Executive assistant performance goals: 10 real examples and smart tracking tools

Business

Executive assistant performance goals have moved well beyond keeping a calendar in 2025. Leaders now expect their EAs to drive strategy. Yet most search results still give vague advice like “be organized.”

This guide fixes that problem by offering 10 SMART, metric-ready goals—each paired with a tracking tool. We group them into four focus areas: retention and engagement, core efficiency, process improvement, and strategic growth, so you can drop them straight into Lattice, Viva Goals, or any platform you use.

Why do SMART, metric-ready goals matter in 2025?

A strategic executive assistant uses clear metrics and dashboards to drive performance conversations.

Annual reviews now shape budgets, bonuses, and even the meetings an EA can join. Nearly three-quarters of large companies already link incentive pay to three or more performance metrics, up from 2020 levels, according to a 2024 Harvard Law School Corporate Governance analysis. When objectives stay fuzzy (“improve communication”), assistants lose bargaining power.

A SMART target (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound) helps in two ways:

1. Weekly progress is visible, so you can adjust months before review day.  
2. The metrics align with the executive’s scorecard (quarterly KPIs, investor decks, OKRs), so your wins stand out.

Software makes tracking effortless. Calendly, Fellow, and Lattice automatically log reschedules, agenda scores, and recognition counts. High-performing HR teams are 2.6 times more likely to invest in this kind of performance software than low performers, according to Lattice’s 2024 State of People Strategy report.

Clarity also protects well-being. Gallup research shows employees who strongly agree they know what is expected are 47 percent less likely to feel frequent burnout. Swap vague wishes for tracked metrics, and you gain proof of impact along with a healthier workload.

Segment A – retention and engagement

Turnover drains momentum and budget: Gallup estimates that replacing a skilled assistant can cost up to 200 percent of salary when you add recruiting, onboarding, and lost productivity. A 2024 Gallup study offers hope: employees who receive high-quality recognition are 45 percent less likely to leave within two years.

This segment turns those numbers into action. You will set goals that build steady feedback loops, visible recognition, and trackable engagement scores. When those inputs are solid, every efficiency play that follows rests on firm ground.

Goal 1: launch a feedback and recognition program that cuts turnover

High-quality recognition is sticky: employees who receive it are 45 percent less likely to leave within two years, according to Gallup. Industry analysis by SecondTalent shows that replacing a clerical or administrative professional usually costs 50 to 80 percent of annual salary.

Drawing on Gallup’s 45 percent stickiness finding, C-Suite Assistants’ 2025 deep dive into executive assistant retention recommends pairing quick weekly check-ins, in-the-moment thank-yous, and quarterly reviews.

It then tracks success through three KPIs—EA retention rate, pulse-survey satisfaction, and alignment to agreed goals—so you can prove the program works without crowding the calendar.

That same research recommends tracking a small set of KPIs, including EA retention rate, satisfaction from short surveys, and alignment to agreed goals, so you can see whether recognition habits are actually moving the needle.

SMART objective

Set up check-ins every two weeks and run quarterly pulse surveys to raise the EA’s Gallup Q¹² engagement score from the U.S. average of 31 percent to at least 37 percent (a 20 percent lift) while keeping voluntary turnover at zero for the next 12 months, Gallup reports.

How to measure

Lattice or 15Five can schedule feedback, nudge responses, and chart:  

• Recognition entries logged per month  
• Engagement score trend each quarter  
• EA tenure compared with the admin-team average

If the first two climb and the last stays flat, you have data-backed proof that your recognition program works.

Segment B – core efficiency and time-savings

Busy executives lose nearly 11 hours a week to meetings—about 28 percent of a 40-hour schedule—according to meeting-analytics platform Noota. The average professional still waits more than three hours for a work-hour email reply, EmailAnalytics finds. Those hours crowd out strategic thinking.

The goals below attack that waste directly: cleaner calendars, quicker inbox triage, and meetings that wrap before the coffee cools. Trim these drains, and you free up time the executive can invest in high-value work.

Goal 2: cut reschedules by 30 percent with an AI calendar assistant

A 2024 Reclaim.ai study of 15,000 professionals shows that one-on-one meetings get rescheduled 42.4 percent of the time. Every switch costs context and goodwill.

SMART objective

Install Clockwise or Calendly Smart Scheduling, track Reschedule rate = meetings moved ÷ meetings booked, and shrink that rate by 30 percent within one quarter, recovering at least two hours of executive focus each week.

