Hire A Personal Assistant

Did you know that there are 305 million new startups globally each year?

We live in the most connected world in history, and every year millions of people are taking advantage of this to start new businesses. 

If you are an entrepreneur, you will know how much work is involved in starting a business. 

Do you ever feel like you spend all your time setting up your business and not enough time on developing your products and services?

If you feel like this, you may need the services of a freelance personal assistant. 

It is easier than ever to find a person with the skills and abilities to support your business. 

How can you find a skilled personal assistant? Why not read our in-depth article to find out.

1. What Is a Freelance Personal Assistant

Before you can go about hiring a personal assistant you will need to know what they can offer to you. 

A personal assistant or virtual assistant is a person that has office administration skills to support your business and personal life if needed. 

The goal of the personal assistant is to remove nonessential tasks from your to-do list. This leaves you feeling less overwhelmed and able to concentrate on the priorities in your business ie. your products and services.

They will save you hours of time each week.

What does this mean in real terms? What can a personal assistant do for you?

2. What Does a Personal Assistant Do?

The range of tasks that a personal assistant can do for you are broad and getting broader all the time. This is true even if your assistant is in another country and providing virtual support. 

They can assist with business-related matters including:

• Inbox and general data management and filing
• Travel arrangements and accommodation
• Meeting notes and minutes, agenda generation
• Filtering calls communications to save time for the manager
• Liaising with clients and low-level project management

However, since they are aware of your overall calendar, your assistant can also provide personal support including:

• Remembering important dates such as anniversaries and birthdays
• Research personal projects and vacations
• Payment of bills and other matters related to the managers household
• Shopping and other errands

Likely you can think of many more tasks that a freelance personal assistant could care for on your behalf.

3. How Much Should I Pay a Personal Assistant?

There are a number of factors that influence the pay rate of personal assistants. these would include the location (country) of the personal assistant, their skill level, their experience, how much work you can provide to them. 

A new personal assistant is about $15 per hour starting rate. One of the great advantages of hiring a personal assistant is that their support is scalable. If your business expands you can increase their hours to handle the extra work you will provide. 

If your business contracts, you can reduce their workload and save money by doing the work yourself. 

4. How to Interview and Evaluate a Personal Assistant

In addition to the normal interview questions, you will likely want to ask specific personal questions that will reveal what the assistant will offer your business. 

What languages do they speak? What are they passionate about? Why did they apply for this job specifically?

After receiving applications you can check their references. You will be looking for individuals who have a strong record of punctuality and professionalism in their previous employment.

5. Why Is a Freelance Assistant Best for your Business?

One of the major advantages of hiring a freelance assistant is that they are freelance workers. The benefit of a freelance worker cannot be overstated.

Your assistant will provide devoted assistance to you, however, since they are freelancers you will not have obligations to handle their tax affairs for them. This will not only save you time but also money.

6. Consider the Pros and Cons of Timezones

You may notice that many assistants are virtual assistants. That is, they live in another country and communicate using Skype, Zoom, or other communication tools. 

Workers in other timezones have real pros and some cons. 

In one scenario, you have urgent tasks that need resolving. You assign them to your assistant in the evening. Because they live in another timezone, they work on those tasks during their daytime. This means that when you wake up in the morning, the tasks are complete and you start the day refreshed rather than feeling stressed. 

Of course, this coin has two sides. There may be times when you need to communicate with your assistant but are unable to reach them because they are sleeping. 

Timezones have real pros and cons, consider this before you hire an assistant from across the planet.

7. How Involved Will the Assistant Be?

It is important to weigh carefully your expectations when considering hiring an assistant. 

Some managers would like an assistant who will meet with them for a briefing and debriefing each day and report on their tasks. This takes time but allows the manager to track project progress and evaluate key performance indicators. 

Others prefer not to have face to face contact at all, or very rarely. They issue tasks by means of software alone and expect the assistant to contact them if there is any lack of clarity. 

You will be able to find an assistant who can meet each of these needs, however, understanding your expectations will allow you to communicate them to your assistant from the beginning. 

Findıng a Freelance Personal Assistant that Works for You

If you are looking to expand your business and develop even better products and services, then you need someone who can handle your day to day tasks. Finding a freelance personal assistant either locally or online is a great way to make extra time in your day to do this. 

If you are interested in getting more out of your time and increasing your productivity, then we are here to help. We connect thousands of freelancers with work providers each day. 

Why not take a look at our site or contact us to find out how we can help you today.