 | What is a VA? (Virtual Assistant Part 2posted by Seonlady47 , Limited AccessFriday, September 25th 2009 @ 9:29 PM (not yet rated) |
What is a VA?(Virtual Assistant) Part 2
Let’s continue our talk about the VA (Virtual Assistant)
Last post I said “A Virtual Assistance business is continuous and systemic support; a secretarial services business is transactional, piecemeal and intermittent.”
A Virtual Assistant is an independent professional whose business is to provide ongoing administrative support to business owners, speakers, authors or whichever niche the Virtual Assistant has decided to support.
Because the virtual assistants are administrative experts, they can work with you to streamline your business, improve your workflow and make your operation more cost-effective. While it may appear that Virtual Assistants work and do work that is similar to an employee, please keep in mind that since they are not employees how you work and interact with them will be different.
Think of Virtual Assistants as administrative consultants. When you engage a Virtual Assistant you are hiring an independent professional who runs her/his own business. So do not expect the Virtual Assistant to be dedicated solely to you and your business. Virtual Assistants work for other clients. They have fees, policies, procedures and systems for working with their clients.
As a client of Virtual Assistants you have a say in the results not in how they are accomplished.
Because there are other important facts, opinions and observations that I want to tell you we will continue with What is a VA? (Virtual Assistant) Part 3
| What is a VA? (Virtural Assistant)posted by Seonlady47 , Limited AccessFriday, September 18th 2009 @ 4:29 PM (not yet rated) |
What is a VA?(Virtual Assistant) Part I
The workplace has changed over the last 40 years in many areas. The area I want to talk about is the administrative area. When I started my career in the business world I started as a secretary. After I graduated from high school on the College Preparatory track and attend a major university for a little over two years, as a Liberal Arts major, I discovered after completing the Executive Bilingual Secretarial/Professional Modeling program at The Philadelphia Career & Finishing School that I enjoyed the world of dictation, typewriting, writing letters, answering phones and generally running an office.
Working with typewriters, changing messy ribbons, correcting mistakes on carbon paper copies, then on to “white-out” and typewriter cartridges was fun and exciting. As a secretary you were required to work the duplicating machine, operate a ten-key adding machine, take diction, answer the phones, make coffee, and a host of other duties.
Fast forward, personal computers, facsimile machine, cell phones and the person running the office becomes an “administrative assistant.” This person is required to operate the computer in creating documents in a word processing program, marketing materials in a desk-top publishing program, make copies on the copy machine, use the PBX system for the phones and in many cases now, did not make coffee.
Today a Virtual Assistant is quite different from the administrative assistant and the secretary. In 1996, Stacy Brice in her vision saw the Virtual Assistant as a professional with an intentional brand of administrative support. The basic difference between Virtual Assistance and secretarial/business support services is the service delivery platform.
Although there are many people in the Virtual Assistant Industry, who don’t understand there is a difference between a Virtual Assistant business and a secretarial service business. A Virtual Assistance business is continuous and systemic support; a secretarial services business is transactional, piecemeal and intermittent.
Stay tuned for What is a VA? (Virtual Assistant) Part 2
