Showing posts with label Health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Health. Show all posts
Personal Assistants - "Not Just For Celebrities"
First allow me to start by ending the false perception that one must be a celebrity or very wealthy person to have a personal assistant; this is not the case. Busy individuals, students, families; senior citizens and small businesses are utilizing personal assistant services more and more every day.
The average person’s life is filled with priorities from work, family life, groups, memberships or organizations not to mention personal life. Having a personal assistant is not just a luxury it’s a necessity for many people in today’s society.
Who Can Benefit From a Personal Assistant?
Busy individuals, college students, families, senior citizens, entrepreneurs and small businesses all can benefit from the services of a personal assistant. Having a personal assistant can bring about efficiency and eliminate stress. There is a great benefit for businesses to contract personal assistant services as they save on health, employment and payroll expenses.
What Can A Personal Assistant Do for Me?
A personal assistant can provide many different services however; many personal assistants will tailor their services to meet the needs of the individual. Listed below is a general list of services a personal assistant can provide:
Administrative Services o Make Travel Reservations o Monitor & Reply to Emails o Answer & Return Phone Calls o Plan & Coordinate Meetings o Open, Review & Sort Mail o Bill Payment Assistance o Generate Reports & Presentations o Conduct Research o Create Filing Systems o Create & Update Data Bases
Errand & Messenger Services o Grocery Shopping o Pharmacy Runs o Pick Up & Drop Off Packages o Pick Up & Drop Off Dry Cleaning o Gift Delivery o Bank Runs
Organizing The Home & Office
Homecare Services o House and Office Cleaning o Manage Home Improvements
Event Planning Assistance o Locate and Visit Venues o Coordinate Caterer, Music, Photographer, etc. o Order Invitations and manage RSVP’s o Shopping Assistance o Provide Day of Event Assistance
Can I Afford A Personal Assistant?
Personal assistants are not as expensive as people think. Many personal assistants provide services for a little as $10.00 up to $40.00 per hour depending on the service. A good personal assistant will provide a consultation to discuss your needs and advise the number of hours required to accommodate your request. Many people utilize personal assistants for a few hours a month to assist with their personal and business needs.
What to look for in a good personal assistant?
A personal assistant will have all the characteristics stated below:
Organization A personal assistant is involved in the direct management and organization of her clients’ life and more directly making sure the day to day goes smoothly. This can involve things like scheduling, organizing meetings, making travel plans, event coordination and phone and e-mail management.
"Go-To" Person A personal assistant has to be able to handle a lot of responsibilities. She must be highly organized and be able to deal with a hectic day.
Upbeat Energy A personal assistant is constantly working and often does not have a chance to have a break. Individuals seek assistants who not only have the required skills but can also keep up with the demands of a fast-paced environment and work long hours.
Advanced Computer Skills Personal assistants should have excellent computer skills for organizing spreadsheets in Excel, writing invoices and maintaining the contacts of their client. Personal assistants also have a lot of emailing and online research as part of their duties, so they will have to be able to communicate and solve problems online efficiently.
Trust & Commitment Personal assistants deal with sensitive and personal information, so individuals need assistants that they can trust and who are willing to commit the time and efforts required.
Thank you for inquiring about the services of a personal assistant. Your comments on this article are greatly welcome.
Lakisha Melvin - COO Uniquely Coordinated - Personal Assistant Boutique 400 Perimeter Center, Suite 900 Atlanta, GA 30346
P: 678-656-9409 E: lakishamelvin@uniquelycoordinated.com W: www.uniquelycoordinated.com
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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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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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Considerations when Hiring an Assistant
When you interview people for your open assistant position then you need to ask people right off the bat if they have any interest in investing. You want someone who says they have no interest at all. The person who gets excited and their eyes light up when you ask them and they say yes are the people you need to worry about. These are the ones who will steal your knowledge and become your competitor.
Some recommend you be sure to use a non-compete clause for your business. You should not trust anyone because when you least expect it they will take your clients and your prospects. A non-compete clause will ensure you that an assistant cannot take your business elsewhere. You can rest assured that if they want to go out on their own then they will have to start from scratch.
Others might recommend that you should be sure to complain on occasion about your job and the work you do. An assistant will make life very good. An assistant will also give you more free time and make the job look very enticing when you are making a lot of money. Be sure to complain about the things you deal with and be vocal. This is how you deter your assistant from wanting to be successful in the same field as you. Your success is for you and no one else.
When you purchase the systems to hire a personal assistant, you will learn all of the things you need to think about when hiring and working with an assistant. You will learn how to protect your business, your clients, and your success.
Find books, articles, or magazines to find out the best concepts that are involved in hiring a personal assistant. This is a concept by ones whom say this worked for them. There is no guarantee these systems will work for your or anyone else. You cannot hold the company liable for the system not working and it is at your own risk when you purchase the program. Not all people will be given a refund and given 30 days to test the program.
Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com
About the Author:
For more articles and a 10 part e-course on how to create your own Ultimate Buying and Selling Machine! plus over 50 training audios, simply go to www.LarryGoinsFreeOffer.com where you will gain instant access
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