Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

There has been numerous threads and posts here in the last few months about and by VAs - Virtual Assistants. This service niche has always interested me as I know a number of "momprenuers" who operate various versions of a VA business. I ran across an interesting article that relates the VA business to the real estate business. Might be something for established VAs and wannabe VAs to consider. Sounds like a pretty lucative avenue to me. Opens up other ideas for me to relate VA service to any sales organization.

What to do when . . . You want to grow but can’t yet afford in-house staff

Have a great weekend - I`m making it a long one - see ya next week.

R@

Mia,

Best wishes and much success in your new career. Maybe you VAs should start your own thread here at SuN. Seems to be quite a bit of interest and discussion on the subject.

Have a great weekend! - R@

How true your thoughts are regarding the idea of "being" in the office to be able to handle the administrative tasks.

It`s a mind shift of many that needs to formulate to understand that it`s not necessary to be next door at the desk to be able to handle the administrative tasks.  What I do now and much of what I did previously was still handled via email and phone calls with my managers.

It`s important idea for people to remember that virtual assistants are also solo business people as well and no longer considered an employee of an organization, unless of course your a partner is a business handling the administrative aspect of it.

Virtual Assistants can handle all aspects of the administration side of things for a business and likely be more efficient and not as costly as an "in-house" assistant because when a Virtual Assistant is working on a project their time is wholly dedicated to that project and not what`s going on around the water cooler.

Hi, all!  Just joined here (I`ll have to explore and find out where to post my introduction). As the founder of the Virtual Assistance Chamber of Commerce, I`m loving the lively conversation about Virtual Assistants.

One of my jobs as the founder, and the role of our organization, is to help bring greater awareness and understanding to the business world about what Virtual Assistants are and how they can help business owners.

This topic is coming at the perfect time.  My husband and I were just talking about this last night; me hiring a virtual assistant.

I like the concept overall as I run my business from my home, but I cannot help but think that it may be easier to just do it myself than to contact my VA every time I need something ordered, reasearched, etc.  Not to mention that I`ve had the worst experiences with hiring independent contractors to do work for me who had stellar references and ended up leaving me with results way below expectations and contractual obligations. 

I`m interested in hearing more about others` experiences with VAs.

Cheers,

Tammy

2. Do your research. A VA should have several years of corporate/real-world experience. Additionally, it would be helpful if they can provide you with a list of references. If you want, and have time, give some of those people a call.

3. Don`t settle. In my opinion, you`ll know when you find the right person. If it doesn`t feel right, keep looking. If you’ve contracted them for a month and it’s still not working, dissolve the relationship and try again. After all, this is your business and you have a lot riding on it. Believe it or not, Virtual Assistants can feel the same way you do -- if we come across a client that we`re unsure about, we won`t work with them. In short, we don`t settle either.

4. Most important, Communication. This is a two-way street. Your VA will and should communicate with you and ensure her understanding of what you need done. Likewise, you should be communicating with her.

Bottom line: it can work. Once you have a VA whom you begin to trust and you have a system going, you`ll find it easier and easier to delegate projects to her. Start off with something small, see how she handles that and see how you feel about giving it up. You don`t have to give up everything all at once, but if it works, you`ll find yourself giving up more than you ever thought you would and having time in your day to actually work on your core business rather than handling things such as bookkeeping, compiling marketing lists, or trying to figure out that dreaded mail merge system.

Let me tell you, once you work with a good VA -- you`ll never be without one again! I`m sure there will be other VAs who may have some other advice, but those are just a few things that I can think of now.

Tammy, yours is a common complaint.

What I`ve found in my 10 years of business, listening to clients and the marketplace, is that they haven`t known how to go about the process of hiring the right service provider. So what happens is that they fall back on the only things they know, which is to go about it as if they were hiring an employee (which doesn`t work because you aren`t hiring an employee when you hire an independent professional and there`s a whole different set of criteria involved), or they shop by price (which leaves out just about every other more important aspect for meeting your business needs and finding the right fit).

To help business owners find the right Virtual Assistant and give them a process and understanding for doing so, I wrote an article titled "How to Hire a Virtual Assistant: Your 10-Step Guide to Finding the Perfect Fit."

You can find that here:  http://www.virtualassistantnetworking.com/how-to-choose-a-vi rtual-assistant.htm

Your other other comment, about it being easier to do yourself, is also a very common sentiment. What I like to get business owners to do is put some math to that. What do you consider your hourly rate as the business owner and entrepreneur? Multiply that by the number of hours you spend on non-revenue generating work (such as administrative tasks). That`s the number of hours you are NOT making money for your business, and the total you get after multiplying that is the amount of money that`s been expended on that work.

The questions to ask yourself are, Is that a sensible, profitable and strategic use of your company finances? Could someone else do that work more quickly, more efficiently and more cheaply than you doing it yourself? Would that freed time be more beneficially spent by you on growing your business? And how much would your profits increase if you allowed yourself to focus your efforts there instead?

Yes, some things could be just as easily handled yourself. But as the idea person and profit-maker in your business, is that the best use of your time and attention? What is that wastefulness really costing your business?