity — Job requires being honest and ethical.
  • Dependability — Job requires being reliable, responsible, and dependable, and fulfilling obligations.
  • Leadership — Job requires a willingness to lead, take charge, and offer opinions and direction.
  • Self-Control — Job requires maintaining composure, keeping emotions in check, controlling anger, and avoiding aggressive behavior, even in very difficult situations.
  • Attention to Detail — Job requires being careful about detail and thorough in completing work tasks.
  • Concern for Others — Job requires being sensitive to others' needs and feelings and being understanding and helpful on the job.
  • Stress Tolerance — Job requires accepting criticism and dealing calmly and effectively with high-stress situations.
  • Achievement/Effort — Job requires establishing and maintaining personally challenging achievement goals and exerting effort toward mastering tasks.
  • Adaptability/Flexibility — Job requires being open to change (positive or negative) and to considerable variety in the workplace.
  • Cooperation — Job requires being pleasant with others on the job and displaying a good-natured, cooperative attitude.
  • Analytical Thinking — Job requires analyzing information and using logic to address work-related issues and problems.
  • Independence — Job requires developing one's own ways of doing things, guiding oneself with little or no supervision, and depending on oneself to get things done.
  • Social Orientation — Job requires preferring to work with others rather than alone, and being personally connected with others on the job.
  • Initiative — Job requires a willingness to take on responsibilities and challenges.
  • Persistence — Job requires persistence in the face of obstacles.
  • Innovation — Job requires creativity and alternative thinking to develop new ideas for and answers to work-related problems.

Workforce Characteristics

Wages & Employment Trends

Median wages (2023)
$30.50 hourly, $63,450 annual
State wages
Local wages
Employment (2023)
1,570,500 employees
Projected growth (2023-2033)
Decline (-1% or lower)
Projected job openings (2023-2033)
138,100
State trends
Top industries (2023)

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics 2023 wage data and 2023-2033 employment projections . “Projected growth” represents the estimated change in total employment over the projections period (2023-2033). “Projected job openings” represent openings due to growth and replacement.

Job Openings on the Web

State job openings
Local job openings

More Information

Professional Associations

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National Associations