Hiring a digital assistant is the proper staffing resolution for a lot of startups. Entrepreneurs like Pat Flynn and Chris Ducker have a minimum of one on board, and John Lee Dumas even had a group of 12 nice digital assistants at one level! It’s onerous to not see why when hiring a digital assistant could be a extremely strategic and worthwhile enterprise transfer.

Simply to be clear right here, what I imply by a digital assistant is somebody who, like every other freelancer, can work remotely—principally a contract administrative assistant. They’re digitally based mostly staff who might be discovered wherever on the planet and, with the regular rise of individuals working from house or remotely, they’re extra out there than ever.

Apologies to anybody who thought this was going to be an article about outsourcing your workload to futuristic AI. We didn’t provide you with the title.

A digital assistant is usually a extra manageable expense than hiring a full-time employees particular person and often simply as certified and skilled for the job. Even in case you’re working a brick-and-mortar enterprise, there are nonetheless many duties which you can outsource to a digital assistant.

With that in thoughts, I’m going to interrupt down for you as we speak simply how one can begin releasing up your time and direct your focus to the place it must be, in simply 5 straightforward steps.

Step 1: What Is A Digital Assistant (and Why You Want One)

As an entrepreneur, your most treasured useful resource isn’t cash; it’s your time and vitality. When your entire enterprise begins and stops with you, you can’t be losing your time or vitality on issues that don’t want your consideration.

What many seasoned entrepreneurs will know, and youthful entrepreneurs will generally wrestle to know, is that generally you simply can’t do all of it. Typically there simply aren’t sufficient hours in a day, or days in week so that you can get work finished.

You possibly can both deliver somebody on board and assist alleviate your workload, or hold working your self till the purpose of collapse. Alternatively, you may all the time discover a strategy to clone your self and go on a sequence of wacky adventures.

Till expertise grows to the purpose the place you may reliably clone your self with out unintentionally splicing your genetic materials with a family fly, you’re type of caught. We do, nevertheless, have expertise that significantly will increase choices and adaptability in the case of hiring a digital assistant.

A digital assistant, like every other assistant, is somebody you get that will help you be extra productive, scale back the chance of burnout and choice fatigue and, most significantly, give your extra methods to leverage your time.

Whereas digital assistants might be very versatile and simply as well-trained as every other worker, you even have to contemplate the challenges of working with somebody remotely.

The actual fact you’re not working with somebody face-to-face means there can probably be problems with belief, productiveness, and efficient communication. In the event you rent somebody from a unique nation, there would possibly face some language or cultural obstacles. You would possibly offend each other with out realizing it, one thing that’s by no means good within the office, particularly the digital office.

Until you’ve labored with a digital group, or have labored remotely your self, these might be very critical points that may spiral uncontrolled except you develop the right pointers and procedures.

However, on the finish of the day, nearly all of digital assistants are extraordinarily hard-working individuals who might be precisely what your enterprise must take it to the following degree.

Step 2: Get Your Enterprise Prepared

So now that you just’re set on hiring a digital assistant, the very first thing you have to do is dispel the parable of there being some type of Tremendous VA. Sure, many digital assistants are superb at their jobs, however they’re nonetheless human. Digital assistants aren’t magical beings which you can simply insert into your workflow and simply count on them to select the whole lot up instantly.

On the flipside, you additionally don’t wish to make that classically naive mistake of hiring an assistant after which realizing too late that you just’re not truly positive what it’s you want them to do. Too many overzealous entrepreneurs have employed digital assistants as a result of they simply learn Tim Ferriss’s 4-Hour Work Week after which found that exterior of a set of vaguely outlined duties, they actually had no must make the rent.

So what you have to do is just remember to sit down and correctly work out what it’s you want out of your digital assistant.

What I recommend is that for a minimum of one week you retain a piece diary, or have one thing that tracks the way you’re spending your time. That approach, on the very least, you can begin pinpointing what duties you’re spending an excessive amount of time on and what you may outsource to your VA.

For instance, I’d personally check out a Google Chrome timetracker.

Straightaway, I can inform that I’m sinking in approach too many hours into Gmail, Netflix too now that I give it some thought, and that I may probably outsource some email-related duties to a VA. By checking my work diary, I can inform that I’m spending a whole lot of hours on article analysis, one other activity that I can outsource to a reliable digital assistant.

In the event you don’t really feel like creating a piece diary then you may take a look at foundr’s very personal “Hiring a VA Guidelines” which can information you in determining whether or not you want a generalist or a specialist digital assistant.

Work out what particular duties you really want taken care of earlier than you begin hiring.

