Streamline Your Life

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Streamline Your Life

Use a Virtual Assistant for your home

I know that you are not expecting the person who tells you to reduce your expenses to advise you to hire a virtual assistant—you’re wrong. I am telling you; you should consider hiring a virtual assistant for your home. Before I explain, let’s back up a little bit, so you understand where I am coming from.

I am a man who believes in giving yourself enough room to think. I also feel that people should reduce material things, reduce your expenses, and focus on the really important things. I want you to reduce your expenses so that you don’t have to work as hard. You shouldn’t have to live in a constant rat wheel because you NEED to make more money to be happy.

Ultimately, I desire that you become the best you. I define the best you as someone who has the time to do what they are good at or what they truly need to get done. In other words, you’re able to handle things that you cannot delegate. For example, reading your child a bedtime story or taking your kids to the park. You could delegate this duty, but if you do it yourself, it will help solidify your relationships within your family. Finding more time for your family is essential to becoming the best you—in my opinion.

Reduce Your Expenses

That being said, once you reduce your expenses, you can add other costs that will increase your productivity. Let’s face it, if you are a dual-income family, you need help. From the time you wake up in the morning until the time you go to bed at night, you are constantly on the go. Your kids are always making demands of you. My wife and I look at our children and ask them, “are you not happy with the management?” Between children’s activities and your own personal needs, it can be a bit overwhelming. When you add in money problems, it’s ball game folks. Pause for a moment and think of something you could hand over to a virtual assistant—something that will help you get organized. Let’s face it, running a family is like running a business. There are checks and balances. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a project manager for your life? Someone who could cover your back and take some of the mental weight off.

Today, I hope to answer a few questions for you regarding a virtual assistant.

1. How do I get the right mindset for a virtual assistant?
2. What can a virtual assistant help me with at home?
3. How can I successfully implement a virtual assistant?
4. Where do I find a virtual assistant?
5. What is a typical day for a virtual assistant?
6. Will it really improve my life?

How do I get the right mindset for a virtual assistant?

Stop being afraid to admit that you need help—it’s OK. I am a parent, too, and I am drowning over here. Even when I’m trying to enjoy myself, I feel like I am screaming for help.  It’s totally OK that it was a half-day at school today. I mean, I didn’t need to work or anything. I guess I’ll just take this time off work and basically never be able to make it up. It’s OK. I am a super parent, and that’s what I have to do. No—You don’t. You need help!

You do not have to do everything by yourself.

You are not less than because you receive support; a virtual assistant can help you with finding efficiency in your life. I know you don’t like to ask for help. Socially, it makes most of us feel horribly uncomfortable. However, you have to get into the mindset of letting go and letting someone else handle things for you. If you do this, you can focus on what you need to do or what you’re good at doing. I know you want to be a good parent and spouse, but you didn’t go to school for that, so being a good spouse and parent requires lots of on the job training. If you are going to do that well, you’ll have to be more present. Another thing, the happier you are with your life, the better. When you are anxious, depressed, or frustrated, you are less likely to focus on the needs of the people around you (pg. 83 Reinforcements by Heidi Grant).

We tend to feel as if we need to suck it up or push through what we are going through, but we shouldn’t have to. I would like you to get rid of the mental clutter and hand it off to someone else and let them take care of it.

Let’s be honest, most husbands (and I am guilty of this) do this very thing to their wives.

Daughter: Daddy, I need new shoes

Husband: Oh, you need new shoes?

Daughter: yes, daddy.

Husband: OK, well, tell your mother.

Now in my defense, I could buy the shoe; however, I will get in trouble for buying them—I just know it. I won’t get it right. You could literally give me two options, the red shoe or the blue shoe, and I will, 100%, pick the wrong one.

In cases where you’re just not good at something, but it needs to be done, you should have a virtual assistant who handles it for you. Part of the mindset shift is letting go of control and thinking about the benefits that come with not worrying about buying new shoes. So what, your assistant ordered the blue shoes with the red stripe instead of the ones with the black stripe.

It is not the end of the world.

As long as the kid can wear them to school. After all, the shoes magically appeared at the doorstep while you were out at the park having a picnic with the kids. I’m sure you’d get more value out of spending time at the park than by searching for shoes on the Internet. Let someone else do that so that you can spend more time doing what you do best.

