Showing posts with label United States. Show all posts
Showing posts with label United States. Show all posts
Hiring Virtual Assistant Services
What is a virtual assistant? A virtual assistant is a trained and skilled individual who works in the comfort of home or their own office. Virtual assistant services is to report and work in collaboration with small and big business owners and entrepreneur providing administrative support without being physically present in the office.
In the recent times, we have seen high growth of this job due to the fast phase of technology. One can now work in remote place while reporting to some other countries. Many big and small companies across the world are now hiring virtual assistant services. You can check online for the list of all the companies providing service VA, you can choose the company and country of which you would like to work with. Companies can save more when they get a services because VA's are sub contractor and they are not entitled to employee benefits nor pay any tax like those working inside the office. Though VA's do not have the same privilege like those working in the office, the good thing is that they have their own advantage like they can do their job anywhere as long as there is an internet connection.
Most of the service provider assisting you to get virtual assistant have flexible terms and you can take the service for an hour or a day or a month as per your need. While companies get benefited by paying only for the job done unlike regular employee, the candidate get help by doing the job in part-time or full-time as per the requirement.
Considering the importance of VA's, you have multiple options to hire one, however it might take a time to select one and there are high chances that you might pick the wrong candidate and they will fail to deliver your expectation. So you should always prefer to hire professional services that are in this business from long. They take care of screening the candidates, teaching them the skills and they always perform well.
Hiring a professional virtual assistant services has become more popular especially for those with small and home business. It is very efficient to keep the business working smoothly. It is also a viable option for those businesses who wants to cut their operating costs. Having done that, the company will save a lot from simple office supplies to paying off the electricity. A company, small or big has the option to hire a virtual assistant as a regular full-time employee or a part-time employee.
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Visit us to get the best and affordable Virtual Assistant Services. You can visit us at rajpromotions.com
Become A Virtual Assistant
He or She works from home and provides professional, technical, administrative, or creative assistance. Virtual Assistants work as independent contractors. They are hired by other agencies or organizations that need assistance, either for a particular job or even on a long term basis. The money they earn by becoming a Virtual Assistant is dependant on the performance of the person. Virtual Assistants are similar to those who perform outsourced work.
How does the process of making money work for a Virtual Assistant?
VA is a business entrepreneur and in order to be successful must provide good service. This is predominantly a work from home job and therefore requires discipline, focus and dedication. Virtual Assistants make money by working on tasks delegated to them, through e-mails, telephones or fax.
What resources or skills does one need to be a Virtual Assistant?
To be a Virtual Assistant, one needs excellent communication skills, ability to coordinate research, and to organize the process efficiently. One should also be skilled at canvassing and marketing products or services if required by the company or individual they work for.
How can one acquire these skills?
A Virtual Assistant may be required to do many things including writing articles, researching or even creating a website. With a little direction and training it is possible for VAs to excel in this field and make a lot of money. There are many short term courses offered to help fine tune skills.
How much investment is required?
The person who wants to earn money by being a Virtual Assistant can kick start with ease as this does not require high investments. Apart from learning the course, VAs needs a good computer with internet connectivity. The person who is engaged in this business does not have to rent a separate office. Sitting at home, equipped with excellent communication skills, VAs have to communicate with clients and deliver online.
Who are the competitors?
Competitors for Virtual Assistants are others who work in a similar field. If you are good at your job and skilled in organizing and communicating, then companies will definitely offer you great opportunities. You can either advertise your services independently or be a part of VA service providers to access good opportunities.
How difficult is it?
For those who are disciplined, committed and skilled, being a virtual assistant is not difficult at all. As this is a work from home job, you can work on it as an additional source of income, at a mutually convenient time. Once you establish your reputation in the market and find a few reliable clients, your job becomes easier and money starts rolling in.
How much can one earn?
Virtual Assistant pay depends on the skill, training and type of job. It also depends on how efficient, quick and useful the assistant is. The more skills one offers to clients, the more money they can make.
