Want to Be a Right Hand Person?

By Marty Nemko

Would you like to be the right-hand to a successful person. Sometimes, personal assistants are treated poorly and given only scutwork, but often, it's a cool career. For example, a typical day in the life of Olympia Dukakis' personal assistant: Give your opinion on her new movie contract, pick up her dog's gourmet dog food, suggest ideas for marketing her new salad dressing, pick up her dry cleaning. Salaries range from $30,000-$120,000 plus perks. What sort of perks? Well, Carol Burnett gave her assistant a Land Rover for her birthday. What does it take to be a good personal assistant? It varies with the job, but you almost certainly must be organized, responsible, loyal.

What can you do today?
Personal assistant jobs are almost always landed through a personal referral. So, ask every well-connected person you know if they might know someone who could use a personal assistant.