10 Reasons Virtual Assistant Projects Fail
I’d love to say that most of the time Virtual Assistants are a great buy. The fact is, it is a lot like hiring a normal employee. You get better at it over time. You learn what to look for and what to ask. And you eventually realize that you have to manage them, not just tell them what to do and hope it turns out OK.
Here are the 10 top reasons a project with a virtual assistant will fail:
- Poor definition of tasks the Virtual Assistant must do.
- Hiring the VA for a big project without first doing a small project to test the Virtual Assistant.
- Not setting clear outcomes that you expect from a group of tasks.
- Hiring the cheapest Virtual Assistant.
- Not monitoring progress and setting milestones.
- Having unrealistic expectations of the outcome (especially with internet marketing)
- Hiring a virtual assistant that tries to do too many different things – they will not be very proficient at any.
- Failure to cut project quickly. If things are not going well and you are spending more time with the virtual assistant than it would take to just do it yourself, cancel the project and move on.
- Assumptions – Failure to carefully explain each thing will doom your project. Assume nothing and document everything.
- Forgetting about the VA over time and not giving them encouragement. It is easy to forget they are out there doing tasks for you and they may not stay enthusiastic if you do not connect with them occasionally.
Really all of these items can be summed up into this. You need to carefully hire, train and manage a virtual assistant if you expect them to preform well for you. And if you do not succeed with the first one you try, don’t give up. Assess what went wrong and hire a virtual assistant that is better the next time.
Other Important VA Articles:
Awesome list!
I have read many blog post where the author has outsourced a few task to a Virtual Assistant only to be disappointed and vouch never to do it again. I fully agree that the process is very much like anything else… practice makes perfect. In time, you will find the right Virtual Assistant, one that compliments your style.
However, I don’t quite agree with your statement that VAs need to be managed. A good VA should have a project management system in place and be on top of things. If anything, it would the VA’s responsibility to ensure her projects and clients are well managed.
And I cannot stress number 9 enough!! Assume nothing and document everything. Everything!
this is a good heads up to project managers.. nice blog..
Thanks Chantal.
All VA’s need managed, but good VA’s are very easy to manage because they have systems in place and have set clear goals.
My point with managing a VA is that everything in a business needs managed by the owner/manager. If something is not profitable or performing as planned, it needs adjusted or eliminated.
A good VA manages themselves well and reports accurately, making it an easy decision.
Interesting points, Ron.
These problems, in my experience, come when a person outsources projects or piecework, rather than finding a Virtual Assistant to be his or her right hand person, investing in the partnership, and making the Virtual Assistant an integral part of everything that goes on in his or her business/life.
When retaining a Virtual Assistant on that level, tests aren’t necessary, nor is management.
If you think or working with a Virtual Assistant as the business version of getting married, you’d spend far more time choosing, and far less time worrying on the back-end about that choice, or the value of what you were getting from the chosen.
As for not choosing a VA to do many things, in fact, the most powerful thing you can do is retain one who wants to be your one-stop shop… the person you turn to for literally ANYTHING you need. In turn, you should know that while everything will get done and done well, your VA is unlikely to be the person who does it all. What s/he can’t do, she’ll make happen.
Nice points, Stacy.
My post was definitely more oriented towards hiring a new person. Once you have someone that is a trusted team member, that dynamic changes.
As for doing everything, I disagree, but only in the sense that if you know someone that can get anything done and done well, you have a business manager, not a virtual assistant. This is a different kind of skill set.
From working with VA’s I have found that some people are under $10 an hour willing to do anything while other people are truly high end consultants calling themselves VA’s. It really is all over the map and just depends.