Role

Executive Assistant

Our Executive Assistants act as a dedicated right-hand for founders, partners, and senior leaders. They protect your time, prep your meetings, manage personal logistics, and keep both work and life moving — with the discretion you'd expect from an in-house chief of staff.

What they handle

  • Inbox & calendar
  • Travel coordination
  • Meeting prep & notes
  • Personal errands

Best for

  • Founders and CEOs running lean teams
  • Partners at boutique firms
  • Executives juggling personal and professional ops

Tools they use

Google WorkspaceMicrosoft 365CalendlySlackNotion1Password

Why founders hire an Executive Assistant first

An Executive Assistant is the highest-leverage first hire for almost every founder we work with. The reason is simple: the work that drains a founder's calendar — inbox triage, meeting prep, scheduling, travel, vendor follow-up, expense reports — is recurring, low-judgment, and time-bound. Those are the exact characteristics that make work safe to delegate to a trained VA in week one.

Most clients tell us they get back 10–15 hours a week within the first month. That's not because the EA works faster than they do — it's because a focused EA owns the queue. When inbox triage stops happening in 3-minute spurts between calls and instead happens once at 8am and once at 4pm, the founder gets uninterrupted blocks back for strategic work, sales calls, and product. The compounding return on those reclaimed blocks is what makes the role pay back in the first 90 days.

How an EA fits into your week

Your EA works your business hours in your time zone. We default to a daily morning briefing (priorities, calendar, anything urgent in the inbox), a daily end-of-day wrap (open loops, follow-ups for tomorrow), and a 30-minute weekly sync to plan the next 5 days. Tools, communication channels, and SLAs are documented in your shared SOP folder so the role is replaceable without losing institutional knowledge.

We've seen this cadence work across every kind of operator — solo founders running $1M services businesses, partners at boutique law firms, GMs at multi-location operators, and executives at fast-growing startups. The role is the same; the volume and judgment dial up over time as the EA earns more decision rights.

What an EA does in week one vs. month three

In week one your Executive Assistant is in shadow mode: getting access to your inbox and calendar, learning your tone of voice from past replies, and recording short Looms back to you of how they're going to triage. By Friday they own the first version of inbox triage, daily calendar review, and a shared running 'open loops' doc that becomes the source of truth for everything that needs follow-up.

By month three the role looks completely different. Your EA is drafting replies in your voice that you approve with a one-word reply, owning meeting prep packs for every external call, and quietly catching the kinds of mistakes that used to cost you weekends — the double-booked vendor, the renewal that was about to auto-charge, the personal commitment that conflicted with a board call. The transition from week one to month three isn't about the EA getting smarter — it's about your SOPs accumulating and your decision rights expanding.

How to know it's working

There are four signals that tell you an EA engagement is on track. First: your inbox ends every day at zero or your defined threshold, and you didn't have to think about it. Second: your calendar has at least three protected deep-work blocks per week that no one moved. Third: every external meeting on your calendar has a 1-page brief delivered the day before. Fourth: you can take a real day off without your business going sideways. Hitting all four within 60 days is the standard we hold every EA placement to.

Sample responsibilities

A snapshot of the work a Executive Assistant ships day-to-day. Your SOPs and priorities shape the actual mix.

Triage and respond to email on your behalf using your tone of voice
Own your calendar — scheduling, rescheduling, and protecting deep-work blocks
Coordinate domestic and international travel, including itineraries and confirmations
Prep meeting agendas, briefing docs, and post-meeting action items
Manage vendor relationships, expense reports, and recurring subscriptions
Handle personal logistics: appointments, gifting, reservations, household vendors

Example deliverables

Concrete artifacts your Executive Assistant ships on a recurring cadence — so you always know what's coming and when.

Daily inbox triage report

Daily

Inbox at zero (or your target threshold) with a short brief flagging anything needing your attention.

Weekly calendar plan

Weekly

Next week's calendar reviewed and optimized — conflicts resolved, deep-work blocks protected, prep time scheduled.

Travel itineraries

Per trip

Door-to-door itinerary with confirmations, ground transport, hotel, and meeting-by-meeting logistics in one doc.

Meeting briefing docs

Pre-meeting

1-page brief for every external meeting: attendees, context, talking points, and post-meeting next steps logged.

What "done" looks like

Measurable success criteria we hold the work to — reviewed weekly with your account manager.

  • Inbox triaged within your SLA every business day
  • No double-bookings or missed conflicts on your calendar
  • Every external meeting has a brief delivered before it starts
  • Expense reports submitted within 5 business days of receipts
FAQs

Common questions about hiring a Executive Assistant

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Resources

Guides for hiring & working with a Executive Assistant

Practical playbooks to set your VA up for success from day one.