I don’t have time to get a virtual assistant up to speed
The irony is that you don’t have the time to enable you to get more time. The point at which you most need it is often the point at which you feel least able to set it up.
You are already busy. Work is waiting, things are being held together in your head, and even explaining it all to somebody else feels like another job.
The ‘stuff’ you want to give away you already dislike doing intensely, so the prospect of having to go back into it again, newbie in tow and explain your action or inaction feels painful and revealing.
The ‘stuff’ you want someone else to action you’ve undertaken for so long in autopilot that it’s just easier to spend the hour doing. The prospect dealing with an inexperienced mistake or the question of why it’s done that way, just irritates you.
You imagine having to document every process, explain every client, find every password and transfer several years of accumulated business knowledge before the virtual assistant can do anything useful.
It begins to look rather like employing and onboarding a new member of staff. So you decide it would be quicker to do the work yourself. Again.
Maybe next time you try a new piece of software, or try out the latest AI model your friend swears by, or just sigh and say that’s how it is right now, may be next year. How many cycles do you go through?
Is that the reality of delegating to a VA?
How much time does it take to onboard a virtual assistant?
Onboarding a virtual assistant requires some input from you, but it should not mean spending weeks documenting your business or answering endless questions.
When we work with new clients, most of the groundwork has already been completed before the proposal is sent. We will usually have discussed what is happening, what needs to change and what a useful outcome would look like.
For most Jessanol projects, one focused set-up call lasting no more than an hour, the relevant files and system access, and a few practical decisions are enough to get the agreed work moving.
You do not have to design the onboarding process. A VA already has one.
You are not starting from the same place as a new employee
When you employ someone, you may need to introduce them to the whole business, explain their role, provide training and gradually transfer a substantial amount of internal knowledge.
Working with a VA is different.
You are engaging an established business that should already have its own methods for gathering information, organising work and getting a new client started.
Behind the scenes, we follow a structured onboarding process. The client does not need to manage that process or even see most of it. Its job is to make sure we identify what is needed, prepare the working arrangements and prevent important details from being missed.
We will have already considered what information, access and decisions are likely to be required. We can then ask for the right things at the right time, rather than presenting you with an enormous list of everything might conceivably needed over the next six months.
What does a new Jessanol client actually need to do?
The precise requirements depend on the work, but most new clients need to:
Accept the proposal and agree the relevant booking information.
Attend one focused set-up call, usually lasting no more than an hour.
Choose from the suggested options for ways of working, including communication and sharing files.
Initiate secure access to the systems needed for the agreed work.
Answer any questions or make any decisions that genuinely affect delivery.
Your client portal stores key documents, dates, and status reports. Everything is managed behind the scenes, or, put another way, we project-manage our clients, but nicely.
I don’t ask clients to design the working relationship from scratch
Open questions can create more work.
If somebody asks, “How would you like us to manage everything?”, you first have to understand all the possible options and then design a process you didn’t particularly want responsibility for in the first place.
As your VA, I will work in a way that fits you and your existing systems where that makes sense. But I also bring the established Jessanol structure with me: our client portal, structured planning, regular status reporting and standard ways of operating to reduce risk, error or security issues. For example, file sharing, system access, and communication tools. I anticipate what will be required and ask for it at the appropriate point.
The aim is not to impose another complicated system on the client. It is to create enough structure for both of us to work as independently as possible, while retaining clear visibility.
Do I need to document everything before working with a VA?
You do not have to empty your entire head onto a page.
Some work will require background information, examples or an explanation of how you currently do things. But that does not necessarily mean producing a comprehensive handover document before anything can begin.
An existing example can often tell me more than a page of instructions. A conversation may uncover the important decisions more quickly than a lengthy questionnaire. Other details can be gathered as they become relevant to the work.
You should not have to get the business beautifully organised before asking for support. Quite often, organising the work is part of the work.
We document what we learn, so the same information does not need to be repeatedly rediscovered or requested. We have tools designed for this purpose to enable processes to be captured quickly and efficiently in the background.
Over time, the working knowledge grows. It does not all have to be transferred before the first useful job can be completed.
What can delay the start?
In my experience, the work itself is rarely the problem.
The two things most likely to delay a start are arranging the set-up call and receiving access to the systems involved.
Access has to be initiated by the client because the accounts belong to them. We use LastPass to support secure access and provide clear instructions explaining what the client needs to do.
There is still an action at their end. I cannot press that particular button for them.
But they shouldn't have to research the process, figure out what access we might need, or wonder whether they have done it correctly. We identify the requirements and guide them through it.
Once the call has happened and the necessary access is available, we can normally get on with the work.
A professional VA should make onboarding easier
Business owners sometimes forget that they are not simply handing work to another busy person and hoping for the best.
They are engaging somebody who is organised, proactive and professionally accustomed to joining an existing business, understanding what matters and creating enough structure to move the work forward.
Alongside virtual business support, I design onboarding and learning experiences for other businesses as an L&D specialist. Understanding what somebody needs to know, when they need to know it and how to avoid overwhelming them is part of my professional work, not simply something I apply to my own client checklist.
It would be rather unfortunate if my own clients were met by an enormous onboarding obstacle course.
There is some effort, but it should have a purpose
You will need to contribute to the start of the relationship.
You may need to attend a call, choose between a few practical options, share relevant files, arrange system access and answer questions that genuinely affect the work.
What you should not have to do is document your entire business, create a perfect filing system or become the project manager responsible for getting your VA started.
The initial effort should be proportionate to the work you have commissioned. It should create clarity, protect both businesses and allow the VA to take proper ownership of what happens next.
If you are waiting until you have enough spare time to prepare everything before asking for support, you may be waiting for a quieter period that never arrives. You don’t need to organise everything first.
You need a VA who knows how to get started with what already exists.