Let’s also talk about the elephant in the room. How many of y’all take care of this type of stuff while at work? Come on now? Don’t be shy. So instead of getting your work done or studying something about a job or a future job, you are taking care of personal stuff at work. You shopping for shoes is literally costing you money and future promotions. Remember, our goal is to make more money, not lose money! You can let go of shoe shopping— I promise it will not hurt at all.

What can a virtual assistant help with at home?

Running a business is a serious thing; running the family is no different. We’ve got places to be and things to do. So, take a look at the things your virtual assistant can do for you. First, give your assistant access to your calendar. I’m not just talking about the family calendar; I’m talking about the school calendars and work calendars. Mesh all that stuff into one if necessary. You can add everyone’s birthday: family members’ birthdays, important friends’ birthdays, children’s friends’ birthdays.

Wouldn’t it be nice if your virtual assistant let you know that the triplets are having a birthday party in two weeks and you need to get gifts for them? Not only that:

What gift are you thinking of getting them, in what price range?

Don’t forget that your husband has a meeting that conflicts with the parent-teacher conference. Does he want to attend the conference? Should I reschedule his appointment? Would you like me to call him to see what he wants to do? Or should I just send him a text?

By the way, you have been putting off calling the doctor for your little problem.

Would you like me to call and make an appointment for you? 

Hey, you sent me your grocery list, would you like me to order all of that for you? What time would you like to pick it up at your local Walmart?

I took care of everything you needed to do as a secretary for the Parent Teacher Group (PTG).

Your virtual assistant is going to make you look pretty well organized in front of Suzanne. Freaking Suzanne.

If my little breakdown didn’t suffice.

Here is a list of things you can have a virtual assistant do:

1. Schedule appointments
2. Track your family’s calendar
3. Research fun activities for your family
4. Buy groceries
5. Buy special items that your children “need” ☺
6. Holiday shopping
7. Send out holiday cards
8. Research: car, home, and appliance shopping
9. Special occasions: anniversary and birthday gifts
10. Make reservations
11. Manage to-do list
12. Organize paperwork, receipts, and bills
13. Travel bookings
14. Coordinate events and family get-togethers
15. Track your finances (if you are feeling really open)
16. Manage your other services

1. 1. Lawn care
   2. Pool man
   3. Meal Kit Delivery Service (Marley Spoon is my favorite)
   4. Maid Service (Tidy.com)

Oh my god, can you feel the cool breeze of stress just floating away? You can get your virtual assistant to handle a whole barrage of things and have your family running like a well-oiled machine.

How can I successfully implement a virtual assistant?

After you have let go or relinquished control, and you have figured out some things you can pass off to your virtual assistant, then you can set everything up for success.

First off, your assistant needs to know more about you. Therefore, you will need to set up processes for how you want things done. How would you like her/ him to communicate with you? Do you only wish to text? Do you prefer phone/video calls? Your assistant is not a mind reader. Also, you have to give your assistant space to make mistakes.

What is your assistant’s main job?

Is it to keep your family from drowning? This is important because your assistant needs to be able to identify their primary focus. Be clear about what you absolutely need from your assistant versus simple niceties that don’t necessarily have to be done—enough though they would earn the assistant extra kudos.

You: I really need help managing my family’s calendar and making sure we have the items we need to get through from day-to-day.

You: It would be nice if you researched some travel options and some fun activities for us to do. However, if you need to push that to the side to manage my calendar, please do so.

If you want your virtual assistant to get a clear understanding, you need to meet with him/her regularly. I meet with my team once a week during the busy season, and if things are slow, we meet every two weeks. I coach my team; I let them know precisely how to take care of my clients and me. After a while, they know who I am, what I need, and they can handle things for me without much direction; then I can focus on what I really need to focus on.

As far as the process, well, it’s up to you to communicate how you want them to manage each task.

Getting up to speed

For instance, your virtual assistant sends you a text asking you when you want the groceries. When do you want them to follow up with you on that task? What is the max price range before they need to contact you? Meaning, if they are buying school supplies, how much can they spend without talking to you? Do you want them to handle the gifts for the birthday party without talking to you, or do you want them to email you the options and let you choose? What is your process? How do you want things to be handled? You have to be clear so that your assistant can take better care of you. I have seen it happen so many times in business, where people don’t have a process for handling things. Everything about their life seems like their hair is on fire. Everything is an emergency, and therefore, they make the people around them uneasy. If you think it is an emergency, then you will make it a crisis for everyone else too. Then more important things get missed because the assistant is constantly putting out fires for you.