How does the process of making money work for a Virtual Assistant?
VA is a business entrepreneur and in order to be successful must provide good service. This is predominantly a work from home job and therefore requires discipline, focus and dedication. Virtual Assistants make money by working on tasks delegated to them, through e-mails, telephones or fax.
What resources or skills does one need to be a Virtual Assistant?
To be a Virtual Assistant, one needs excellent communication skills, ability to coordinate research, and to organize the process efficiently. One should also be skilled at canvassing and marketing products or services if required by the company or individual they work for.
How can one acquire these skills?
A Virtual Assistant may be required to do many things including writing articles, researching or even creating a website. With a little direction and training it is possible for VAs to excel in this field and make a lot of money. There are many short term courses offered to help fine tune skills.
How much investment is required?
The person who wants to earn money by being a Virtual Assistant can kick start with ease as this does not require high investments. Apart from learning the course, VAs needs a good computer with internet connectivity. The person who is engaged in this business does not have to rent a separate office. Sitting at home, equipped with excellent communication skills, VAs have to communicate with clients and deliver online.
Who are the competitors?
Competitors for Virtual Assistants are others who work in a similar field. If you are good at your job and skilled in organizing and communicating, then companies will definitely offer you great opportunities. You can either advertise your services independently or be a part of VA service providers to access good opportunities.
How difficult is it?
For those who are disciplined, committed and skilled, being a virtual assistant is not difficult at all. As this is a work from home job, you can work on it as an additional source of income, at a mutually convenient time. Once you establish your reputation in the market and find a few reliable clients, your job becomes easier and money starts rolling in.
How much can one earn?
Virtual Assistant pay depends on the skill, training and type of job. It also depends on how efficient, quick and useful the assistant is. The more skills one offers to clients, the more money they can make.
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Reasons for the Virtual Personal Assistant Boom
Thanks to the advancement of technology, these problems are now things of the past. All people have to do nowadays is to go online and get themselves a virtual personal assistant.
Virtual personal assistants are now taking over the work of any regular employee. Their capabilities are basically the same. The only difference is that virtual assistants are more technology-wise. They make use of modern tools to provide their clients with the best of service.
Below are some of the reasons why many people are getting their own virtual assistants:
1. Virtual personal assistants are capable of multi-tasking.
You will be surprised with the many skills virtual assistants are capable of. From sorting out emails to logging important files, you name it and it is done. Some virtual assistants can even do site maintenance and web marketing on the side.
Think how easy it would be for you to just rely on one person what would have been a task delegated to three or more persons. And imagine how reassuring it is for you to know that you do not have to train or teach your assistant everything.
2. Virtual personal assistants know what it like running a business.
Many virtual assistants have prior experience about running a business. Some are even business owners themselves. You know you are in good hands when a virtual assistant is helping you with your business.
For all you know, they might be able to share their ideas about how a business should go about. Experiences they had in the past makes them capable of giving sound advices and even strategies that can help your business become successful.
3. Virtual personal assistants are affordable.
A virtual assistant is your best option if you are on a tight budget. They do not cost as much as your regular employee.
In addition, you can agree upon certain terms of payment which will help you manage your finances better without getting a big hole in your pocket. You can hire the assistant on a per project term, months or years. It all depends on you.
4. Virtual personal assistants can start working for you ASAP.
Virtual personal assistants are not only equipped with the required skills, they also have with them the materials needed to start working immediately.
You do not have to worry about renting an office space or equipments. All you have to do is designate the tasks, specify your requirements and set deadlines and the virtual assistant is all set.
Lack of space, limited budget and work experience should not bother you anymore if you are just starting your business. What you should be concerned about is finding the person who can get the work done.
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How to Attract and Keep a Personal Assistant
Many managers will often say their personal assistant is invaluable to them yet they often treat them as if they're not.
Day after day, week after week the P.A. is in the office, slogging away making sure the work gets done. In many instances it is the P.A. that holds the business / department together.
