Francis

by Francis
(February 15, 2014)

To bring you even more news, tips and articles about real-life experience of hiring virtual assistants, we invited Denise into our team. She will be starting her trial period for a position as a full time virtual assistant.

Please wish her luck, but to be honest I have a quite good feeling about her work 🙂

She is from the Philippines, and has great English skills. We hired her from a specialized service for full time VAs from the Philippines. Also look out for the diary posts from my VA’s side, because we will be adding the impressions of her work and daily experiences there also.

For me, I am excited to be able to “attack” more ideas and projects, since I have more inspirations than I have time to implement them. Time to close a few open loops and get more projects going.

As a nice side effect, we will be able to enjoy more opinions from the “virtual assistant point of view” with Denise on our team. She already started leaving some comments on some of my blog posts, where she adds insightful details from her point of view.

Some challenges in the first week of setting up the cooperation with this new full time assistant are

• Supervising her work with a specialized screenshot recording software

• Making sure every work day there is a daily update sent to my team

I am sure that if we can overcome these doable challenges, we are able to dive into a multitude of interesting new projects.

And my VA can make sure I don’t only start with these projects, but that I also finish them 🙂

• Read more about outsourcing to Philippines

 

The importance of daily updates

by Francis
(February 18, 2014)

Denise proves to be a very motivated candidate for working as a full time virtual assistance.

One thing that is very crucial for work supervision are daily updates. The optimum is of course when you have screenshots of the work of your assistance.

That is an aspect that we still have trouble with. But I instructed my assistant to test a few screen recording solutions with Denise.

We will report what worked best.

 

Reviewing screenshots from your VA to be able to manage them

by Francis
(February 18, 2014)

You need to be able to review the screen of your VA as he or she works. This might feel intimidating at first for the VA.

Your job as an employer is to take that fear and / or uneasiness off your assistant. Build some trust.

However, this information is not optional. In my opinion, it is mandatory to be able to manage the time of your VA effectively.

One example: my VA wrote a preface for an eBook for me. She researched information on how to do that. She poured in considerable amount of time into this task.

Even if the end result is really solid, it could perhaps been achieved with less time.

How? When you, as an employer, review the screenshots of your assistant from time to time, you can simply call them (or send them a voice message) whenever you see something that could be better or different.

This way, your assistant does not continue to use time (for which you are paying) in an effort to do something that you don’t want.

Record the screen from your assistant and you save time.

Don’t do it and you waste time and resources.

When you use oDesk, then there is a free built-in screen recording software for the VA that solves all that for you.

• Click here to learn more about oDesk Team Application

 

Using Skype or Emails to communicate with your assistant?

by Francis
(February 21, 2014)

When possible, I try to put some time aside to Skype with my new full time VA, Denise.

When you are on the phone, it’s much easier to show you are human and to emphasize what is important to you.

It’s doable with voice recordings, too. But being able to go back and forth, perhaps making a joke to relax your assistant, helps a lot.

Believe me, your assistant will be very nervous when working with you at the beginning. Especially if it’s an assistant that is not very experienced.

So do invest some time into building a healthy working relationship with your assistant in Skype at the beginning.

Note: it is not always easy to Skype with your assistant.

• Bad internet connections,
• the time difference,
• and most importantly the fact that many foreign assistants are self-conscious about their spoken English skills

will make it hard to get them on the phone.

But do try 🙂

The interview extract linked below will teach you more about how to effectively communicate with your VA.

• Learn more about how to set up effective email communication with Your Virtual Assistants

Comments for Using Skype or Emails to communicate with your assistant?

Sep 25, 2014

English is our second language by: JomvieYes, indeed. Since English is not officially everyone’s mother tongue, and served as only our second language that we seldom use for casual talks, it gives off the uneasy and not so comfortable feeling when talking to someone who fluently speaks with it.But, if you are interacting day by day, it gets easier—you just have to get used to it.

 

by Francis
(November 01, 2013)

With the right skill level and training, an assistant is able to provide a tremendous amount of work and results in a short amount of time.

Let’s take an example:

My Virtual Assistant logged 2,5 hours of time today, using the time recording software of a popular outsourcing service.

There, he listed what he managed to do in this amount of time.

1. He researched, downloaded and inserted free stock photos in my content pages
2. He fine-tuned an existing job opening and pre-screened the candidates that applied to this online job offer
3. He transcribed an audio recording of 320 words and sent it via email to the proper recipient
4. He earned credits on a website for online survey answers, which is essentially data entry work

All of that in 2,5 hours. No distractions, no procrastination.