Ask your self, do you want a technical or artistic digital assistant? Do the duties you want finished require somebody who could be a bit extra unbiased, or do you want somebody to simply full recurring duties or initiatives you immediately assign?

“Rent for the function, not the duty” – Chris Ducker, Founder and CEO of Live2Sell Group.

In the event you had been to create a place description on your digital assistant what would you write? To start with you don’t wish to write one thing like this:

It’s too obscure and also you received’t get the proper of particular person making use of for the job. What you have to be doing is making a place description extra like this:

You wish to be as particular as doable in order that once you do tackle a VA you realize precisely what it’s you want them to do and the way you’re going to handle them.

Step 3: Discover Your Digital Assistant

The subsequent step is to determine the place it’s you’re going to search out your self a digital assistant.

When hiring digital assistants previously, we truly went by means of Digital Employees Finder, a recruitment service for anybody trying to outsource their work. All we did was fill out a fast questionnaire about what we had been on the lookout for and we had been shortly matched up with a handful of candidates that suited our wants. After going by means of some interviews, we instantly employed VA  and haven’t seemed again since.

In terms of recruitment companies like Digital Employees Finder, you may usually count on a sure degree of high quality in the case of the expertise pool. Candidates are required to undertake sure assessments in an effort to gauge their literacy, typing velocity, even their Web velocity!

Nonetheless, recruitment companies might be expensive, and may not be price it except you’re on the lookout for somebody to work with you for the long run.
Check out these different recruitment companies as properly:

The choice to hiring a recruitment service to discover a digital assistant for you is to simply do it your self. The most typical approach is to go to websites that provide freelancing companies and submit a job on their job board saying that on the lookout for a digital assistant. It actually is sort of easy.

Take a look at websites like Upwork in an effort to discover a entire vary of candidates on your job.

Chances are high you’ll get a minimum of a dozen candidates for the job, however earlier than you begin hiring the primary particular person with a half-decent resume, keep in mind that hiring a digital assistant is rather like hiring for any job. You wish to just remember to have the correct particular person.

Be certain that to do a minimum of one spherical of digital interviews so that you get to know their persona and whether or not or not you may work collectively. It’s extremely vital that you just do a minimum of one face-to-face interview, and don’t be afraid to get direct and ask the onerous questions.

Taking a leaf out of the guide of our Neighborhood and Development Supervisor David Hobson, I might ship any potential rent this electronic mail.

I’ll ask every applicant to learn and touch upon every level with their very own private emotions or opinions as a part of their evaluation. Their solutions might be extremely revealing and insightful as to their character and whether or not or not you need them in your group.

You probably have the time, I extremely recommend setting all candidates a small activity. As somebody who admittedly scored very unhealthy grades throughout school, I can (hopefully anyway) say that the way you do on paper doesn’t essentially have any correlation with how properly you do within the discipline.

In any case, that is going to be somebody you’re going to be trusting with a whole lot of duty. You wish to guarantee that the particular person you tackle as your assistant is accountable, competent, and reliable.

Step 4: Onboard and Prepare

Typically talking, it ought to take round three weeks to correctly onboard your digital assistant and to completely practice them on the duties you’re handing over.

When it got here to coaching our VAs, we spent a minimum of two weeks making it our high precedence, ensuring that they understood the ins and outs of the enterprise and the way greatest to go about their obligations. For a month, we spent a minimum of an hour a day having a chat with them to see how the whole lot was going and if there was something that was notably complicated.

Today, they an integral a part of our group, and has helped take foundr to the following degree.

Like a tiny seedling you have to take the time to domesticate them to allow them to develop and be part of a forest and stand to be a mighty oak of busi-you know what? This analogy has flown the coop, I’m simply going to belief that you just perceive the place I’m going with this.

If a tree falls in a forest and nobody is there to listen to it, do you get a digital assistant?

Now I do know what you’re considering. You’re in all probability saying to your self that you just don’t have the time to spend 2-3 weeks coaching somebody. However I can not stress to you the way vital that is.

In the event you’re discovering your self saying that you just don’t have time to spend a minimum of one hour a day on coaching a brand new worker, then that could be a clear an indication as any that you just want extra time! Which is strictly why you want a digital assistant within the first place.

Don’t overlook what it was like once you first began a job, all of the uncertainty you confronted and the way having a affected person boss and an ideal framework helped you compromise in that a lot faster.

A great way to remain on high of the whole lot and monitor how your new rent is doing is to electronic mail them this set of questions each day.

• What actions did you are taking as we speak?
• What outcomes did you get?
• What issues did you’ve gotten?
• What questions do you’ve gotten?

Not solely does this enable the each of you to work by means of any points collectively, but it surely’ll additionally imply that you’ve got a radical report of how they’re doing with the work you’ve assigned them.

