Natalia Fedotkina is a longtime executive assistant who is passionate about helping other assistants manage stress and embrace learning and development.
In this episode of The Leader Assistant Podcast, Natalia shares her story of becoming an assistant, tips for managing stress, and her favorite (and least favorite) part of being an assistant.
LEADERSHIP QUOTE
Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.
– John F. Kennedy
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ABOUT NATALIA
Natalia Fedotkina is a bilingual Executive Assistant working with top managers from international companies who run business in Moscow, Russia.
Speaker, moderator and trainer for Executive Assistants, she helps young professionals to grow and supports various communities of personal and business assistants in Russia by writing her blog, sharing tools and resources for assistants. Natalia is married, raising 2 sons.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Natalia Fedotkina [0:00 – 0:21]: My name is Natalia Fedotkina. Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other. Jean F. Kennedy the Leader Assistant Podcast exists to encourage and challenge assistants to become confident, game changing leader Assistants.
Jeremy Burrows [0:31 – 1:04]: Hey friends, welcome to the Leader Assistant Podcast. It’s your host, Jeremy Burrows, and I’m very excited to have you listening in today. Whether you are on your commute to work or you’re on the treadmill or you’re doing dishes or you’re out going for a walk in your neighborhood, whatever you’re doing right now. Thanks for tuning in to the podcast. Appreciate your support. Thanks for listening and yeah, we’re excited to jump in and have a fun conversation with my new friend, Natalia Fedotkina. Natalia, welcome to the show.
Natalia Fedotkina [1:06 – 4:28]: Hello Jeremy, and thank you for inviting me. I’ve been waiting for this moment for several years. To be honest, a few words about myself. My name is Natalia and I’m from Siberia. I was born nearby the famous Baikal Lake and spent my childhood in the forest. When I was a teenager and started thinking about my profession. One day a girl from US entered my classroom. She was sent to our village to teach English and she was definitely shocked by the Russian reality and didn’t speak any Russian at all. So we helped her to settle up and and I immediately decided that I want to be a translator to understand other languages and other cultures. Back in 1990s we moved to Siberia and I went to university. It might be interesting because it took me two and a half days to travel from my university to my hometown. And I do not mention plane tickets because neither my fellow students nor myself could afford to buy a plane ticket those days. And after my graduation I had a chance to travel to us. This is what actually changed my life because I met so many girls from other countries and I worked for Girl Scouts in Oklahoma and Michigan and I traveled to New York and Boston and favorite city, Michigan is where I spent my most time. So this trip actually changed my life because I changed personally, I changed professionally, I improved my English and it gave me the confidence to move to Moscow. From Siberia to Moscow, it’s again four hours by plane. It’s totally different environment, it’s totally different city. Moscow is 20 million citizens right now. But it was a great move because as I like to say, both my husband and myself managed to triple our salaries. This is what happened when you come to Moscow one day. So I’ve been living in Moscow for 20 years. I’m an executive assistant to Xenium Vice president. I’m a simultaneous Translator. I publish my articles and I speak at conferences not only in Russia but abroad. In 2019 I visited London, attend executive secretary Life. Why I met Lucy Brazer and Diana Brendel and Libby Moore and this actually event inspired me in such a way that I returned to Moscow and started my own network.
Jeremy Burrows [4:29 – 4:30]: Nice.
Natalia Fedotkina [4:31 – 4:45]: Yeah, so here I am. So what I basically do, I’m just looking around the world picking up the best of knowledges and tips and trends and bringing them to Moscow.
Jeremy Burrows [4:46 – 4:47]: Love it.
Natalia Fedotkina [4:47 – 5:25]: And yeah, during one of the conferences a girl was watching me and I was giving a talk about networking and now she’s running the associations for assistance. Her name is Anna. We are friends. So this is basically and about my family of course. I’m a mom of two sons, 15 and 18 years old and this year they’re graduating. The younger son will go to the college and the oldest son will go to the university. So this is quite a challenge for a mom.
Jeremy Burrows [5:27 – 6:04]: Wow. Two boys, 15 and 18. My boys are 11 and, and 13. So I got a few years, few years to catch up to you. Okay, that’s awesome. Yeah, that’s a great, great background. Thanks for sharing. Love, love Diana and Lucy and Libby, they’ve all been on the podcast at some point or another. And yeah, it’s so great for you to share your story. Tell us a little bit about maybe one thing that you like to do when you’re not working or not translating.
