One of the most common concerns we hear from business owners is how they can go about delegating work to a virtual assistant. You know that you’re overworked and struggling to keep up with your admin, but the idea of handing it over to someone else can feel like a whole new chore.
Of course, the aim of using us as your virtual assistant is that we make your work life easier and give you more time for your business. We like to think that we do that from the very beginning. So here are our tips for delegating your admin to your VA.
Identify the admin tasks causing you issues
This might seem obvious, but actually deciding what you want to hand over to your VA is one of the biggest challenges. Some tasks seem too small to bother with or are just once a month. Some seem too complex to explain. And before long, you’ve talked yourself out of needing that VA again, and you’re back to juggling. Remember – your time is valuable, and better spent working with customers. The aim here is to make your work life easier.
When we first meet you, we’ll have a long chat about what your current admin challenges are. We’ll help you breakdown the various tasks you do and establish how much time you’re spending on them – time that could be spent with your customers.
Decide how long you need a VA for
Once we all have a better understanding of where you’re spending your time, we’ll know how long you actually need a VA for. It might be that you are entering a busy period or have a one-off project that is taking all your time, and you only need a quick fix to get you through it. If your admin tasks are more regular and long-term, you probably want to establish a strong relationship with the person that you’re delegating your business tasks too.
At Aggrandise VA we want you to see us as an extension of your own office. Whether it’s short-term or ongoing, we pride ourselves on becoming a part of your team. We offer flexible contracts that give you the right amount of hourly support you need to get the job done.
Consider which software or systems your VA needs
It’s likely that you already have your admin tasks set up on various software or systems. A virtual assistant is used to adapting to different systems, and we are very quick to pick up anything new. If you are using something we haven’t seen before, which can be common with purpose-built CRM systems, for example, there will naturally be a learning curve. But don’t give up and think it’s just easier to do it yourself. We’ll soon get the hang of it.
If you haven’t already got your admin set up – well, this is our speciality. We love systems and creating efficiencies. We’ll work out what you are currently doing, discuss how it’s working out for you and offer some recommendations for software that suits your kind of work and your budget, and that we have tried and tested. If we can help you to streamline some tasks then it will not only make your business more efficient, but there’ll have more time that we can use to take something else off your hands too.
Be honest about budgets
Talking of budgets, this is something you need to consider. You might well have a long list of admin tasks you want to hand to a virtual assistant, but you have to decide what can be done within your budget. It’s all about prioritising. What do you most want to hand over to someone else and not have to do yourself?
Security and confidentiality is vital
As with all businesses, we understand the importance of GDPR and cybersecurity, and take it very seriously. We use a system called LastPass to share confidential information, which means you can give us the access you need to without handing over your personal log in and password information. You can even share your business banking information so that we can handle your bookings.
We are happy to sign an NDA (if you have one), and we only start work after a complete client agreement is signed which outlines our Terms and Conditions, and Privacy Policy.
Working with a virtual assistant
So, is handing over your business admin to a virtual assistant a whole new chore? As you can see, we start helping you from the very first conversation by working out what you need to delegate to us in the first place.
We know that at the beginning you’ll need to spend time explaining things, but that short-term pain will be a long-term gain. Once you’ve delegated the tasks you don’t enjoy to us, you won’t have to do them again, and that definitely makes it worthwhile. And once we have your admin running smoothly, you’ve got all that time back to do something else – whether it’s working on your business, or just having a few hours a week for yourself.
If you’d like to discover more about how Aggrandise VA can help you and your business, please get in touch today on 01785 337 810 or email us at helen@aggrandiseva.com.