The biggest hurdle for most people is the amount of work it takes to get your virtual assistant up to speed. Once you do, I am telling you that your life will be much easier to manage.

Where do I find a virtual assistant?

I have been personally using virtual assistants since 2006 with my first financial planning company and I found that hiring a virtual assistant has allowed me to make the best use of my time; I didn’t have to do the training for staff. I also didn’t have to do performance reviews nor negotiate salaries or desired pay. Honestly, I loved the fact that I could just send my information or the documents to the virtual assistant team, and they would process everything and take care of me. However, I decided to take my virtual assistant use to the next level after reading Tim Ferriss’s 4-hour Workweek (https://fourhourworkweek.com/). Then I began doing a lot more research and found the website https://www.virtualassistantassistant.com and used this as my main resource. It helped me find companies that I wanted to work with, companies that fit my needs. For personal use, I find that Time Etc. http://web.timeetc.com/ref/32520 is a perfect choice because they provide you with rollover minutes. Especially when starting off, if you are not sure how much time you need, this will allow you to “test drive” their services. Currently, they offer a 10-hour package that enables you to spend some time implementing your virtual assistant into your daily life. There are other companies out there, but I have been thrilled with Timeetc. If you go to their website, you will find even more ideas and tasks that you can delegate to your virtual assistant.

What is a typical day for a virtual assistant? 

The reason I find this topic important is because you want to work with happy people. Generally speaking, the people who work as virtual assistants couldn’t be happier. Think about it for a second. These people get to work from home in their pajamas—if they want. They don’t have to fight traffic to get to work or a boss standing over their backs. They also get to pick their bosses, meaning, if your business relationship with them is not working out, they can move on, which gives them job security. There are no in-office politics, so they get to wake up in the morning and cook themselves breakfast. Then fight through their kitchen and sit down at their computers with a warm cup of coffee. After all, they get to make the good coffee—not that weak coffee in the breakroom.

They get to go through their emails and organize their day.

Maybe, they get to spend time with their kids and take them to school. They have time to hug and kiss their kids in the morning or even have breakfast with them. They’re able to schedule their time wisely and make sure they are at some, if not all, of their kids’ activities. Lunch is in the comfort of their own homes, and maybe all they need is about 30 minutes to eat their lunch because they don’t have to go anywhere. There is no one stopping in their office to chat because they are bored. They have fewer interruptions and more control over their time. They save on:

1. Food
2. Gas
3. Clothing
4. Time (Commute to and from work and people talking to them)

They are getting the things that you hired them to do done while also spending time with their family. So overall, they are generally happy people. The assistants I talk to never want to work outside their home again. Yes, of course, they do get some bad clients who don’t have processes, that don’t take the time to train them, their clients that are not clear on what they want; however, when it works—it works!

Will it really improve my life?

YES! Please let me reiterate, don’t do this if you are still having trouble staying within your budget. Work on getting your expenses down and work on your savings program. However, would I buy a car that is only $15,000 vs. $30,000 so that I could afford a virtual assistant? Heck yes! Would I buy a smaller home so that I could afford a virtual assistant? Yes, I would.  Here’s the thing I have personally seen an increase in my income because of my virtual assistant. The reason is that I get to focus on what I do best. My assistant, on the other hand, handles the stuff that is simply just time consuming and doesn’t need my personalized attention. It allows me to fire and forget so that I can focus on my core business or educating myself—then I can get ahead of the competition. If you hire a virtual assistant for your family, it will allow you to focus more on work. I have seen an increase in my happiness, as well. Now, I get to focus on the things that are important to me—my family. Since the virtual assistant is taking care of so much, I am a happier person when I am with my family. I am not as mentally drained as I use to be and I am a lot more engaged with my family. I don’t have to worry about the small tasks that I can do, but someone else can do as well for me—if not better.

Lastly, think about the time that it will free up.

You can focus your energy on eating better or working out. Really start tinkering with changing some of the bad habits and making improvements. Also, think about the impact all of this would have on your family, seeing you improve yourself right before their eyes. I have to tell you; I think this is an investment you really need to make for yourself.

To learn more about how to budget and be more efficient in your financial life, please subscribe to my blog. If you want to learn more about how budgeting will impact your life in a positive way, purchase the book, The Financial Effect.