Many of them are so conscientious they won't take time out and will stay at their desk until the work is done. Not only are they integral to the running of any business, their income and the way they are treated may not always reflect the importance of their role.
Jenny has worked for her current employer for the past three years and thoroughly enjoys her role as Personal Assistant to the General Manager. They have a great working relationship.
If she requires the occasional afternoon or morning off to deal with personal matters, all she has to do is ask. Her boss praises her regularly for her contribution and rewards her … sometimes monetarily and other times with a dinner out or movie tickets when they achieve their sales targets.
Because of this attitude with her employer, she does her utmost best in her work and never thinks twice about working overtime on the odd occasion. In fact she works twice as hard because she’s appreciated and has some flexibility in her working hours.
This is a totally different situation to Jenny's previous employer. Jenny had been working for another organisation where her boss was 'married to the job'. Although he had a wife and family, his behaviour didn't reflect this. He worked all hours of the day and night and couldn't understand why everyone else went home at 5.00 p.m.
Although she did her utmost best to organise him and get the work done on time, he would always ask for tasks to be done just when she was getting ready to leave for the day.
On the many occasions when she worked back or took work home so that her boss would have what he wanted for the next morning, he never thanked her. He just assumed that's what she should do. He never considered her needs. She was a single parent and therefore had major responsibilities. She had a life too. Her boss on the other hand was fortunate to have a wife who didn't work and took care of their personal life.
Prior to Jenny being in this role, there had been three other people who had worked in her position, and each one had lasted less than 3 months.
Jenny had enough, she left after 6 months and found her current position. It wasn't the money that was her main issue. It was the flexibility and appreciation. Although her boss was pleasant enough, he just didn't understand that there is more to working with someone than just paying their wages.
Learn How to Look After Your People
As soon as you have people to manage, the most important skill you need to learn is how to look after them.
Every client I have coached will often say their biggest challenge is the people that work for them.
There are many reasons for this including hiring the wrong people to begin with and the most common being the manager/boss… they haven’t developed the skills on being a masterful manager.
What the Boss Wants:
Someone who can use their initiative, make decisions in their absence and carry out tasks without supervision.
A person they can trust and take many of the basic administrative duties from them so the boss can spend his/her time on more important tasks.
A person who can organise them (and in some cases be a mind-reader).
An assistant who is their right-hand person and can keep everything running smoothly.
What the PA Wants:
A boss who they can communicate with.
A boss who understands that when they are given tasks to do, although they may have taken 2 minutes to discuss, could take the P.A. 2 days to complete with all the interruptions they have from others.
A boss who realises that the P.A. is a person who has to do many tasks as well as answering all the phone calls and often has many interruptions in their day which can cause them to get very behind with their work.
A boss who is appreciative of them and realises that the P.A. does have a life outside of work and needs to have time-out just like they do.
To be recognised on a regular basis that they are important. They also need to be renumerated for their valuable contribution and should have regular performance appraisals and be offered incentives.
The Final Word
When employing a personal assistant make sure they are the right fit. If you're looking for someone who can be extremely flexible in their hours and can come in early and stay late, then make sure that person is in the right personal situation to do that. Using our invaluable tool How to Hire the Right People can save you time, money and stress before you go through the process.
Employing people is a skill in itself. Keeping them happy so that they will be an important part of your business is another story. See Look After Your People And They Will Look After You
Have a great week
Lorraine Pirihi
About The Author
Lorraine Pirihi is Australia's Personal Productivity Specialist and Leading Life Coach. Her business The Office Organiser specialises in showing small business owners and managers, how to get organised at work so they can have a life! Lorraine is also a dynamic speaker and has produced many products including "How to Survive and Thrive at Work!"