Natalia Fedotkina [6:06 – 8:34]: Yeah, of course. This is learning. I’m a little bit obsessed with getting new knowledge and I always promote this idea that we should learn every day everything new. And I remember when I had doubts actually whether I should develop as an assistant or I should go to another field. And I took a course in marketing. There were times when I decided to I might be full time interpreter and I took a course in simultaneous interpretation. But most importantly I liked the webinars form assistance and because I could apply them in my daily life. And right now, of course for a couple of years we are obsessed with artificial intelligence learning. And in case of Russia we have a specific because most foreign applications and software cannot be opened from Russian phones and you should download VPN and you should bypass the systems. And for example Jeremy, imagine one day we were told at work that let’s imagine that tomorrow you will not have access to Microsoft Office. Like how come? How can I live without Excel? But it was a real topic of the meeting like can we think about other systems? And if you work for a bank institution or government institution, they have their own, their own applications for chatting, for exchanging emails. And the topic of cyber security and data protection comes along with artificial learning new tools. I mean, of course I will learn new tools, but where I will apply them, how I will apply them. But still the economy is developing so well, especially in Moscow, that you can pick up the employer, pick up the company, go get new knowledge. And surprisingly about most knowledge can be get for free.
Jeremy Burrows [8:35 – 8:37]: Yeah. So you like learning, huh?
Natalia Fedotkina [8:40 – 9:17]: Because Jerry, for a girl which is from remote area, it was actually the only way to grow. I remember when I learned English, we didn’t have Internet and I had to email my homework to my teacher. I’d wait while she sends a reply to me via snail mail. Like imagine from Moscow to Vladivostok, it’s. It’s like two weeks to wait when your home mask is checked. It was a long time ago, now it’s of course it’s faster.
Jeremy Burrows [9:18 – 9:36]: Awesome. And what do you, you know, what are you passionate about when it comes to like you’re writing your blog for assistance, you’re networking, and what are some of the topics you like to write about or that you have written about for assistance in your blog?
Natalia Fedotkina [9:37 – 11:26]: Yeah, usually my blog is about helping newcomer, helping junior assistants to grow. And I really like to pass my knowledge to those assistants who just start. Because I remember my first years in Moscow where we had no network and how hard it was to find the right employer or the right advice. And my best advisor was my best friend actually, and that that was her who helped me to settle in the profession until I found the Facebook and Executive Support, Executive Secretary Life, Executive Support magazine where I took all the resources. Of course my other topic is resilience and managing stress. Because when it comes to our daily life, this is what we talk a lot about in our conferences. And you might be surprised, but in some companies they have like psychological support for the group of assistants. So it’s like it’s not individual consultations. It’s like they take a group of assistants, put them in the class and work on their stress management skills. Interesting. So I developed this topic and of course I’m not very advanced in artificial intelligence, but I have my friend who is running a blog which is about only about tools and AI, kind of exchanging our knowledge.
Jeremy Burrows [11:27 – 11:34]: What are your number one or two tips for stress management for yourself? Like how do you manage your stress?
Natalia Fedotkina [11:36 – 13:02]: The first advice will be to develop the exercises, the tips only for yourself, to manage the stress right in the moment when it happens. Like you can jump, you can yell, you can listen to the music you will go around the office for one hour to vent your emotions. But it should be your own way to manage the stress. Exactly in the moment when it happened. And in the long term, of course, it’s again the system of tools which suits you personally. For example, for one person it can be sport. For another person it could be long hours of hiking in the forest. Just be very. Just listen to yourself and listen to your body and make sure that this is your way to cope the stress. Speaking about myself, it’s hiking. I like to hike in the park which, like across our. Across my apartment. And it’s music. And I have different kind of music for different kind of days.
Jeremy Burrows [13:02 – 13:03]: Yeah.
Natalia Fedotkina [13:05 – 13:14]: Yeah. And of course it’s experience. The more. The more stressful situations you come through, more resilient to become.
Jeremy Burrows [13:15 – 13:37]: Yeah. That’s awesome. Thanks for sharing any, any tips on like. Well, actually, I’m gonna take that back. What’s been your favorite part about being an assistant over the years? What’s your favorite part about the job?
Natalia Fedotkina [13:37 – 14:46]: It’s supporting the leadership teams, having the vision of the company together with my leadership teams, being present at all the meetings where you can watch how the solution was born, how they managed the hardships and headwinds and how they transformed the companies. This is very interesting to watch actually. And of course while I watch, I learn. I told to my general manager that my boss that one day I thought that I could become a gm because I have been learning for seven years from you. I’ve been watching you. But my best friend told me, you know, that usually a mistake to think like this because you were born to be an assistant and he was born to be a gm and we had a nice conversation. It’s just exchanged our views, but it’s definitely. So I like it a lot.
Jeremy Burrows [14:47 – 14:53]: Nice. What would you say is your least favorite part of the job?
