Virtual Assistants Are Real-Life Humans!
Please treat us like that…
As a virtual assistant, there are some days I just want to slap my head. Hard. Really hard. I am a red-blooded business owner. I work damn hard. I raise a family. I cook. I clean. I laugh. I cry. I AM HUMAN.
So I ask you – why are some people pure jerks? Male or female – down right rude jerks!
If you don’t know, a Virtual Assistant (a VA) is a business owner. They work super hard in their own business to build it up, to gain respect and credibility, to find clients and build trust-worthy relationships with their clients.
A VA helps other business owners with the tasks they loathe – everyday admin, email management, phone answering, data entry, bookkeeping, copywriting, database management, social media, presentation preparation, word processing and much more. Pretty much anything you can think of, a VA can assist with.
Australian Virtual Assistants are highly trained.
Priding themselves on being their own business owner, most Australian VAs are highly skilled in their areas of expertise. They invest in themselves to make sure they have the required skills to help their clients. Many do not work for a large bank of VAs, opting to run their own business. And as such, they own their reputation and make sure they can provide high quality services for their clients.
It’s not often that you will hear of an Australian VA giving a client a less than desirable product (unless they’ve said they can do something they’re not qualified to do which is a whole other blog in itself).
The following recently happened to a VA colleague and made me mad!
Firstly I give full praise and credit to my VA colleague for her amazing response to a less than desirable situation. Her ability to actually finish the job with poise and grace proved how professional she is. Rather than totally loose her shit, she remained calm, and plodded on through the task. It was an amazing effort and I’m super proud to have VAs like her in Australia – and as part of the awesome Virtually Yours network.
This client must not have been ready for an Australian VA (as she had only used overseas VA in the past). She was not ready to let go of control of the job at hand and wanted to ‘manage’ the VA.
Her inappropriate actions included:
- Continually picking her nose on the Skype briefing call (I am NOT kidding!)
- Calling the VA every hour to check on progress
- Telling the VA that she feels she’s getting ‘ripped off’
- Asking why the task is taking so long
- Complaining about her overseas VA experience
If you want to manage, you need an employee, not a Virtual Assistant.
Some business owners are not ready to let go. They feel they need to manage the VA to ensure their job is being done. It does take some time to form a virtual working relationship, but you need to listen to your VA for guidance.
If a VA tells you it’s not productive to call every hour, please don’t! If your VA has given you a deadline, please rest assured they will meet it – or they will call YOU to explain. If your VA has quoted for the job, please be assured they’ve taken all aspects into account and they are not ripping you off.
My Aussie Virtual Assistant colleague has made me proud.
I promised I wouldn’t name this VA but I want her to know that she is amazing. She will know who she is. To plod on through a hard job takes courage. It can be lonely being a VA with no fellow office workers to bitch to when we have a rough day or get treated poorly.
I told her to stop if it was causing her too much grief but she finished the job! Of course, she’ll never go back, but she finished the task she was given.
Well done chick – you totally rock!
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