To subscribe to her free ezine visit www.office-organiser.com.au
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Great Contribution of a Virtual Personal Assistant
| If you think that you can do limitless administrative tasks on your own without the aide of anyone else, then, you must be a superhero. If not, you cannot possibly do it or if you just did, your social and familial relationship is seriously inadequate. A balance of the different aspects in ones life is always a necessity so as to live a life that is full and satisfying. A virtual personal assistant can greatly help you to divide these administrative tasks so as to lessen the load of work that you have on your desk. The browsing of resource sites in the internet to seek the aide of a personal assistant is the best thing that one can do. This is not a draining task for you since you simply browse in the internet and find the sites that cater to such things. This is a convenient alternative if you do not have the time to read thick resume of applicants as well as the taxing interview of potential personal assistants that can take too mush of your time. They will simply do it for you and provide a personal assistant that can do loads of things for you for the reason that they are trained to be flexible and efficient in many ways. The hired personal assistants also have the proper qualifications that a personal assistant must have since they are screened thoroughly before they are even hired. They can perform a task from a difficult and complicated angle like decision-making and accounting overheads to the simplest ones like running errands for you. A personal assistant is trained to assist you in every way they can. They are prepared to do the typing, answering the phone, writing business letters, calculating expenditures, taking down important notes, making a schedule, organizing papers and many more. They should also possess a special ability like good communication skills and excellent interpersonal proficiency since they are the ones who will attend to the clients. Their impressive qualifications are also needed to keep up with you on your administrative tasks. Of course, all these credentials should be recompensed with a reasonable salary. Well, if you think that you have spent much on your personal assistant that is exactly untrue since having an assistant helps you to be more efficient in a high-speed time given that two heads are better than one. It will simply make you more effective and able to cover a whole lot of loads than you can ever think of. Therefore, a virtual personal assistant should be present in every establishment to provide organization and efficiency in a high-speed time. |
| Author Resource:- Matthew Stanton writes an article about Virtual personal Assistantand how it gives great contribution and benefits to you. Simply visit this site for information at http://www.personal-virtual-assistant.com/ar/virtual-personal-assistant.php |
| Article From New Ezine Articles |
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How to Get a Job as a Secretary, Getting Hired as a ...
How to get a job as a secreatry, personal assistant, legal secretary and how to get hired in ANY economy and a recession.
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Personal Assistant for the Disabled
Celebrities and executives are not the only ones who need a personal assistant. The disabled also need such individuals to help them do things that they can’t do on their own.
The task required of the personal assistant to do for the disabled include bathing, cleaning, cooking and dressing among other duties. If there are other things that the personal assistant will be instructed to do, this should be agreed upon and written in the contract.
The client may decide to write down what needs to be done daily as part of a routine so it will be easy for the personal assistant to follow. This allows the client to live within the community rather than being shipped off to a nursing home or assisted care facility. Unfortunately, not that many people are aware of this.
Just about anyone can become a personal assistant to the disabled as long as they are 18 years of age, have a social security number, passes through the screening process which includes the background and health check. The personal assistant can even be a member of the client’s family as long as he or she is not the spouse or a parent of a minor child.
You don’t have to be internet savvy to get this job. Just be able to do some simple chores and tasks as required by the client.
When the personal assistant is off into the field, the client becomes the acting employer so he or she must do what is necessary to enhance the client’s ability to live independently as well as respect the individual and their property.
The pay rate of a personal assistant for the disabled varies depending on the state where one is employed. This may increase after a year while other benefits are at the discretion of the employer. One example if giving the personal assistant an incentive for bringing another client to the business like perhaps a neighbor of the person you are caring for right now.
In order for you to work well as a personal assistant, both you and the client must have a good relationship. This means you are able to communicate openly with each other. This is why certain house rules are set. There are regulations set by the employer but you also have to know what are the rules which the clients wants you to follow.
Just like working for a celebrity or an executive, the personal assistant should not reveal any information about the client to anyone. You have to know which matters should be kept so their privacy is not violated.
Being a personal assistant to the disabled is not that popular yet unlike other occupations. This means that the pay is also not that high but if you are willing to put yourself in the service of others that is all the matters.
