Secretaries and Administrative Assistants
(Except Legal, Medical, and Executive)

Moderate Risk
Low High

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Occupation snapshot

What does this snowflake show?
The Snowflake is a visual summary of the five badges: Automation Risk (calculated), Risk (polled), Growth, Wages and Volume. It gives you an instant snapshot of an occupations profile. The colour of the Snowflake relates to its size. The better the occupation scores in relation to others, the larger and greener the Snowflake becomes.
JOB SCORE
2.7/10
What's this?
Job Score (higher is better):

We rate jobs using four factors. These are:

- Chance of being automated
- Job growth
- Wages
- Volume of available positions

These are some key things to think about when job hunting.

Risk & user votes

Calculated automation risk

59% (Moderate Risk)

Moderate Risk (41-60%): This occupation may be meaningfully affected by automation. Some parts of the role may be suitable for AI, software, or robotics, while others still rely on human skill, judgement, trust, or real-world context. People in this range may benefit from building skills that complement automation and reduce replacement risk.

More information on what this score is, and how it is calculated is available here.

Human strengths important in this job

These are human abilities and work contexts that are important in this occupation. They may help explain why parts of the role are harder to replace end-to-end, but they are not the only inputs into the automation score.

Assisting and caring for others

Quite important
Why this matters
Provide hands-on help, emotional support, or personal care to people—work that depends on empathy, trust, and responding to individual needs in the moment.
Jobs that also use this strength

Thinking creatively

Quite important
Why this matters
Coming up with original ideas and designs—creating new concepts, products, systems, or artistic work. This kind of open-ended invention and taste-based judgment is harder to automate end-to-end than routine, rule-based tasks.
Jobs that also use this strength

Social perceptiveness

Quite important
Why this matters
Noticing others’ emotions and reactions in the moment and adjusting what you say or do based on why they’re responding that way.
Jobs that also use this strength

Decision-making and problem solving

Quite important
Why this matters
Analyze information, weigh tradeoffs, and choose the best solution—especially when situations are ambiguous, high-stakes, or have real-world consequences.
Jobs that also use this strength

Communicating with people outside the organization

Quite important
Why this matters
Represents the organization to customers, the public, or government—handling questions, concerns, and relationship-building through conversations, writing, calls, or email.
Jobs that also use this strength

What users think

Based on 195 votes

73% chance of full automation within the next two decades

Our visitors have voted that it's probable this occupation will be automated. This assessment is further supported by the calculated automation risk level, which estimates 59% chance of automation.

What do you think the risk of automation is?

What is the likelihood that Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive will be replaced by robots or artificial intelligence within the next 20 years?

Sentiment

Based on user votes over time

View sentiment trend

How opinions have changed over time

Pay & outlook

Wages

Low paid relative to other professions

In 2024, the median annual wage for Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive was $46,290 ($22 per hour).

The median annual wage for Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive was 6.5% lower than the national median annual wage, which stood at $49,500.

View wage trend

Wages over time

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Growth

Slow growth relative to other professions.

The number of 'Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive' job openings is expected to decline 1.6% by 2034

View employment trend

Total employment, and estimated job openings

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the period between 2023 and 2033
Updated projections are due 09-2025.

Volume

Significantly greater range of job opportunities compared to other professions

As of 2024 there were 1,737,820 people employed as 'Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive' within the United States.

This represents around 1.1% of the employed workforce across the country

Put another way, around 1 in 88 people are employed as 'Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive'.

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What people are saying (4)

Angelie avinado (Moderate)
03 Nov 2022 22:18
As new technology arises today it is highly possible.
Daniel G. M. (Highly likely)
22 Jun 2022 03:52
AI is a reality, and all administrative tasks will be automated by a computer. It's happening now.

In the future, only face-to-face assistance will remain human.
learningprof (Highly likely)
30 Sep 2019 17:21
Much of the work of scheduling and coordination has been absorbed by employees. Also, easy to use design of calendars and automation of procurement and service coordination has rendered their jobs obsolete.
Tyler
31 Mar 2019 01:16
I had a job as a recruiting coordinator and I have to say it felt like I was a robot that my managers watched after only to fix malfunctions, never to give me something more to do or think about in life. If I had an idea to improve work flow or make the job easier for my team, the response was that my Service Level Agreement responsibilities came first. So with all those robotic responsibilities, I usually worked 5 hours of overtime a week just to get them done and I never for anything else. I feel bad for anyone with this kind of job because it is lowly and surely automation software will make it non-existant soon enough.
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Job description

Perform routine administrative functions such as drafting correspondence, scheduling appointments, organizing and maintaining paper and electronic files, or providing information to callers.

O*NET-SOC code: 43-6014.00