Managing a Virtual Assistant or virtual team doesn’t require hours and hours of reading emails fielding questions and feedback requests, asking (and waiting) for revisions, dealing with lost data when they take off without notice or their computer crashes. Nor does VA management require spending time you don’t have on instant messenger programs.
Knowing what you want and how to get it from a VA does have a learning curve, but you’re in luck: The ever-present cloud technology, as well as our own experience in hiring VAs, can help you get things right.
Always Use Cloud Services
Cloud storage, paid or free, gives you the flexibility to provide quick and easy input to the projects they’re working on rather than wasting time being sent an attachment, then sending feedback to them – and the time each of you wastes waiting for the other to respond. The cloud also allows you to restrict/remove their access to important files if need.
The cloud also ensures that if they flake out on you, never to be heard from again, that they won’t take a timely project with them. Last, if their computer crashes the night before a deadline, leaving them without enough time to redo the project, the data will still be right where they left it.
Here are the things you should do with the help of the cloud services of your choice:
1. Start Small, and Use Tools to Assist you
No matter what experience they claim to have, always start with one small project. Preferably a project that takes approximately 30 minutes or fewer. Immediately check their work after the time’s up, to make sure they’re on track with the project’s goals.
This is a good way to test a potential VA before hiring them too, but even after the initial project meets your approval, you should continue slow and steady for a few days at least. Failing to do so leads to more time spent editing and revising, and financial loss if important deadlines are missed.
Using cloud-based project management tool can help you manage the small projects, allowing you to try multiple VAs’ services at once. This will speed up the whole VA “recruitment” task.
Alternatively, to cut your ‘trials-and-errors,’ you can hire VAs from a personal assistant company, like 24/7 Virtual Assistant.
2. Communicate Project Guidelines and Deadline Expectations
There are certain times when it’s prudent to allow your VA some creative freedom. Allowing a designer to work with some basic suggestions and see what they come up with can lead to a better website or logo design. Allowing an experienced writer to let their creativity flow on a given topic will lead to less-wooden and share-worthy content.
However, for most tasks you need to be as specific as possible and demand edits and redos if expectations aren’t met. Generally, if you let your VA run wild and do things their own way, the finished result won’t match the picture in your (or your client’s) head. Be as detailed as possible while keeping your instructions succinct. Deadlines must be met without exception, unless there are dire extenuating circumstances, and even then: let them know they only get one generous bye before you say “adios amigo!”
3. Be Smart With Email Practices
Over-emailing with your remote assistant can quickly get out of hand, with them sending you email messages that resemble a high-school term paper, or dozens of small little emails of which a few can easily get missed if you’re busy, or if they accidentally hit “reply” to an older message instead of adding a fresh one to your communication thread. Insist they only send one email per day and ensure they consider each communication they send carefully before hitting the “send” button.
4. Instant Messaging (and Chatting) for the Win
Set expectations with your VA as to when you might choose to IM with them. Their time is valuable too and communications will go much smoother if you don’t pop onto their desktop at random times, usually when they’re trying to get important time-consuming tasks done for you.
At the same time, they need to respect your time-constraints and you need to make it clear what times you’re available, and that it must be important if they deviate from those timelines. Use Skype or an instant messenger for communication. If they work for an agency, use the agency’s built in messenger.
