Virtual Assistant Outsource Administration

More and more media are identifying that the pressure is being put on employees when management and business owners have decided to reduce staff through redundancies or not replacing people when they leave.  Something I have noticed a lot of while visiting clients or at networking events, is the flow-on effect that this can have on the remaining staff.

Stress, extra workload, overtime, re-training and up-skilling of staff seem to be common ground and in the short term employees don’t seem to mind, but if this occurs for a long period people seem to feel unvalued and this approach can cause a gradual slowing of workload and limited tasks completed.

Whilst the media are quick at using the ‘recession’ as a reason for why this is happening, it would seem that this has been occurring for quite some time prior as people would resign from the role to seek the gratification and recognition of workload elsewhere, and although at present those people are still employed, they are reluctant to leave unless they have a secure position to go to as their salary is so important.

While delegating additional responsibility to others can be seen as a way to advance an employee into another position, the more additional tasks they undertake, the lower the quality of work will be achieved as they try and spread themselves too thin, this can and does have a dramatic effect on the business as a whole. 

Whilst employee retention and redundancies can’t be avoided, what are some solutions to try and balance the employee’s workload?

ü       Try identifying the right candidate for the right role, when an employee resigns and you are not replacing that position, think about who can do those important tasks competently, and then consider what tasks they can then shift to another person doing similar duties.  Only focus on the important tasks as these are the ones that will ensure the business continues to run smoothly while there is an absence in that role.

ü       Recognise employees for the extra work they are undertaking, there are plenty of non-monetary rewards available to ensure they feel valued.

ü       Give employees assurances that this is for the short term and keep your word, too many broken ‘promises’ just lead to disorder and confusion.

ü       Consider combining all the small tasks several employees are completing and combining it into a temporary, part time or casual position, this will ensure that these continue to remain up to date.  The skill set of the candidate may not necessary need to be at the same level as previous and handover or training will only require minimum attention. 

ü       Finally, consider contracting work out to businesses such as AdminCorp to complete those day to day tasks.  The difference between us and a temping agency is that you have to guarantee a minimum workload, with us it is minute by minute for only what needs to be done.  The other major advantage to using businesses like ours is that you only have to train us once, not try and get the same temp as last time etc. 

Call AdminCorp today on 0800 ADMINC to see how we can help your business today.  This is what we do best!

Tara McGowan

Who is spending your business time? You, your staff, your clients?  

When work starts at 9am is everyone sitting at their station ready to work or are they just walking through door? Do you get sidetracked by issues? Are your clients leading you astray?

Doesn't matter who or what or when, your business time is valuable and you need to account for it. Here are three simple steps to get you underway. 

- Set an example of working from the start time not arriving at the start time.
- Set billable hourly targets daily for your staff and contractors.
- Give your clients boundaries.

With so many applications available today one could quite possibly find themselves in a position where there are too many tools and not enough features working for your business.

Its great to use one program for this and another for that but when you get too many programs, you fail to use them effectively.

So narrow the scope. You may have to sacrifice one great feature but narrow the scope to a managable set of tools.

You can narrow the scope to 2 or 5 or 10 or 20 depending on how much time or delegation ability you have.

You need to ask yourself these questions when narrowing the scope:

1. Is this application going to take me into the future or is it going to be defunct in 18 months time?
2. Does the application have data exportability? i.e. export to .csv or API.
3. Can I customise some of these features or add my own?
4. Is there another application that will do what I'm doing now plus more or even include another applications features so I can narrow things further?

Lately we have implemented the following to narrow our scope:

1. Ping.fm - to feed out updates to 4 of our social networks at once.
2. Zoho CRM - a long term project to take over our newsletter and webform integration.

Most programs have many features that need to be discovered and implemented. So find them and use them!

As a member of the AAPNZ (Association of Administrative professionals New Zealand) I see a lot of behind the scenes work of those adding value to our profession. And now more than ever do we need to convey the value within ourselves and our roles as administrators.

Haven't you noticed that administration is a very technical vocation now. Sure you can maintain manual systems of old but if you couple those with technical solutions available today you open up a brand new world of administration and office management.

So what do we all get for it? You as a business owner, what do you give for it? Sometimes its not always easy to pay top dollar for a good administrator, so what else can you do to value the role?

* Send your administrator to the annual Administrators Professionals Day Event in your area.
* Send your administrator to the annual AAPNZ conference.
* Nominate your administrator for the Administrator of the Year Award.
* Purchase a member subscription to AAPNZ in your area for your administrator.

When you come across an exceptional employee that is Gen Y don't expect them to stay that way if you don't skill yourself with information about how and why they work.

To keep them you must learn as much as you can about them and adapt your management style to work effectively with them.

The tools are out there so there are no excuses. Search the internet for information and use providers when you need to, preferably before things start to go haywire.

They're not going to go haywire, I hear you say... lets talk in 6 months time...

Every employee has the potential to be great and as managers we need to ensure we have that pathway open.

Data to you is the review of collected information in a quick and easy to read, informative manner. A bit like your profit and loss report.

Data to me is how we get the collected information into that quick and easy to read, informative manner that you require.

So now that we understand that, where is your information to be collected? If its for a profit and loss report then you will find it in your bank statements, incoming invoices, last year's financials, employee contracts etc. If its for your sales team, you'll find it in their diaries, in the call log, on the computer etc.

So now that we know where to get the data, what now?

You contract me for a project and I get stuck in and grab the data, compile it, format it and present it to you, your sales team or your accountant.

Now that wasn't so hard was it? All you needed to do was point out what you wanted!

Therein lies the dynamics of data and outsourcing and why so many people love it.

A local company shut its doors last week. No warning, no inkling no nothing. As a potential client for AdminCorp I was shocked and incredibly lucky as we hadn't done business.

A colleague of mine was made redundant some weeks ago and didn't even know the company was in liquidation.

Should you be carrying out companies office searches on your clients or employer? I think so. As harsh as it sounds, you need to be aware.

Like many companies at the moment we are all feeling the effects of the recession and late paying of invoices creates a domino effect.

Don't panic though! If you see your employer struggling approach them to see if there is anything that can be done by the team to help. If your clients are struggling put them on a managed limited plan to minimise your exposure while still offering some support.

If you have then you'll now be feeling the pinch of being left with more work to do. When cut backs are made it doesn't mean the work stops. If the work does stop, more assessment is required.

Don't cut off your income by cutting back on your infrastructure. Be smarter, in fact be smarter than the rest. This is the time for the select few to flourish, those that rise above the recession and make their business stand out above the rest.

Be smart by getting rid of luxuries, all of them, cut out those things that were great when the market was bouyant but we could do without them. If you aren't hiring any further staff or downsizing, hire a VA, an on call experienced adminstrator to continue the back bone of your business. We are available as your work is required and we complete the tasks expertly.

So don't get left behind, don't let things build up, get out there are be at the top.