Administrative professional vs administrative staff

The differences between administrative professionals and administrative staff can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 1-2 years to become both an administrative professional and an administrative staff. Additionally, an administrative staff has an average salary of $77,101, which is higher than the $39,486 average annual salary of an administrative professional.

The top three skills for an administrative professional include customer service, powerpoint and data entry. The most important skills for an administrative staff are telephone calls, word processing, and travel arrangements.

Administrative professional vs administrative staff overview

	Administrative Professional	Administrative Staff
Yearly salary	$39,486	$77,101
Hourly rate	$18.98	$37.07
Growth rate	-8%	-8%
Number of jobs	87,372	119,030
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 55%	Bachelor's Degree, 63%
Average age	50	50
Years of experience	2	2

What does an administrative professional do?

An administrative professional specializes in performing administrative support and clerical tasks in a company or office, ensuring accuracy and smooth workflow. Their responsibilities typically revolve around managing schedules, arranging appointments and meetings, producing progress reports and presentations, delegating tasks, and attending meetings on behalf of executives or staff. There are also instances when an administrative assistant must answer calls and correspondence, respond to inquiries and concerns, welcome guests, relay messages, and provide staff with any support tasks or documents.

What does an administrative staff do?

As the administrative staff, they primarily provide administrative and secretarial support for the department. Typically, they do report-writing, filing and scheduling, and payroll. They plan department weekly meetings, schedule conference calls, and work on solving administrative related concerns and issues. They do a complex task that involves multi-tasking from the preparation of department reports, analyzing data, and finding solutions. It is a requirement to be an experienced, collaborator, and trained cross-functional communicator. Moreover, other duties will include scheduling company-initiated activities, meetings, and events.

Administrative professional vs administrative staff salary

Administrative professionals and administrative staff have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Administrative Professional	Administrative Staff
Average salary	$39,486	$77,101
Salary range	Between $23,000 And $65,000	Between $58,000 And $101,000
Highest paying City	San Francisco, CA	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	Connecticut	California
Best paying company	HomeOwners Advantage	NVIDIA
Best paying industry	-	Professional

Differences between administrative professional and administrative staff education

There are a few differences between an administrative professional and an administrative staff in terms of educational background:

	Administrative Professional	Administrative Staff
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 55%	Bachelor's Degree, 63%
Most common major	Business	Business
Most common college	Western Carolina University	University of Pennsylvania

Administrative professional vs administrative staff demographics

Here are the differences between administrative professionals' and administrative staff' demographics:

	Administrative Professional	Administrative Staff
Average age	50	50
Gender ratio	Male, 17.4% Female, 82.6%	Male, 31.9% Female, 68.1%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 9.4% Unknown, 3.9% Hispanic or Latino, 16.4% Asian, 3.8% White, 65.8% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7%	Black or African American, 9.2% Unknown, 3.9% Hispanic or Latino, 16.2% Asian, 3.8% White, 66.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7%
LGBT Percentage	6%	6%

Differences between administrative professional and administrative staff duties and responsibilities

Administrative professional example responsibilities.

Manage documentation, folder structures and user permissions in SharePoint.
Participate in committee meetings by preparing minutes and presentation summaries, planning meeting agendas, and organizing and managing meeting logistics.
Keep vendors accounts up to date, process payroll, collect on accounts receivable, keep accounts payable up to date.
Create document libraries for several hospital initiatives in SharePoint.
Receive and distribute payroll garnishment/bankruptcy notification letters to employees.
Develop and maintain relevant organizational charts, facilitating retrieval of staff data in PowerPoint format.

Administrative staff example responsibilities.

Support medical doctors, manage sensitive and confidential records pertaining to high risk patients with emphasis on accuracy.
Prepare PowerPoint presentations for management distribution.
Maintain payroll information by collect, calculate and enter data.
Prepare briefing slides and presentation material using PowerPoint and Visio.
Maintain accounting statements, databases, and other financial information such as payroll coding and budget preparation
Provide cloud base customer relationship management with Salesforce for optimization in coordination of the workforce development program and other community orient events

Administrative professional vs administrative staff skills

Common administrative professional skills

Customer Service, 16%
PowerPoint, 12%
Data Entry, 11%
Travel Arrangements, 7%
Administrative Tasks, 3%
Office Equipment, 3%

Common administrative staff skills

Telephone Calls, 19%
Word Processing, 16%
Travel Arrangements, 7%
Payroll, 6%
Personnel Actions, 6%
Financial Reports, 5%

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Office and Administrative Industry
Administrative Professional
Administrative Professional vs Administrative Staff

Updated January 8, 2025

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