The personal assistant service these days is not only for the disabled. This is now being used to benefit seniors, doctors, clergymen and financial planners with the fees being economically priced to meet a range of budgets as the number of people who will be over the age of 65 will jump to 21% by the year 2040.
Truly, the government should have done something better in terms of healthcare way back in the 1960’s but there is nothing we can do about that now except promote the use of personal assistants.
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Why a Personal Assistant May Be Right for You
If you are busy professional that never seems to have enough hours in a day, hiring a Personal Assistant (PA) can be a step in the right direction. With a PA you can be more productive, reduce your stress level, and most of all spend your time on what matters.
Celebrities and famous people have learned to leverage their assistants to get more done in a day. If your disposable income does not allow for a full time employee you could hire an assistant by the hour from a concierge and errand service company. In the last few years these companies are flourishing in every major metropolitan area. Check the International Concierge and Errand association at www.iceaweb.org for a provider in your area.
When it comes to the tasks that you need to delegate, the important questions to ask yourself are
- Do I have the time to do it myself?
- Do I want to complete the task?
- Am I going to complete the task on time?
If your answer is “no” to any of these questions than you should consider delegating the task. Before hiring the assistant decide what tasks you would like to delegate and your budget.
Take the following sample list of tasks that a PA can perform and think how much time you can save by having a PA complete them.
Travel arrangements;
Buying gifts for special occasion;
Car maintenance;
Caring for pets;
Dry cleaning pick up;
Grocery shopping;
Maintaining household, business, and social calendar;
Scheduling all appointments;
Organizing special events;
Handling all email and written correspondence;
Managing bill-paying;
Maintaining all personal and business files;
Maintaining address book;
Writing personal thank-you notes, invitations and greeting cards;
Completing all personal errands;
A good Personal Assistant makes an enormous contribution to the employer's effectiveness and posses numerous professional skills. Once you hire a Personal Assistant you will realize that it is well worth the investment.
Check out http://www.errandmanager.com for more information. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Louisa_Kamau |
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What is A Virtual Personal Assistant
The personal assistant is there everyday doing the tasks that you tell them to do. Examples of these are answering the phone, checking the mail, filing your paper and so forth. A virtual personal assistant can do the same thing using various methods of communication such as the web, telephone and fax. The only thing it can’t do is make your morning coffee.
Another difference with the virtual personal assistant is the he or she is not a temporary or full time employee. This person is hired on a contractor basis so you only call upon them when they are needed. This enables you to save money when you can do certain things on your own.
These individuals are paid on an hourly fee which could be from $15 to $40 depending on their geographic location.
Just to give you an idea, someone who is based in Los Angeles, California will charge a much higher hourly fee compared to someone who works in Austin, Texas. One way you can save money is to agree to pay a certain amount of hours per week.
Should you always get a virtual personal assistant from out of town? The answer is no because sometimes you need them to be familiar with the places where you are residing.
The best place to find a personal virtual assistant is online because these people do their business using the web. You can of course put an ad in the newspaper or bulletin board and specify there what are the duties and responsibilities that they will be doing.
In the next few days, you should screen the applicants just like how you will do it when you are hiring someone for a job.
But what should be the criteria when you hire a virtual personal assistant? Naturally, this should be based on their work experience. But you should look deeper into the personality of the person so you know how their work attitude. The best one to get should not always be the most experienced but the one who takes interest in your line of business and will do their best to help it grow.
To see how well they will perform, give them a small project to do and see how well they perform. If they do a good job, then this person is worth hiring. If not, check out the other applicants.
You have to maintain a good relationship with your virtual personal assistant by keeping the lines of communication open so you will know a little bit about them.
You should also provide them some feedback so they can improve if there are a few mistakes. But don’t forget to give praise when they did a superb job.
The internet has made the world a smaller place because you can talk to anyone regardless of where they are in the world. The personal virtual assistant could be from somewhere in the United States, Europe or in Asia. The most important thing is that the person is able to perform his or her task just like regular personal assistant.
