The BEST Tips for Working with a Virtual Assistant!
Ok, you’re on your way with your VA! WhooHoo!
Let’s discuss 3 tips to ensure team success from day one!
These tips for working with a virtual assistant might surprise you -- but hey, we can read about productivity tips and apps all day -- we’re building something huge here and we have to lay a good foundation! Ready? Let’s go!
TIP #1: TRUST
Ok, this first tip is... BIG.
Let me tell you about one of my first clients - he was a COO and the work I did for him was very different than what we do for our creative clients. I learned one of the most important lessons about trust with this client and I’ve carried it into my own business. He always encouraged me to be more aggressive in his inbox - probably the most important part of his business that I handled just due to the nature of his work. One day he said, “We aren’t curing cancer here. If I miss something important, they’ll follow-up or call.” Knowing that he trusted my judgment and attention to detail this much freed me to handle it with greater autonomy and less stress all the while understanding the importance this particular job carried.
When bringing on a team member, I trust them wholeheartedly right out of the gate. I’ve done my homework, evaluated their heart and their skills, and made the leap and the investment to go to the next level! I don’t want to waste time inspecting their every little move and I make it known to them. I know that because I’ve gone out of my way to hire the right person, they’ll handle my business the way I want it handled.
Now, don’t get me wrong -- there is an onboarding process in place. We have a Trello board that includes SOPs and briefly explains how I like things handled. Everything from our CRM to invoices (yep, I even give her full access to QuickBooks) to my inbox and schedule. She gets access to my Google drive that has every important document we use as well as all of our client data. The goal is that if I need to be away from my business, she will be able to jump in and handle anything better than I can. (Yep, I said better!)
We should always aim to hire someone who can do those brain dump items BETTER than we can -- otherwise, we’re doing a lot of worrying, hand-holding, and corrections, and that’s the opposite of the goal!
I read this somewhere and regrettably don’t remember where, but I love it: “Look at what you have to do and give away all you can. If you trust others to deliver, you may well be surprised at the outcome—in a good way. Be very clear on your desired outcome. Make sure your employees are well resourced and let them loose. You may well be unlocking their God-given talent. The people you always wanted may already be with you.”
Along these same lines of trust and onboarding, another important and simple tool is your inbox. Letting your assistant into your inbox -- even if she isn’t going to sort it or reply -- allows her to see how you reply to your colleagues and clients as well as how fast you normally reply. As assistants, we need to learn your voice and your tone with other team members as well as with your clients or potential clients.
When you choose Rock Solid Assistants to provide your VA services, the biggest step is taken out of the way for you! We do all the evaluations and testing and match you with the perfect assistant for your personality, business, and timezone! Our hiring process is very extensive and involves 6+ tests and questionnaires before they are even offered a video chat to meet with us. When working with a virtual assistant from our incredible pool of VAs, you already know you’re getting the best!
Trust leads us to the second tip...
TIP #2: DelegatioN
Ok, full transparency -- delegation is always the hardest thing to get used to and find success with when working with a virtual assistant - it's a big learning curve. You’re very good at everything you do, have high expectations and standards, and have been doing it all solo for some time. However, this investment is your chance to grow to the next level. There are so many things a VA could be doing that would lighten your load and give you more hours in the day - hours for business tasks, obviously, but also hours for personal relationships as well. I know delegating more tasks involves trust and relationship building, but sometimes stretching out on that limb just a bit more and more each day helps moves things forward more quickly! This isn’t an area we rush, but rather grow through together and we will ask you to stretch out of your comfort zone just a bit more each day for the sake of personal and professional growth. Once you’re growing in your team relationship, learning that your VA really cares and you can truly trust her, then your delegation skills will begin to shine.
One of the most important things, as mentioned above, is stretching yourself.
Just like an athlete stretches to improve her performance and reduce the risk of a game-ending injury, stretching out of our comfort zone offers the same benefits.
Assign a task that makes you a little bit nervous and remember, we aren’t curing cancer here! Give her the necessary details and tools, and step out of the way. When you see that her actions exceeded your expectations, you’ll be assured you can hand off even more.
Being proactive is the 2nd thing we hire for at Rock Solid. We believe that as your VA, we should always be at least one or two steps ahead of you! Seeing this in action also helps the relationship to grow and confirms that you can now delegate more than you ever imagined!
TIP #3: Weekly Meeting
At Rock Solid, we focus hardcore on relationship! It is our number one goal to step in alongside our clients and represent them and their businesses with excellence. We strive to know everything we can about our clients, their families, and friends, their personal needs and desires, as well as every detail of their businesses. The more we know them and know about them, the better we can serve them!
The heart of this business relationship is the weekly 30-minute meeting!
I can’t stress it enough. This is where we discuss the progress of ongoing projects, assign new tasks, and get to know one another. We need to know our client’s specific preferences and pet-peeves, her dislikes and pain-points. This is the thing that makes or breaks the entire thing!
Recently, I had a team who was all of a sudden at odds with one another. They had been working together successfully for some time and all the check-ins told me everything was going great. Upon investigation, I learned that they had stopped making their weekly meeting a priority. Things WERE going very well and it deceptively gave them the idea that they didn’t need to meet as often. We got their weekly meetings back on track and the last report I got from our client was full of nothing but praise for her assistant. Yep, it’s THAT important!
Ok, those were my 3 favorite foundational tips and I hope you took the time to read and consider each one. It’s so easy to scan -- I get it! ~~ and I’m probably guilty of it more than I’d like to admit! But -- your success, not only in business but also in life in general, is honestly super important to us at Rock Solid! Our clients and our VAs become our family and we truly care about each and every one! So, keep this list of tips for working with a virtual assistant tucked in your proverbial back pocket and try a new tip each week! And pop back by next week when I share three tools that are ahhhmazing for teamwork! Can’t wait to see you then!
On the fence about hiring a virtual assistant?
Ready to take the dive and get started?
Click below! We can’t wait to meet you and
Help make your life easier!
Want to read more??
