Secretary Terms and Abbreviations Glossary

General information, not professional or legal advice.

How to Use This Glossary

The secretary family has more titles and abbreviations than almost any other office role. Some are formal, some are casual, and a few mean entirely different things depending on context.

This glossary gathers the key terms in one place. Where a term has its own full article in the What Is Secy series, this page links to it. Everything here is written in plain language, not legal or HR jargon.

The Core Word

• Secretary. A person who manages correspondence, records, scheduling, and confidential matters for a leader, a group, or an organization. See What Is a Secretary?
• Secy. A common short form of secretary, used in minutes, letterheads, notes, and lists. Read more in Secy vs Secretary
• Sec. A tight formal abbreviation of secretary. It can also mean section or seconds, so context matters.
• Sec’y. An older contraction of secretary, mostly seen in legacy documents.

The full word is safest in formal writing. Short forms save space when the meaning is clear.

Titles in the Same Family

• Executive assistant (EA). A senior support role focused on planning, coordination, and gatekeeping for one executive. Compare the roles in Secretary vs Executive Assistant
• Personal assistant (PA). The common title in the UK and parts of the Commonwealth for a secretary who supports one person.
• Administrative assistant. Usually supports a team or department with shared logistics, rather than one principal.
• Personal secretary / private secretary. A secretary dedicated to a single leader, often with confidential duties.

The boundary between these titles moves by company and country, so always read the job description.

Secretaries by Setting

• Executive secretary. A senior secretary supporting an executive, close to EA work.
• Legal secretary. Supports lawyers with legal documents, filings, and strict confidentiality.
• Medical secretary. Supports clinics and practitioners with patient records and medical correspondence.
• School secretary. Runs the administrative front desk of a school.
• Company secretary. A statutory governance officer, not an administrative role. See What Is a Company Secretary?

Each setting keeps the same core, order and trust, and adds its own specialist knowledge. We map all of them in Types of Secretaries

Words Around the Work

• Correspondence. Letters, emails, and messages a secretary drafts, sends, sorts, and tracks.
• Minutes. The official written record of a meeting.
• Agenda. The list of items to be covered in a meeting.
• Filing / records. Keeping documents and files accurate and findable.
• Diary / calendar management. Protecting and coordinating someone’s schedule.
• Gatekeeping. Controlling who and what gets access to a leader’s time.
• Discretion. The ability to keep confidential matters private, the core of the role.
• Shorthand. A fast note-taking system, less common today but still relevant in some settings.

What the Role Is Called Over Time

The same work has been renamed repeatedly as it moved up the value chain:

• Scribes and amanuenses in earlier centuries.
• Secretaries through the office era.
• Executive assistants and PAs in recent decades.
• Personal AI assistants today.

Understanding the history explains why the titles overlap so much. See The Evolution of the Secretary and The Future of the Secretary

A Quick Rule of Thumb

If you are unsure which term to use:

• Secretary is the neutral, formal, all-purpose word.
• Secy / Sec. are abbreviations for spaces where the word appears often.
• Executive assistant / PA suggest a more senior, one-to-one role.
• Company secretary is governance, not administration. Do not confuse them.

New here? Start with What Is Secy?

Sources & Further Reading

• Merriam-Webster: the definition of secretary and its abbreviations (merriam-webster.com/dictionary/secretary)
• Cambridge Dictionary: the modern meaning of secretary (dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/secretary)
• Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries: the modern meaning of secretary (oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/secretary)
• Online Etymology Dictionary: the origin of secretary and related words (etymonline.com/word/secretary)

Part of the What Is Secy series. New here? Start with What Is Secy? · Explore: Types of Secretaries

Secretary. Secy. EA. PA. Company secretary. Now you know exactly what each one means. 👉 Read: What Is Secy?