If there is one tip you can use to improve your Virtual Assistant business income, it is that teamwork in a supportive and challenging environment creates a feel-good effect that translates into an increased income for the virtual assistant.
While sometimes the team’s dynamism occurs naturally, there are times when a little forward thinking will generate the buzz that leads to success.
Below are Small Revolution tips on how to build an impressive VA team.
1: Build an Awesome Team
Are you ready to hire? Before a virtual assistant creates a cohesive team, the team members need to know and trust each other.
Create an initial team meeting that acts as an icebreaker.
You can, for example, ask the team what they love doing during their free time and let everyone in the team answer the question.
If it is the first time that everybody is meeting or there is a new team member ensure that you have the team bios for everybody.
Do not forget about team-building efforts such as getting quick coffee together, going out for team building exercises once in a while, or arranging a team evening out.
While some of these features are not applicable to teams working in different countries, they are worth putting in mind. You need to get creative to enhance your team’s cohesiveness.
2: Get Remote Workers Where Labour is Cheaper
If you want to cut your costs and increase your virtual assistant income, you need to outsource some of the services to countries where labor is cheaper.
If for example, you are a virtual assistant in Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, the USA, you can outsource some of the services such as content creation to cheaper English speaking countries. A good example would be the Philippines, Kenya, South Africa, India and Bangladesh.
3: Always Have an Agenda When Meeting
Never waste time in meetings.
Always ensure that whenever you call up your team to have a discussion, you have well-structured agenda with tasks to be done and objectives to be achieved.
Always ensure that you keep track of the project goals so that the teams will keep on track. A meeting without an agenda will just cost you unnecessarily and thereby affect your bottom line.
4: Encourage Constant Communication
There are various team communication tools and other useful apps that are available for virtual workers including Asana, and Trello.
You can also use tools such as Basecamp to manage your project effectively.
Any software that is used for project management also comes with communication systems such as instant messaging. They also come with document sharing functionalities.
Ensure your team members have Skype and email where they can be reached easily.
Make sure you have set up communication ground rules that ensure that your team is productive and that the work-life balance is maintained.
5: Train the Team on Communication Skills
The ability to communicate with the customer is paramount for the business’s bottom line.
A virtual assistant will regularly communicate with customers in order to get new business or get new clients.
Verbal and written communication skills should be taught to every team member. The ability of your team to communicate clearly and concisely with the customer will directly translate to better profitability.
6: Measure How Efficiently the Delegated Tasks are Accomplished
Among the best ways to keep a highly efficient virtual assistant team is to create a task list.
After the list is established, you will then need to batch the tasks that look similar, so that you don’t have to switch from one set of tasks to another and back.
Once you have a bunch of similar tasks, you will need to cut them down by delegating these tasks to the team members.
This way, tasks are accomplished more quickly, which means that you are paid for your work more quickly.
To measure the team’s efficiency, you can use time tracking software such as HubStaff.
With Hubstaff, you can do the following:
- Get accurate and detailed timesheets that you can easily export
- App and URL tracking with screenshots
- A smooth shift planning process and clocking in
- And much more
This approach ensures that you don’t waste time checking your social media status. It also helps you establish where productivity is dropping off so that you can do better next time.
7: Develop Team Leaders’ Skills
A team leader is responsible for organizing a successful team.
For you to succeed as a virtual assistant, you will need support from a team that understands your workplace culture and ethos.
The team leader will support, develop, and encourage individual members’ skills.
The collaborative teamwork will deliver great results which will see your business’ profitability rise.
8: Reward Good Work
If you find out that one of the team members is doing better than the rest of the team, it is always good to recognize and reward him so that they can put even more effort for the better good of your business.
The daily challenges of working as a virtual assistant can lead to demotivation. Ensure that you give your team members some bonuses, free lunches, sporting activities and other freebies to keep them engaged and motivated.
Sometimes all you need to give an exceptional team member is recognition by posting his/her name on the message board.
9: Mentor the Team Members
It will be great if there’s a team member in your group that can produce the same work you’ve been producing in your absence.
A mentorship program within your team is important for both individual’s growth and business continuity in case of absence. Once a mentorship program is embedded in your team, productivity follows.