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Starting Your Own Personal Assistant Service Business
But what does a personal assistant service actually do? Someone from their office will deliver or pick up personal items, wait for contractors, deliveries or installations in your home, shop for gifts, groceries and other items, take your car for repair or cleaning, take your pet to the vet, arrange business or personal travel, simply your way of paying bills and organize your home or office space.
Since you don’t need the personal assistant service all the time, you can simply call them up and only pay them for the number of hours rendered. Some companies have a flat rate for an hour or two which is more than enough to get a simple task done when you are busy doing something else.
You can find a personal assistant service online or through the phone directory and be happy to know that most of these are bonded and insured.
Given that the idea of a personal assistant service is not hard to do, you can make one yourself if there are not that many yet where you live. In fact, you can start by doing this at home and then when you take the call, you do the work or have some other people do it for you.
The skills you need to have to get into the personal assistant service business are not that difficult. You and your team should be internet savvy, knowledgeable about the latest gadgets, be able to do some basic financing and be well organized.
You then advertise to your neighbors and friends about your business and hopefully get referrals whenever it is needed.
The amount you charge depends on the kind of service you are providing. The best way is to aim for an annual salary so if you are able to finish the job in a much shorter time than expected, what you earn stays the same.
But if you are just establishing your presence in the market, it is best to charge hourly. You can charge extra when your services extend beyond the agreed upon time. Be sure to put everything written in a contract and have them sign it. You should be paid for your services the minute that the job is done. When things pick up, you can demand that clients should pay for this a month in advance.
Don’t forget to be bonded and insured so you will never be accused of theft if something is missing. You should also apply for disability and insurance to protect yourself and the people you send over.
To make yourself credible, you should have a bank reference and belong to the small business association, better business bureau or the chamber of commerce. After working with a few clients, use them as your reference since the client will probably do a background check and feel safe knowing you are a legitimate business.
Having a personal assistant service business is great since you don’t have to work everyday. You get a job whenever the phone rings while the rest of the time, you get to relax and enjoy doing some other activities.
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The Right Attitudes for a Person to Carry Out Personal Assistant Services
Finding the Right One
If you are a business owner or a very busy executive and you want to lessen the pressure and tasks off your shoulders, this is the ideal set up that you can opt for. But finding the right PA whom you could trust confidential business matters to is not a piece of cake. To start with, you should look for the following qualities for the right candidate.
1. The right PA must be open to sudden schedule adjustments. It cannot be helped, especially in the corporate world, to extend work hours beyond the usual 9-5. So you must first ask applicants if they are up for the challenge and are willing to take that extra route at times. You need to find someone who will be there for you, to aid you at crucial business moments and to be there for you whether at good or bad times.
2. You must also look for one who is sociable. There are times when your PA has to meet important people whom you are transacting business with. Your assistant sometimes has to take them to places, to take a look around the area or be entertained while on the waiting process. This can also be possible when you are doing business with these people and they would like to have a break or experience the nearby view for a while.
3. A good PA is someone who is flexible and easy going. Such person must be able to relate with others with ease and confidence. They must not be irritable because that will not do you any good as a boss. They must set good example to other employees. They must keep them composed at times when you seem fed up with work.
4. Choose someone who can handle pressure well. Whatever business you are dealing with, it cannot be helped that there will be times when the going gets tough. Your PA must be able to relate with you and keep up with their job even if pressure is already getting into you.
5. Your PA must be able to multi task. It will be very helpful for you to have an assistant who is adept on different tasks. Select the person who is a master on different programs on the computer. They must also know how to work using the Internet and other office equipments like the fax and phone lines.
6. It will also do you good if you will choose a person who has a good background. This applies not only on their personal lives but more so, on their work history. Opt for the person who has good time management as well as organizational skills.
All these skills and attitudes will make up the overall characteristics of a person to be able to perform different personal assistant services at the top of their game. So make sure that you check this list twice before hiring a person for the task.
