When was the last time you took a step back to assess how productive you were while managing a new venture or the day-to-day operations of a rapidly expanding company? And even after you have worked yourself to exhaustion, you discover that even after you have returned home at the end of the day, you are not happy with how things turned out. You have a long list of things that need to be done, and you just don’t have the time to look for new customers for your company or come up with that next great idea.

According to the findings of a poll, the majority of the productive hours that are spent by business owners and executives are spent responding to emails and doing other administrative activities. It is not always obvious to us, but they make our days more chaotic and prevent us from reaching our full potential. It is not surprising that everyone who has been aware of it is likely seeking for a remedy.

We are all fortunate to have choices available to us that might assist us in concentrating on those things that are of greater significance to us. There is always the possibility of recruiting personnel, but what if you are not yet in a position to employ someone on a permanent basis? It is certain that you are already familiar with the concept of virtual assistants.

But, want to know more about them?

When it comes to employing an outsider or someone we are not familiar with, we all have some reservations. There are actual trust concerns involved in the turning over of the commercial activity. I get that it might be difficult to put one’s faith in an unknown person or a complete stranger. Did you know that there are professional companies that have a framework around virtual assistant services, and that these organizations back it up with a trustworthy management team, procedures, and systems that revolve around your activities and processes?

I anticipate that you could have quite a few inquiries about services provided by virtual assistants. Allow me to provide you with some answers to some of your fundamental questions surrounding virtual assistants.

Who is a Virtual Assistant?

A virtual assistant, on the other hand, may be an app powered by artificial intelligence that does very specialized activities on your behalf. For instance, it could make appointments in your calendar or provide you with information that you have stored on demand. Nevertheless, I will be talking about today the virtual assistants that are similar to us, by which I mean homo sapiens.

Freelancers or managed service providers may both give virtual assistant services to their clients. Depending on their skill sets and the requirements of your company, these virtual assistants are capable of doing a wide variety of tasks on your company’s behalf. Skill related work might be like accounting or web designing. However, the primary reason they are employed and favored is so that they can do the repetitive tasks involved in your company process.

What are virtual assistant companies or managed virtual assistant service providers?

As was just discussed, there are essentially two primary classifications of virtual assistants, namely, those who work independently or those who are employed by managed service providers. The second option is mostly a commercial enterprise that focuses on providing virtual assistants as their primary service. They have a tried and true technique that supports the myriad of tasks or services that may be carried out by virtual assistants.

The fact that you won’t have to depend only on a single person to carry out your company’s tasks is the primary advantage of forming a partnership with a company that provides virtual assistant services. When it comes to one-off assignments or smaller projects, individuals or freelance virtual assistants are an excellent option. On the other hand, if you have an ongoing need for someone who can handle your back office, your best option is to work with a managed service provider. Another benefit is that these organizations not only provide you access to a virtual employee but also to a whole management structure, which may include an accounts manager, an operation manager, and a quality control team. And, most importantly, a backup staff so that in the event that your main staff goes missing in action (AWOL), you won’t have to waste time retraining someone else.

What types of tasks can a virtual assistant handle?

You are going to be astounded by the plethora of options that are available to you when you hire a virtual assistant firm. Your executive assistant duties might be handled by a virtual assistant, and they could even lend a hand with the hiring process. They are able to assist you uncover leads for business opportunities and can also manage marketing campaigns on your behalf. I will include the most popular services, but to summarize it all, I can say that if there is any task in your company that is repetitive, process-centric, doesn’t need highly skilled attention, or on which you can train someone in a week’s time or a month’s time, then that would be the most ideal activity for a virtual assistant to take on for you. This would be the most ideal activity for a virtual assistant to take on for you.

Is there any difference between a Virtual Assistant and an in-house Employee who is made to do the same job?

The correct response is “both yes and no.”

Indeed, there is a distinction between the two. However, a virtual assistant may lead you through the process of setting up your layout, even if an in-house employee is particularly proficient in a certain duty. When you have a person working in-house, you have various duties regarding compensation, but when you work with a virtual assistant, you pay a certain amount each month for their services. This is another distinction. In addition, as their name implies, virtual assistants exist only in the digital realm. This means that they may perform their duties from a distant location, and you do not need any additional equipment to support them.

No, since a virtual assistant should be treated the same way as any other member of your team; the only difference is that they do their duties remotely. You may develop a solid collaboration with the virtual assistant service provider by keeping open lines of communication, ensuring that procedures are well-maintained, and providing constant feedback.

In most cases, we recommend that companies think of virtual assistants as a supplement to the in-house workforce they already have. Your in-house personnel will be able to focus on higher-level company goals while your Virtual Assistant takes care of the grilling and drilling activities. If your recruiter, for instance, spends 90% of your time seeking prospects and keeping the database, then you are only obtaining 10% of the productive time necessary to close a job. If, on the other hand, you have a virtual assistant who can assist your recruiter with sourcing, then the recruiter will be able to focus all of their time and energy on actually closing a position.

What industries or businesses a virtual assistant can work in?

To reiterate, everything that can be done and worked on under one roof using a computer system is fair game. It also does not include activities that need specialist talents, such as drawing a floor layout or creating a budget for your company. However, some examples to mention are e-commerce, recruitment, healthcare, insurance, hospitality, event management, real estate, and legal services. These are only few of the examples.

The degree of compatibility between your business and the virtual assistant’s sector is not the best approach to determine whether or not a virtual assistant may be of use to you. You need to identify the activities that are most focused on the day-to-day and recurrent aspects of the process.

“We as businessmen need to understand that we can be jack of all trades but that leaves us as master of none.”

Our time is valuable, and we need to use it wisely by making more efforts to accomplish what we set out to do. If we are working by ourselves or are concentrating too much on specific pedestrian activities, then we are not working “on” our business; rather, we are working “inside” our company.

Because this isn’t the only list of questions, I’ll be coming up with more of them to include in the series on the virtual assistant. You may also contact me directly via email with any queries that you might have.