| Welcome to Issue 261. I hope this Issue finds you well and you had a great weekend? I had a really fun one, combining cricket (the last game of the season for Lottie, my daughter), and getting together with friends for our local pub quiz on Saturday night. One of the specialist rounds for the quiz was on the topic of “collective nouns”. Whilst our knowledge on this was good, a few missed points meant we came third and were “pipped at the post”for first and second position. Collective nouns is the feature for today’s Issue No 261 as I invite you to consider what a collective noun for PAs/EAs could be. The English language is full of quirky surprises, and collective nouns are one of its most charming oddities. We all know about a pride of lions, a gaggle of geese, or a school of fish — but did you know it gets much stranger than that? For example: A group of flamingos is called a flamboyance (quite fitting, don’t you think?). Owls gather in a parliament (wise and solemn — unless you’ve heard them at night). A collection of crows is, famously, a murder (dramatic, but memorable). Hedgehogs? A prickle. (We got this one right in our pub quiz btw!) And one of my favourites: a confusion of guinea fowl. It seems every species, profession, or even object could have its own playful collective noun, sometimes poetic, sometimes witty, sometimes downright bizarre. Which brings me to us… Executive Assistants and Personal Assistants. If flamingos get a flamboyance and owls get a parliament, surely we deserve one too! Whether we’re at conferences, networking events, or even just in the office WhatsApp group, we’re a community — and surely a collective noun is in order. My ideas are “a precision of PAs”, “a proactiveness of PAs”, “a powerhouse of EAs”… So here’s my question for you: What should the collective noun for EAs and PAs be? Happy thinking! |