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The Duties of a Personal Assistant
But with the modern and complex office and business setting today, the roles and duties of personal assistants have been also redefined. Before, personal assistants—Girl or Boy Friday—only attend to very specific tasks. But now, their job description can be compared to what the secretary does, or even more. This is because the personal assistant has to be there always no matter where the boss or the employer goes. He or she has to be there to attend to all the things that the employer needs to make the workplace and the job easier and more efficient.
All in all, a personal assistant is person who is trusted by the high-ranking person in the corporate world. He or she is a junior employee who—with the directive and instructions of the boss—assumes the duties and role of the chief-of-staff in any executive office or of any executive personnel.
Preparing for the PA's duties
The major qualification for becoming a personal assistant is reliability. Since a high-ranking person will rely on almost everything when it comes to work on the personal assistant, he or she must be skilled enough to do the tasks ahead.
If you want to be a personal assistant, the first thing that you should do is to determine which type of working environment you would want to be. With the complex work setting now, everyone—at least those that have high ranking positions and popular figures in the society such politicians, celebrities, communications executives, entertainment moguls, business tycoons, and the like—needs a personal assistant.
If you want to be effective in becoming a personal assistant, it is a must that you know before hand whom would you want to and what type of tasks would you want to perform. Consider this, if you are a personal assistant for a politician, you will be involved in various political affairs such as dealing with people from all walks of life.
If you will become a personal assistant for a celebrity, you will be living a glamorous life by attending various functions or social events and even dealing with the fans. In a corporate or business world, you will be involved in everything that has to do with the business or the company of your employer.
After finally deciding whom would you want to work for, it is now time for you to do a research on the duties of a personal assistant so you would have an idea what it is like to be in their shoes.
Before finally deciding if you are fit for the position, you must know that a personal assistant is: good in appointment and schedule keeping; fast in running errands; reliable in scheduling for travels locally and internationally; knowledgeable in book keeping and managing accounts; computer literate for correspondence through email, scheduling tasks, typing documents, and preparing presentations; a master of language skills; excellent in managing a small office or even the household; and keen in planning and organizing meetings and other events such parties.
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The Qualities of a Personal Assistant
First, that person should be a jack of all trades. This means he or she is used to multi-tasking. The successful candidate must have a flexible work schedule that goes beyond the nine to five job. You can call them up at anytime, be able to work on weekends, holidays or even overnight if necessary. If this person is not able to do that, then you better hire someone else.
The personal assistant should be internet savvy and computer literate so certain projects can be typed up, research can be done and a presentation can be made. If you are using some programs that the personal assistant is not familiar with, then this person has to learn it quickly in order to adapt to your needs.
When you hire a personal assistant, it is best to get someone with experience so more or less they know what to do in the position. You just have to brief them on how things are done where you work.
The candidate has to be very dependable especially when you are not around because he or she represents you. If a judgment calls needs to be made, the personal assistant has to step up and do what needs to be done. Having such a quality shows this person is self-confident and has the leadership potential to handle more responsibility in the future.
They should show that they are trust worthy so everything you say that is concerned with the business does not leak out of the office.
What does a personal assistant want in return for what you expect from them? Simply put, fair pay because no one is going to work beyond 8 hours everyday and only get paid minimum wage. If you have to travel and you need this person, be prepared to shell out their travel and living expenses.
From time to time, give them tickets to a party or a show if you are not around. As you can see, money is not the only thing that a personal assistant looks for when looking for a job.
How do you look for a personal assistant? By putting down on paper what is their job description and then posting an advertisement saying that you are in need of one. If your company is quite big, you can announce for an opening first within the organization before opening this for outsiders.
Once you have a list of potential candidates, you can now go through the screening process. Those who pass the initial interview and exam can be scheduled to meet you. To help you decide which candidate you think is best, have someone from the company interview this person with you.
If you want to see them in action, let them do something and if you are happy, keep them on a probationary basis first before you decide to regularize them.
At the end of the day, the personal assistant is another employee. If this person does not perform as you expect, they can easily be replaced.
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