Clockwise’s analytics dashboard helps executive assistants measure reschedule rate and hours of focus time gained.

How to measure  

1. Pull a 30-day baseline.  
2. Activate the assistant so it handles holds, buffers, and time-zone math.  
3. After 12 weeks, compare dashboard data: locked events, automatic shifts, and hours returned.

If the reschedule curve drops and free blocks rise, you have proof that calendar chaos is under control.

Goal 3: triage the inbox and reply to high-priority email within one hour

Work email still eats 2.5 hours of an average professional’s day, and the typical business response time is 12 hours—far slower than the one-hour window 90 percent of customers now expect, according to multiple email-benchmarking studies. Speed matters internally, too: Harvard research shows leads reached within an hour are seven times more likely to qualify.

SMART objective

Deploy SaneBox or Outlook Focused Inbox to route low-impact mail away from the VIP queue and cut median reply time on VIP-tagged messages from four hours to one hour within 30 days.

How to measure  

1. Record a 14-day baseline of VIP response times.  
2. Turn on filters and AI summaries; add color-coded labels (VIP, Urgent, FYI).  
3. Track:  

When the dashboard shows a 75 percent faster reply rate and more frequent inbox-zero days, you have reclaimed executive focus and documented the gain.

Goal 4: keep meetings under 30 minutes and close 100 percent of agenda items

Only 37 percent of meetings have an agenda, yet teams with agendas are twice as likely to finish on time and make clear decisions, according to collaboration platform Flowtrace. Attention drops sharply after the 30-minute mark; 91 percent of attendees stay fully engaged for 15 minutes, but focus falls fast beyond half an hour, Noota finds.

SMART objective

Send a structured agenda in Fellow 24 hours ahead, cap weekly team meetings at 30 minutes, and achieve a 100 percent agenda-item closure rate for 12 consecutive weeks.

How to measure

Fellow records timestamps for each section and marks items complete. Track:  

• Average meeting length  
• Agenda completion rate

When the dashboard shows 30 minutes or less and 100 percent closure, meetings shift from cost centers to decision engines.

Segment C – project and process improvement

Poor project execution is costly: the Project Management Institute estimates organizations waste about 9.9 cents of every dollar—roughly 99 million dollars per billion invested—because of weak project performance. Once daily fires are out, the executive assistant can claw that money back through tight budgets, clear processes, and simple automations.

Goal 5: deliver the annual leadership retreat on time, on budget, and at 90 percent or higher satisfaction

Industry surveys show that almost 60 percent of corporate event planners reported budget overruns in 2022, and attendee satisfaction averages hover near 73 percent for internal off-sites.

SMART objective

Plan the leadership retreat by July 15, keep total spend at or below 10,000 dollars (about 250 dollars per attendee for a 40-person team), and earn at least 90 percent “very satisfied” responses on the post-event survey.

How to execute and measure  

1. Build milestones in Asana—venue booked, agenda finalized, travel confirmed—with automatic reminders.  
2. Track spend in a budget column and flag variances above five percent.  
3. Collect real-time feedback via a ten-question QR survey; Asana or Google Sheets logs satisfaction scores.

When the dashboard shows green on timeline, dollars, and a 90 percent or better score, you have a data-backed showcase project.

Goal 6: automate at least five hours of admin work per week with Zapier

A 2025 Talker survey of 2,000 U.S. employees found that knowledge workers spend about 3.5 hours each week on repetitive tasks they would rather hand off to automation tools. Zapier case studies echo that: Remote.com saves 616 hours a month—about 35 hours per employee—by routing IT tickets automatically.

SMART objective

Map a high-frequency task—such as logging signed contracts from Slack into HubSpot—and build a Zapier workflow that saves at least five human hours every week within 30 days.

A Zapier workflow logs signed contracts from Slack into HubSpot and tracks task runs to prove hours saved each week.

How to execute and measure  

1. Time one manual run of the task, then multiply by weekly volume to set a baseline.  
2. Build the Zap (trigger: finalized PDF → actions: rename file, move to folder, update CRM).  
3. Track:  

A steady 20 daily Zap runs at 90 seconds saved each equals five reclaimed hours—ready for your next performance review.

Goal 7: build monthly stakeholder check-ins to cut cross-team turnaround by 25 percent

Inefficient hand-offs and status chases cost companies an estimated 50 billion dollars a year, and half of tech projects stall because stakeholders are not aligned on requirements, according to ParallelStaff’s 2025 communication study.

