A atuação estratégica do secretariado executivo no Vale do Mamanguape: competências, trabalho de articulação e reconhecimento profissional

Abstract

This article examines how executive secretarial graduates and professionals working in assistantship and management support roles perceive their own practice in the Vale do Mamanguape micro-region, in the Brazilian state of Paraíba, focusing on the competencies they mobilise, the nature of the work they perform and the recognition they receive. The study follows a qualitative, exploratory and descriptive approach. Data were collected through a self administered electronic questionnaire containing nine open-ended discursive questions, answered by ten participants currently working in the micro-region. The material was treated as a corpus of textualised statements and submitted to thematic content analysis as proposed by Bardin (2011), articulated with the notions of articulation work and invisible work developed by Star and Strauss (1999) and with Abbott's (1988) concept of professional jurisdiction. The analysis was organised into four categories: transition from operational support to process coordination; multidimensional competencies and digital intensification; asymmetrical recognition and generic job titles; education, regional challenges and future prospects. The accounts indicate that the described practice exceeds operational support and takes on features of workflow coordination and support for managerial decision-making, while formal recognition remains anchored in an operational representation of the role, expressed mainly through pay and generic job designations. The study concludes that the gap between the work actually performed and the recognition granted constitutes not only a matter of professional valuation but also a governance risk for regional organisations, since it concentrates process memory and deadline control in formally peripheral positions. The research contributes by reframing the invisibility of secretarial work as an organisational problem rather than merely a corporate demand of the professional category.