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Why Michael Hyatt Chose a Virtual Assistant
When Hyatt left corporate life, he figured he could manage the workload of a solo entrepreneur by himself. Then, he reflected, “Boy, was I wrong. Before long I was spending all day, every day mired in administrative detail—responding to emails, making travel plans, filling out expense reports. Ugh.”
Hyatt’s 6 Steps to Better Success
- I decided I had to make a change. People don’t enjoying feeling overwhelmed, but you wouldn’t always know it from their actions.
- I identified my three high-payoff activities. I did this by asking these questions: What is it that only I can do? Where do I add the most value? What is really important as opposed to merely urgent?
- I identified my three biggest productivity sinkholes. This was easy. For me, the sinkholes are booking my own travel, responding to email, and meeting with acquaintances who want my advice. All three eat into my productive time. There are more demands than there are me.
- I spent time reviewing the productivity basics. In The 4-Hour Workweek Tim Ferriss says the key to productivity is elimination, automation, and delegation.
- I did the math.
- I hired a virtual assistant.
Just going through the first five steps had a positive impact on Hyatt’s attitude—not to mention his business. But what really did the magic was the sixth. Hiring his virtual assistant was the change Hyatt needed.
The Winning Choice: Time is scarce, and you’re wasting your talents if you’re spending them on low-payoff activities. The surest way to derail your efforts is to get bogged down in all the important details of your business to the detriment of the essentials.
Why You Need a Virtual Assistant
Here are seven key indicators to determine if you need a virtual assistant:
- You’re Overwhelmed by Your Workload. To be at the top of your game, you need to be alert, healthy, and clearheaded. You can’t do that if you are always worrying about how you will keep all the balls in the air.
- You Need Help Digging Out from the Administrative Pile
- You Want to Be More Productive and Less Stressed. Productivity is not about doing more stuff; it’s about doing the right stuff. If you were honest with yourself, you could quickly list three to five things right now that are hindering you from maximizing the time you do have. Stress is caused by a lot of things, but one of them is feeling like you can’t get ahead no matter how hard you work. The solution is simple: stop. Let somebody else work on the things that are holding you back.
- You’re Not Focusing on What Only You Can Do. A good rule of thumb is if you can teach someone else to do a task, you shouldn’t spend your time doing it.
- You Need Help But Can’t Afford Someone Full-Time
- You Can’t Afford the Hassle of Recruiting, Hiring, and Training
- You Need More Margin in Your Life. Margin is like a savings account—only instead of money, it’s full of creativity, energy, psychological well being, and perspective. Margin is not something that just happens. You have to fight for it. Everyone, it seems, wants a piece of you.
3 Big Questions
- What is your lack of focus and loss of productivity costing your business?
- What could you be doing with your time if you were not buried in administrative detail?
- What could you create that would truly advance your business if you didn’t feel so overwhelmed?
Why a Virtual Assistant Beats a Traditional One
A virtual assistant offers several advantages over a traditional employee. Here are Hyatt’s top five:
- You Lose the Overhead of a Full-Time Salary and Benefits. A conventional employee costs your business another 30 to 35 percent on top of their base pay.
- You Don’t Have to Equip Them for Work.
- You Don’t Have to Advertise, Screen, Hire, or Fire. Getting the wrong person can be worse than having an open position. The hiring process is complicated, confusing, and will exponentially diminish the time you have to do the things you need to do to keep the business moving forward. Why mess with it? The company who facilitates the placement of the assistant will interview you to understand your needs and match your needs with someone in their pre-screened database. Your chances of a good match go up exponentially compared to doing it all on your own.
- You Can Adjust Contracted Hours According to Your Needs. You purchase access to this person in increments that are driven by the time you need to accomplish the tasks you need covered. This can fluctuate up and down based on your workflow.
- You Can Avoid Interpersonal Time-Wastes and Landmines.
What a Virtual Assistant Can Do for You
Let’s consider some of the common tasks:
- Screen Your Email
- Manage Your Calendar
- Confirm Your Appointments
- Screen Voice Mail and Make Calls on Your Behalf
- Take Minutes for Your Meetings
- Book Your Travel and Make Other Reservations
- File Your Expense Reports
- Handle Your Invoicing and Other Routine Paperwork
- Provide You Valuable Research
- Create Your Content
- Buy and Send Gifts and Write Your Thank-You Notes
- Provide Operations Support
The great thing is that a virtual assistant’s focus is tailored to your specific needs.
Answering the Most Common Questions
What Kind of Traits Should You Look for in a Virtual Assistant?
- Responsiveness. Being attentive and taking initiative isn’t something you can teach an adult.
- Attitude. You want someone who is proactive, forward-thinking, eager, upbeat, and positive.
- Prior experience. It makes all the difference if your virtual assistant has worked in your field before.
- Professionalism. Because your virtual assistant will be representing you and your brand, you want them to be professional and act appropriately in all situations.
- Technology savvy. You can’t use a virtual assistant who’s scared of technology.
Hyatt urges, “Trust me on this: don’t hire a virtual assistant based on the cheapest option available. The real issue is not what you pay, but the additional margin the right virtual assistant creates for you.”
The First 90 Days with Your Virtual Assistant
- Learning someone’s preferences, strengths, weaknesses, style, and so on, takes time. You can’t bypass or skip that.
- The most important thing to remember is to keep the end goal in mind—you need to free yourself to do the things only you can do.
- Make sure you take time to explain why a task is important, how it fits in the big picture, and what you’ve learned about performing it along the way. Sometimes your virtual assistant may even be able to determine a better way than the one you suggest.
- If you don’t communicate, your relationship will fail. And, truthfully, a failure to communicate context and expectations falls on the shoulders of the leader.
- Differentiate Between “Mission Critical” and “Nice to Have”
- Learn to Delegate and Track Assignments. The point here is that we need to get serious about letting go of tasks that don’t really move us forward.
- Empower your virtual assistant to help you. They can’t will that to happen; you have to be willing to let go of some tasks.
- Make sure you provide ample time to complete the assigned task, particularly for large jobs detail about what needs to be completed and how rationale for why the task is important.
- Schedule a Series of Periodic Reviews
- The best thing you can do is make the most of those first few months by choosing to do the things that will help you go farther than you first thought possible.
An African Proverb says, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
Adopt a Proven Model
Nothing will renew your passion and drive like dumping the weight of needless work.
Keep these three things in mind:
- Your virtual assistant works part-time.
- Your virtual assistant is a professional. They can filter your email, book your travel, manage your calendar, handle invoicing, and respond to all routine requests. And your virtual assistant will likely be three times as fast as you are when working through administrative details.
- Your virtual assistant will handle things your way. Once you spend a little time on the front end explaining how you want your business handled, they will understand your expectations.
So, let me reiterate, “Have you ever considered a virtual assistant?” It may just help you shoot for the stars…