If something occurs they usually drop the ball on one thing you may very simply level out to them that they didn’t elevate any points up till this level. It’s each a good way to facilitate sturdy communication and keep on high of the whole lot.

Step 5: Preserve it Actual

All of that technical stuff apart, right here’s the one key factor you need to keep in mind in the case of coping with a digital assistant, or anybody you’re employed with remotely, for that matter: They’re human.

Suppose again to any time you’ve labored any type of job the place you felt unfulfilled or unappreciated. The place you had that supervisor who by no means appeared to care about who you had been or why you had been working for them within the first place. When it truthfully felt like there was no level in attempting to go above and past the decision of obligation as a result of probabilities had been nobody would even recognize the additional effort.

An important mistake folks make once they first tackle digital assistants, or any worker for that matter, is to deal with them like they’re robots who don’t have their very own hopes and aspirations. The very last thing you wish to do is deal with somebody like they’re nothing however a senseless drone.

So be an individual, and take the time to get to know them and what they’re all about.

One of many biggest challenges in the case of working remotely with somebody is that it’s troublesome to construct a robust basis of belief. In any case, not like the folks in your workplace, you don’t have the identical alternative to speak to them face-to-face each day.

Or for that matter, have them play pranks on you by hiding numerous footage of Sean Connery in a pink leather-based man thong round your private results.

Once you don’t have that fixed interplay it’s onerous to get to construct a rapport with somebody not to mention a excessive degree of belief.

So present that you just care by asking how their day goes, what plans they’ve after work, what films they’ve seen. Now I’m not asking you to be greatest buddies and begin braiding one another’s hair. However actively present that you just care about who they’re as an individual.

Your digital assistant isn’t simply somebody that you just’ve tacked on to deal with grunt work for your enterprise, they’re part of your group. So deal with them like they’re and guarantee that they perceive that too.

The Proper Instruments for the Job

Since you’re going to be working in a digital surroundings, you’re going to wish the correct instruments for the job. Whether or not it’s for communication or collaboration, we’ve bought you lined.

Communication

I do know this goes with out saying however communication is essential in each office, no matter whether or not it’s “in the true world” or digital.

• Slack is one other implausible software that we love to make use of at foundr. The flexibility to create totally different channels for devoted duties additionally make this a really nifty strategy to observe any specialised duties.
• Google, Zoom, or Microsoft Groups are nice in case you’re trying to handle a complete group of digital staff and simply one other nice all-around service.

Coaching Instruments

I discover that one of the simplest ways to coach digital assistants is to report a fast video of your course of, or create a primary set of procedures for them to observe. You wish to guarantee that nothing will get misplaced in translation. There is perhaps instances the place you’ll want to leap on Skype do some extra in-depth coaching, however for many duties only a easy video will do nice. We suggest:

• Loom is our favored software at foundr for doing walk-through movies for onboarding, updates, or communication throughout time zones.
• SweetProcess is a service that we extremely suggest and we use it to fastidiously doc our commonplace working procedures for any given activity. This fashion all anybody has to do is examine SweetProcess in an effort to work out the best way to full a activity.

You too can use Google Docs and create a shared doc to report all of your procedures on as properly.

Workflow and Accountability

Once you’re managing somebody remotely you need to have the ability to hold observe of their work and the way they’re doing. Listed below are a couple of instruments that we like to make use of:

• Asana is one we love at foundr. You possibly can arrange a quite simple board on your digital assistant and have the ability to observe what work they’re getting finished. Trello and ClickUp are different mission administration instruments which might be in style.
• Wunderlist (now Microsoft To Do) permits you to create activity lists which you can share with anybody. One other neat function is which you can connect feedback and directions to each activity as properly.
• IDoneThis is a monitoring service which you’ll be able to automate to ship day by day reminder emails to your digital assistant. All they must do is write an inventory of all of the duties they’ve completed that day, and it even syncs up properly with Slack.

Rent Your Digital Assistant and Begin Scaling Your Enterprise

These instruments and ideas will go a great distance towards making a profitable expertise with digital assistants. And like so most of the office improvements made out there by means of the Web, hiring digital assistants could be a highly effective technique, particularly for companies attempting to scale up on the proper tempo.

However you’re in all probability seeing a working theme to this submit. Like all different improvements, we’re actually simply speaking about interacting with folks. So the one factor I hope you’ll take away from that is that, in working with digital assistants and different distant staff, many of the similar recommendation and pointers apply as when working with staff face-to-face. It’s a smaller world, however you’re nonetheless simply constructing a group.

Able to scale your enterprise? Take a look at our catalog of free coaching to begin rising.