Virtual Assistants - What Are the Benefits For YOU?

What do you do if you're a sole operator orclients partner with a VA they get consistency of
independent professional/executive in need ofsupport - not a different person each time they
professional, confidential admin support, but don'tneed assistance, necessitating training of each
want to go to the expense and hassle involved innew temp in their business procedures. The VA
hiring your own staff? What if you don't have thehas a vested interest in helping clients succeed in
space for staff, or necessary expertise totheir own business goals - a temp does not have
complete a particular job?the same interest, and as they know they'll be in
Your best office support staff member goes offa different workplace next week - or even
on maternity leave and you think your onlytomorrow - they are disinclined to do more than
alternative is to hire an expensive andthe bare minimum required of them, and are
unmotivated temp?certainly not interested in learning about your
Think again! Virtual Assistants (VAs), also knownbusiness.
as Virtual Office Professionals or Virtual BusinessThis partnership with clients and vested interest in
Operators, provide an alternative, cost-effectivetheir success are two of the areas that
staffing solution for businesses of all sizes, includingdifferentiate Virtual Assistants from other
sole operators. They are not temps, but smallfreelancers you may find on Elance or Guru - and
business operators with a vested interest in theirdefinitely differentiates them from companies
clients' success.found in India, the Philippines or China.
You can think of a VA as a "remote" orVAs offer a wide variety of office support
"home-based" secretary. They are independentservices including secretarial support, personal and
consultants who provide a range of personalexecutive assistance, word processing, database
assistant and office support services for clients -management, transcription services, mail outs,
or they might specialise in just one, likebookkeeping, web design and maintenance,
bookkeeping or transcription. They are calleddesktop publishing, presentations, spreadsheets,
"virtual" because they provide these servicescustomer relationship management, e-newsletters
from their own offices - rather than using theand e-mailouts, and office services such as faxing,
office space and equipment of their clients - andemail and scanning. Clients have access to
because they utilise the technologies madespecialist skills that may not be available through a
available by the internet, such as email, instanttemp agency or serviced office, and access to
messaging, chat servers and web-basedlatest technologies including web-based
conferencing tools.conferencing, online calendar and document sharing
VAs provide profound cost-saving benefits to theand project collaboration, real time chat and digital
businesses and individuals they partner with, andtranscription services.
have an important role to play in today's businessAs Michael Russer puts it in The Obsolete
environment, as they form a large part of theEmployee:
growing trend towards home-based business."Any time you do something outside of your core
Many people have difficulty grasping the conceptcompetency you pay top dollar for amateur
of a remote assistant, so it is not surprising thatresults."
understanding the benefits poses a problem. SoWith clients across Australia, Singapore, in the UK,
what are the benefits, what's in it for you andCanada, and throughout North America, I seldom
who would benefit from the partnership?see my clients. But with the technology available
VAs can perform the same services astoday including email, fax, instant messaging
office-based employees but without theservices, Skype, Twitter, digital transcription
associated costs such as payroll tax, worker'stechnology, internet telephony and internet-based
compensation, superannuation, sick and otherfile sharing facilities, I'm as close to my clients as if
leave, or training. There are no equipment costsI was in the next room!
as VAs utilise their own equipment, and there areSo doesn't that mean that being a VA is as easy
none of the associated costs of wear and tear,as knowing how to type and "drive" a PC?
office space, lighting, power, telephone and so on.Absolutely not! A colleague recently put it best
In addition, the VA is available out of normalwhen she said:
hours, on weekends, and public holidays. How"The myth is that anyone can be a virtual
much do you lose, both in monetary terms and inassistant. Being a VA is more than just
terms of productivity, on office politics and staffproclaiming 'I am a VA', logging on to a computer
chatting in the coffee room? Clients pay only forand creating a web site. Professional VAs
time on task when they partner with a VA sotransition years of office administration experience
there is no time/money lost on these typicaland specialisation from a corporate setting to
office behaviours.running their own successful business. Those
VAs partner with clients, which means that aexperiences can include enrolment in advanced
longer term relationship can develop in much thetraining courses, managing offices and supervising
same way as one would with an onsite personallarge numbers of personnel - all while acting as the
assistant - yet clients do not have the associatedassistant to the owner. Others had responsibility
costs of an employee mentioned above.for local area networks (LANs), creating and
So why wouldn't you just use a temporarymaintaining corporate web sites, planning major
staffing agency to "fill the gaps" in yourevents, etc. These are just a few examples of
administrative support needs? Temps do notqualifications that help make a VA a 'professional'."
always offer the most cost effective solutionsFor more information on how a professional VA
for clients as on-costs are still factored into thecan help you and your business, contact eSOS or
hourly rate by the agency. In addition, whenvisit our site.