Natalia Fedotkina [14:54 – 17:04]: The least favorite part of the job? Let’s say about. Of course it’s uncertainty. When you work for the hype for the boss who manages hundreds, thousands of people. You might be put in the situations where you have not enough information to make a decision or not enough time, but people expect from you the answer. And you should risk whether you should respond on yourself or you should go to a boss, but you can’t reach the boss. And if you do not build the system, do not build the. I would say the, the. The processes in your company. It might be hectic and. And you know that it’s also hard when you know that people are watching you. Like when you walk through the office, everyone knows my name, everyone says hi. And I’ve been with my company for 11 years. I watched the kids of my co workers to grow and sometimes it took me one hour to go through the office because I stood by with chats and like, oh my God, I should back to work. Go back to my work. Because it’s. But when I communicate with people with all company, I, I, I got so many interesting information and some of this information I share with my boss, some of information I do not share. This is also interesting how you decide because you know that assistance are the glue between the management and the co workers and the teams and the departments. So I don’t know whether I like this part or not, but it’s, it’s hard.
Jeremy Burrows [17:05 – 17:49]: Yeah, it’s hard to navigate for sure. Awesome. Well, thanks for sharing. I’m kind of curious, you know, whatever you’re comfortable with as far as the translating, you know, I, I can barely keep up with English. You know, I’ve got, you know, people say, oh, you know, I speak two languages, three languages, whatever. I’m like, I barely speak one language. But I’m curious if you’d be interested in. So you speak two languages or do you speak more than two? So I would be, I would love to hear if you’d be open to it. Maybe you saying something to assistant. You speak Russian, is that right?
Natalia Fedotkina [17:49 – 17:49]: Yes.
Jeremy Burrows [17:50 – 18:13]: Okay, so I would love if you could just share couple sentences of inspiration to the assistance of the world who are listening, who also speak Russian. I’d love it if you could share in Russian. If you’re up for it, just say, say a couple of words of encouragement to them. How do you, Are you up for that? In their own language.
Natalia Fedotkina [18:14 – 18:47]: Okay. In my own language, I guess I would say that means never stop yourself from doing something. If you decide to do something, just go ahead, just ask. Just look for the way to do it. Just never stop yourself from what you, from what you dream about, from what you’re passionate about, because there is always be a way to implement it in life.
Jeremy Burrows [18:48 – 18:51]: That’s amazing. Thank you so much for doing that. Thanks for sharing.
Natalia Fedotkina [18:51 – 20:19]: And you mentioned the English language and simultaneous interpretation. And I should say, Jeremy, it’s actually a very similar profession. When you are a translator. You have to be fast, you have to grasp information and you have to learn. Because today you can interpret the medicine topic, tomorrow you can interpret the fashion show. And I love my translator friends because they have such a, they are the best, the best source of information for me. I can ask them Anything. In my case, I was afraid to become a freelance simultaneous interpreter. I was really afraid not to get my salary every month, but to get the salary for each project. So I decided to be assistant translator. So if my boss invites me for a meeting to translate, I can do that. But if the company invites me for a conference to translate for several days, I will die from the stress because you have to be fast. It’s like it’s always stress, but it’s if you like it. I just like how the English language sounds. If I hear somebody speak English in the streets, I will come to this person and ask him where you’re from.
Jeremy Burrows [20:21 – 20:55]: That’s great. Great. Well, thanks again for being on the show and sharing a little bit of your journey and your story and thanks for reaching out to me back. I don’t remember when you first reached out, but thanks for reaching out nonetheless. And I appreciate you and your passion for assistance of the world and assistance in your community. And yeah, I would love to, love to stay connected, of course. And is there anywhere people can reach out to you or is it kind of tough to share your online connections these days?
Natalia Fedotkina [20:56 – 21:04]: It’s usually Facebook. I do not quite often visit at LinkedIn, but Facebook is the easiest way to reach me.
Jeremy Burrows [21:04 – 21:06]: Okay, sounds good.
Natalia Fedotkina [21:06 – 21:59]: Both professionally and personally for any advice because we are developing, developing connections with other countries and my advice to the assistance communities would be to develop adaptability, flexibility, mindfulness and resilience because I think this is what helps us to beat the stress every day and to grow, of course, develop positive thinking and stay on the bright side no matter what is your day and just make sure you’re connected to other systems, to other people. Make sure you have a body at work in life by who can support you and of course learn new things every day.
Jeremy Burrows [22:00 – 22:29]: Awesome. That’s well said. Thanks for wrapping it up in such an inspirational way. I appreciate it. Yeah, I couldn’t have said it any better myself. And it’s been a joy speaking with you and thank you everyone again for listening. You can check out the show notes for this episode@leaderassistant.com 324leaders assistant.com 324 and yeah, thanks again Natalia. Appreciate it.
Natalia Fedotkina [22:29 – 22:37]: Thank you Jeremy for inviting me. Thanks again for what you are doing for the assistance and I hope we’ll see each other one day in person.
Jeremy Burrows [22:37 – 22:38]: Sounds great.
Natalia Fedotkina [22:48 – 22:51]: Please review on Apple Podcasts.
Jeremy Burrows [22:57 – 22:59]: Gobos.Com.