SMART objective

Identify five key partners (finance, legal, product, HR, IT). Host a 20-minute sync with each at month-end, log needs on a shared Notion board, and trim average request-to-completion time from eight days to six days (a 25 percent cut) within two months.

How to measure  

1. Pull last quarter’s turnaround average for cross-team tasks.  
2. Run two check-in cycles; Notion tracks open and close dates automatically.  
3. Compare the new mean with the baseline. Hold the six-day average for two straight cycles, then share the win.

Goal 8: redesign the file system to cut document search time by 20 percent

Knowledge workers lose an average of 2.5 hours per day—about 30 percent of the workday—searching for information in emails and cloud drives, estimates Copernic. That is roughly 24,000 dollars in wasted salary for an 80,000-dollar employee.

SMART objective

Rebuild the digital knowledge base so the median time to locate a file drops from 60 seconds to 48 seconds (a 20 percent cut) within six months.

A streamlined, two-level folder structure and tagged knowledge base can dramatically reduce file search time for executive assistants.

How to execute and measure  

1. Run a two-week baseline test: record how long it takes five teammates to find ten common documents; log the median.  
2. Reorganize high-traffic folders in SharePoint, Google Drive, or Notion using a two-level folder rule and clear titles.  
3. Add an indexed wiki with search-friendly tags (project, owner, fiscal year).  
4. Use platform analytics to track search success rate and time-to-open each month.

Hit the 48-second median and reduce duplicates, then share a Loom walkthrough to lock in new habits.

Segment D – growth and strategic partnership

Career development is not a perk; it is a retention lever. Market.biz reports that 72 percent of employees feel more engaged when their company invests in training and advancement. For executive assistants, new skills translate directly into higher-level delegation and more executive think time.

The goals below focus on measurable growth—certifications that shorten report prep and project takeovers that give leaders additional strategy hours.

Goal 9: earn a CAP certification and trim report prep by at least 15 percent

Pearson’s 2025 Value of Certification report found that 70 percent of certified workers say their productivity improved after upskilling.

SMART objective

Pass the Certified Administrative Professional (CAP) exam by Q4 and use advanced Excel skills (pivot tables, Power Query) to cut the finance dashboard cycle from six hours to five hours or less, a reduction of at least 15 percent, for two consecutive months.

How to execute and measure  

1. Block two 90-minute study sessions each week; track progress in LinkedIn Learning’s CAP prep course.  
2. Re-engineer the dashboard: automate data pulls, replace manual formulas with pivots, and add templates for narrative commentary.  
3. Time one full prep cycle before the revamp, then log the next two cycles. A drop to five hours or less proves the certification delivered real efficiency.

Goal 10: take over three low-priority projects and raise executive think time by 25 percent

A ServiceNow survey of U.S. and U.K. managers shows senior leaders spend about 15 hours each week on routine updates, forms, and status checks that could be delegated—nearly two full workdays.

SMART objective

By September 30, assume ownership of three tasks worth a combined ten hours per week (for example, vendor RFPs, a quarterly slide deck, and a cross-team status report) and raise the executive’s blocked think time from eight to ten hours per week, a 25 percent lift, for one full quarter.

How to execute and measure  

1. Run a two-week time study to record current strategic hours.  
2. Add the three projects to Microsoft Viva Goals, linking each to a key result:  
3. Review metrics after 12 weeks. When the calendar shows ten or more strategic hours and the delegated projects hit deadlines without direct oversight, the partnership has shifted from support to leverage.

Ethan Bull sums it up: “The executive assistant’s goals are the principal’s goals.” Achieving these targets proves the point.

Which tool fits which goal?

Here is a side-by-side snapshot so you can match each SMART target to software that tracks progress automatically.

Each software tool in this guide supports specific executive assistant goals, from feedback and calendars to automation and OKRs.

*Vendor prices reviewed December 19, 2025. Check current tiers before purchase.

Pick the tool that aligns with your highest-impact goal first; automated data capture means fewer admin chores and quicker wins.

Turn annual reviews into launchpads

Executives no longer reward general promises like “be proactive.” Instead, they need clear, metric-tied results that map directly to their own scorecards. The ten SMART objectives above—spanning retention, efficiency, process improvement, and strategic growth—show exactly how an executive assistant can deliver measurable impact.

Pair each goal with the right software, track progress in real time, and you will turn annual reviews into launchpads for both the assistant’s career and the organization’s success.