communication with VAs
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Importance of Communication Between Employers and Virtual Assistants
Importance of communication is part-10 of the second interview from Stefan from Germany, who lives the Four Hour Work Week lifestyle in Thailand.
Click here to read part 9– A comparison between verbal and written communication
Summary:
- Nothing is more important than communication. More specifically, how often you communicate with your virtual assistants.
- A virtual assistant should report to you about his work of that day daily – even if he does’t work on any particular day.
- Make it clear at the start of the cooperation, even in the job description and in the interview process that daily communication is a must.
Start of the Interview:
Francis:
One important detail about daily communication, it has happened to me in the past that I was expecting daily communication and, perhaps, asked it. I propose that you definitely ask for daily communication in the interview process already.
When the assistant does not do daily communication, make it clear that he is not annoying you. Even if he has to communicate, “Okay, today I was confused. I couldn’t do anything. Sorry.” Tell them that they can write exactly that.
Stefan:
Yes.
Francis:
Tell them the bad example, sort of, the worst case scenario. Tell them okay in some cases, you have the birthday with your brother and have family party.
Therefore, you cannot do anything. Then please at the evening write me “I had birthday party with my family, I couldn’t do anything. Sorry.”
Stefan:
Okay, just a quick idea here. Because whenever I did that, as you suggested, it was basically the invitation to be lazy. I have the feeling and because of the situation that whenever I showed the person who was working for me that it’s okay when something comes up just tell me. It’s okay. Just tell me. I have to know stuff.
Francis:
They always took the easy way out when you gave them the easy way out.
Stefan:
Exactly. The problem was whenever I showed it’s like showing weakness, in my opinion.
Francis:
Yeah.
Stefan:
At least that’s my experience. Whenever I showed it’s okay when something comes up, just tell me, we can work that out. The only thing that matters to me is a good relationship, a good work flow. And one day lost, it’s not a broken bone. No problem.
We make it up the next day or the next two days or whatever. But once they see that it’s easy to work with me and it’s an easy-peasy thing, I have the impression that they assume they can pull this off whenever they want to go out instead of working.
Francis:
Okay. In principle, many freelances have very motivated work ethics because they wouldn’t be freelancing if they didn’t need the money and the work. So I assume a base level of motivation to work.
Assuming that the first trust building steps have been done and they are the right person for the job and daily communication is established. It is a difference between being a human employer so being a nice person, a nice boss than being a lenient employer meaning being a boss that you can do everything with.
So there’s a clear difference between that. I think that I’m a rather nice person, if I may say that. I believe that you might be a more strict person, if that’s okay to say.
Stefan:
Actually, I think I’d rather go into the opposite direction. I’m a true easy boss.
Francis:
Okay.
Stefan:
Because I tell my employees that the only thing I’m interested in is that the job is done and if they take 1 day, no problem; if they take 2 days, no problem. It takes as long as it takes.
Francis:
That’s perhaps not the best way to attack this sort of work.
Stefan:
Yeah but then on the other side, I wanted to compensate this behavior with that employees give me feedback at all the time. Like every day or every 2 days.
Francis:
Yes.
Stefan:
But they still lack in that aspect.
Francis:
Yeah. So as I said, make it clear in the job description and in the interview process. Daily communication is work. If they don’t do daily communication, you assume this is not like it was decided in the beginning and then they fail.
So it is just as important daily communication as the actual work. Make this clear that this is no joking matter. You understand jokes; you understand human weaknesses. That is okay. But on daily communication, there is no playground.
If on some evening they fell sick, I mean if they’re sick then just write. They write you one line “I’m sick” and you understand that. That’s okay. If they’re sick all the time then you have a problem. Either you have a very sick virtual assistant and you have to decide if you want to work with him or you have a liar.
So assuming that we don’t have the sickness excuse and you will see that over a long time how often a normal person is sick. If they don’t communicate to you in one evening, tell them “Okay, you might miss out occasionally and, I’m telling really occasionally, to communicate to me at the end of the day.” But if you miss that, communicate to me the next possible point in time so next morning.
Next morning, you write “Okay, sorry last evening I couldn’t write so I’m writing you this morning. This and that…” You expect that if there’s a miscommunication there will be some sort of compensation for that.
Stefan:
Yes.
Francis:
I tried to point them out in our mastermind group which we have which is closed so I won’t link to it. But unfortunately, Google plus deleted somehow my comment when I pressed enter and I didn’t want to write it again.
Voice Or Text – Which is Most Effective Type of Communication?
Verbal or Written type of communication is part-9 of the second interview from Stefan from Germany, who lives the Four Hour Work Week lifestyle in Thailand.
Click here to read part 8 – Virtual communication between you and your virtual assistants
Summary:
- Voicemails are much faster and effective ways of communication.
- Video communication is also good mean of communication, but If you make video without voice then don’t make video at all.
- You can make one instruction in the evening, talking about everything takes half an hour of a video then post it to your assistant and this will be sufficient work for your virtual assistant for the following day.
Start of the Interview:
Stefan:
Would you, which I in the past never did, go with the voice orders in the video or would you go text based?
Francis:
Definitively with the voice. That’s the whole point. If you make video without voice then don’t make video at all.
Stefan:
Yeah. I mean the voice instructions or if you had to chose.
Francis:
Yes?
Stefan:
And let’s say because for me taking a voice recording is more difficult than writing.
Francis:
Okay.
Stefan:
Because when I’m doing voice recording I have the problem that I don’t know if I told everything, you know.
Francis:
Okay.
Stefan:
If I had everything that I have to say so the person understands what I’m talking about. If I write it, I can review it. I can read it again and find out that I put everything in that – yes or no.
Francis:
Okay. So this is a question of style. I hate writing. I’m very write-lazy. That’s why I use transcription all the time including this interview. And that’s why I love video transcriptions. On the other hand, I have no problem talking. You probably hear this when I’m talking with you.
But if I have the feeling that I might have missed something at the end of the video I would say something like “I tried to explain it to you as best I could in the video but I feel I am missing something. Can you explain back to me what you have understood from my video?” Sort of make your assistant make the written instructions.
And then you review the written instructions perhaps with screenshots from your video and then you will know, “Oh, I missed this important part.” So your assistant takes away the work from you working out the written part.
Stefan:
Okay. Yes.
Francis:
This is only if, of course, you are okay with your assistant investing time and therefore your money to do this. You say this is not worth it then write your instructions yourself. For me, the missing element is time.
I think for many people who work day jobs… at the same time they don’t have the time. Normally, I make one instruction in the evening. Talking about everything takes half an hour of a video then I post it to my assistant.
He works the whole day while I’m at my day job. And when I come home, I get his feedback and I make a new video. So it goes from day to day, in general.
If you, for example, have a lot time but not have a lot of money to invest then it probably make sense for you to create written instructions with bullet point format and screenshots.
This takes a lot of time but you don’t need to invest money in him watching the videos and understanding these things. And if you have made them once, you can reuse them for any other assistants you might hire in the future.
Stefan:
That could be useful.
Continue reading part 10 – Importance of communication between you and your virtual assistant
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