Hiring Virtual Assistant – Things You Really Need To Know Article

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Hiring Virtual Assistant – Things you really need to know

What are the important things you need to keep in mind while hiring virtual assistant for your business and personal assistance.

Author: Vik Chabra

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It was several years back when famous American Author & Public Speaker “Tim Ferris” introduced the concept of Hiring Virtual Assistant in his book “4-Hour Work Week”, since then Virtual Assistant industry has made its mark in the outsourcing area, as the time passed away their have been several changes introduced to it. And currently it is empowered to a level where your virtual assistant cannot only assist you as your personal assistant, but he/she can also keep you updated with the latest technology and could easily take care of technical solutions as well..

This area has its good and bad effects. But if you are really interested in finding if there will be advantage or disadvantage of hiring virtual assistant for your particular business then you should not listen to or see what effects it had for other people.

Every one has its own needs and requirements. It does cuts the costs but many a times with hiring a virtual assistant you also get lower quality of work. However, this is not always a case.

So let’s look in to some common drawbacks of hiring a virtual assistant, and the reason why it is like that:

COST:First and foremost you need to be wary of cost while hiring an virtual assistant, as for many virtual assistant companies which are perhaps well known in the market, this has become business of earning dollars, so they always emphasize on their assistants to get as much work as they can; which resulting assistant’s start offering & accepting all such kind of tasks which they are not expert in, Yes, this is what inside story of every virtual assistant company, most of the time they just accept the tasks and then would give it to someone who might have very little knowledge about it just for the sake of to get it done, as each task is worth of some dollars..
So it becomes very important for you to check what kind of packages and plans they are offering and what all types of services are included in their packages before you could pay for it. Always inquire about their possibilities of performing tasks in any “ABC” area which they might not have listed under their services.

QUALITY:Taking cautious steps is essential to help prevent you from committing mistakes while outsourcing your tasks to virtual assistant. The first thing that you must do is to try your best to choose the right company. Looking for the cheapest solutions may backfire as the cheapest does not guarantee quality. It is highly suggestible to find Virtual Assistant individually; not from any virtual assistant company, which provide number of virtual assistant to multiple clients.

Going with some freelance virtual assistant could avoid you committing this mistake, as freelance virtual assistant’s does not handle large number of clients and their services are limited and very specified; as they are directly answerable to their clients and do not have any management who could cover their mistakes each time by sending you apology email with the assurance of not repeating such mistake.

BARRIERS:There are other non-financial problems while hiring an virtual assistant like: another country time zone differences, language barriers, unexpected cultural differences etc. So always make sure to speak with your virtual assistant over the phone few times before you can actually start up your service as this could give you good idea about your assistant.

ASSIGNING RESPONSIBILITIES: Another problem while hiring virtual assistant is the responsibilities you are going to outsource. Many people end up outsourcing crucial business processes which any normal virtual assistant can easily mess up with, if you are planning to delegate such crucial tasks to your virtual assistant, make sure assistant is skilled enough or having knowledge of latest techno working trends. Many virtual assistant companies hire large chunk of virtual assistant’s who does not come up with any experience, they are just fresh chunk of college passed out students, and then companies would provide them with basic training on how to handle clients, so most of the time clients remain unaware with the actual skill sets of assistant as companies are involved in between to cover or to hide such aspects.

So in order to avoid yourself from committing any mistake while hiring any virtual assistant, all you need to do is choose right platform; specially beware of the middle sharks; by this means is to beware from the large virtual assistant companies, as these companies may claim to provide you several skilled services. But when it comes to actual business; then it’s you and your virtual assistant, and at that moment you may regret your decision as assistant could be of very basic communication & skill sets.

And there are some other problems that you might face while hiring assistant from any virtual assistant company, for example: there isn’t any guarantee you will get the same person each time you need help. Working with a VA permits you to partner with the same person for consistency and at the same time gain valuable knowledge of you and your business wants.

Hence it becomes very important for you to go with some freelance virtual assistant who could give you consistent skilled & professional services and would directly answerable to you.

So remember hiring a right Virtual Assistant that has the talents you need permits you to get the job finished without the additional expense of employee down time and coaching costs.

About Author

Vik manage full time Freelance virtual assistance service “vlancing.com”, Vik has introduced this concept after tasting the area of Virtual Assistant while working with one of pioneer company in this industry for several years. vlancing.com act as powerful resource for medium businesses and personal needs, with an ultimate goal to provide people with utmost easy and techno virtual assistance services in much affordable range,

For more information, please visit: http://www.vlancing.com

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Hiring Virtual Assistant – Things you really need to know