If you can work that fast yourself, and can afford to invest the time to do so, then you don’t need a VA.

But if you can make use of the extra free time, and a virtual assistant is more effective than you, then you should get started with outsourcing.

Read on to find out my preferred outsourcing service.

 

Your Input Required: How Can We Increase the Readability of our Blog?

by Francis
(November 01, 2013)

Today, I need your help and opinion, so that we can make our blog even better readable for you.

It’ll take less than 2 minutes, tops.

I have published a poll using a survey maker with the help of my VA.

Please click the link above to participate in the poll.

 

Don’t Get Too Used to Your Assistant Doing Your Stuff

by Francis
(November 28, 2013)

Phew! I just tried to work a bit on re-organizing the design of my sites.

Looks like I lost the habit of working on my sites myself. Why?

My virtual assistant implements my wishes and video instructions so perfectly, that all work gets done overnight.

But as a side effect, the work he does looks effortless.

Figures that his webmaster duties are not as easy as I imagine somehow. That’s what inspired me to remind you all to do the work of your VAs from time to time.

This will keep you on track on how much your assistants are performing for you.

What tasks does my Virtual Assistant usually do on my websites? Just read on…

• Read more about Sitesell Virtual Assistant.

Comments for Don’t Get Too Used to Your Assistant Doing Your Stuff

Sep 10, 2014

Super VA by: JomvieYour main VA is sure a hard worker, dedicated to his job. I can’t imagine myself re-organizing a web site overnight.He hand me some knowledge about technical stuff and I thank him for that at least I get to experience those stuff for awhile 😀

Feb 20, 2015

Writing down Lessons Learned Is Important by: FrancisMy main VA is taking up many more tasks than I was doing in the past. I am positive that he has surpassed my skill level using SBIs tools by far.The most important thing if you’re in a situation where your virtual assistant knows these stuff than you is that you still understand enough so that you can take care of your business even when your virtual assistant is not there. One lesson that is important to remember is that you ask your virtual assistants to write down his lessons learned from time to time. It can be in a format of teaching materials or a step by step instruction. This is especially useful if, like me, you have more than one virtual assistant. In this case, you will want to have one virtual assistant relay his learnings to the other.

by Francis
(Sep 16, 2013)

These last days my normal day job keeps me extremely busy. You know this feeling when you barely get to sleep after work and nothing else.

It’s times like these you wish you could escape the job rat race.

And it’s the last call to get yourself great teamwork established with a virtual assistant.

In my case a few video instructions per week are sufficient to keep my assistant going.

And they don’t take long.

Why do this when you are busy?

Life has the tendency to get harder, not easier. In other words, what you are experiencing now might be a relatively relaxed time, if you are not taking steps to build your own future.

Whatever dream you have, take it in your hand today!

• Read more about how to be your own boss

Outsourcing services legally: Mind any Confidentiality Agreement!

by Francis
(October 14, 2012)

When you outsource services to others using your virtual assistants, the other party (your client) should know about you outsourcing the job.

That’s because often, there is a real (or implied) confidentiality agreement (also called non disclosure agreement) between you and your client.

In other words, your client only trusts his information with you. Not with your team of VAs.

So the only solution if you want to avoid hassle like hiding the IP of your VA, and other less-than-moral methods…

You have to be crystal clear about your terms and your assistants working for you.

Breaking any confidentiality agreement will come back bite you (or even lead to serious legal troubles).

Personally, I was a bit naive about this issue in the recent past. Now, I’ll try to set things right.

If I am able to get an agreement of using my VA in a service, then all is good.

If not, then I will have to pass an otherwise very lucrative business opportunity.

But it’s always better to cover your bases first.

—

We dedicated a full page about legal dangers of outsourcing. Be sure to check it out!

Second Interview with my friend and entrepreneur on its way

by Francis
(Sep 16, 2013)

Some time ago I interviewed a German friend called Stefan via Skype. This interview went over an hour and was transcribed, summarized and posted here.

Perhaps it is because he went out to leave the conventional work rhythm and live a four hour work week; fact is his interview is rather popular here on this site.

Now I had a second interview with him! It was even more intense and long and we discussed all facets of training your virtual assistant to be more self motivated.

That is his -and he is not alone- main concern when working with virtual assistants.

Look forward to another great interview. We are still compiling and presenting it from a big transcript file.

If you haven’t, make sure you read the first interview first.