How To Hire A Personal Assistant Who Will Save You 10 Hours a Week
Jan 31, 2023 • 12 min read
When it comes to hiring an assistant, there are many things to consider. Do you want executive assistants that work on daily tasks such as calendar management and travel plans? What skills do you want them to possess? And how much time will you spend working together, would it be on a day tasks basis or hourly rate?
If you’re thinking about hiring a personal assistant (PA), here are some tips to help you find the perfect fit.
1. Know Your Expectations
Before you start searching, make sure you know exactly what you want out of the person you’re considering hiring. Are you looking for someone who saves you money? Someone who helps you organize your life like an administrative assistant? Someone who takes care of errands? If you’re looking for someone to take over certain tasks, like scheduling appointments or organizing your calendar, list those items on your “to-do” list. It’s important to know what you want for the purposes of putting up your personal assistant job description!
2. Think About What You Want Out Of It Yourself
A good PA should save you time and energy. How does your current schedule look? Is there anything you could be doing better? For example, maybe you could use a little extra time to focus on your career. Maybe you could put aside time to exercise. Whatever it is, think about whether you’re willing to sacrifice something else in your life to achieve a goal.
3. Ask Them Questions
Think about the list of tasks you have, such as social media management, project management, and others – such that you can understand what type of interview questions you should ask. For a personal assistant, it isn’t necessary to have a hiring manager filter them, it’s important for you to know what your ideal candidate is!
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Start with introspection to define the ideal fit
The best way to find a great assistant is to start with introspection. You want someone who matches your personality, work style, and informational preferences. Then, once you’ve found the perfect candidate, don’t just look at his/her salary; consider how much he/she charges, how long it takes him/her to complete tasks, and whether he/she provides value beyond what’s expected.
It’s mandatory to hire someone who can handle “fuzzy” tasks
The best assistants don’t just follow directions; they understand what it takes to make things happen. They’re able to anticipate needs and provide solutions before you even realize there’s a problem. And while most people think of an assistant as someone who does mundane chores like scheduling meetings, answering calls, and sending emails, the truth is that a truly effective assistant can do much more. In fact, according to research from McKinsey & Company, companies that invest in their employees’ skills and capabilities see a return on investment of up to 10 times their initial training costs. However, whilst the best assistants can anticipate, it’s important to have a general list of duties and be an effective delegator yourself. It’s important to give context as much as it’s about culture fit and creating an organizational culture.
So whether you’re looking for someone to answer your phone, keep track of your calendar, or organize and double check your documents, here are five tips to help you find the perfect assistant.
Systematize a delegation structure that works for you
Delegation is one of the most important skills for project managers. But how do you make sure that you are getting the best out of your team members? How do you ensure that you’re not wasting everyone’s time? And how do you avoid falling into the trap of micromanaging?
In this article, we’ll look at some ways to improve your delegation process. We’ll start by looking at why delegation is so important. Then, we’ll take a closer look at the different types of delegation. Finally, we’ll look at how you can systematise a delegation structure that works well for you.
Why delegate?
Imagine, that even as a project manager, you know that there are always things that you simply cannot control. You know that you can’t predict every single thing that might happen during the course of a project. This is where delegation comes in. By giving someone else responsibility for a specific task, you free up your time to focus on the bigger picture. Instead of being bogged down with small tasks, you can concentrate on the big picture. It’s important to provide both high-value tasks and low-value tasks such as email management and more complicated processes. It’s important to give a wide range of tasks
Part of your assistant's job is to create and refine the system of being a world-class assistant for you
Your assistant needs to understand your personal style and habits. If you like to keep things simple, let him/her know what works best for you. You don’t want to give up too much control over how she operates. Document everything about your life and your work so that you can quickly pass along your knowledge to another person. This way, everyone knows exactly what you do every day and where you are located at all times.
Make sure your assistant has access to all of the information she needs to make good decisions (and also get instant access). Provide clear instructions and guidelines so that she doesn’t waste time trying to figure out something that isn’t important. Having limited access or limited permission access to certain documents would be a road blocker for a lot of tasks, as they would need to reach out to you to get permissions and you might be too busy to answer.
Can I hire a personal assistant for a few hours each week?
DigiWorks lets you find independent contractors and virtual assistants to automate tasks like scheduling meetings, sending emails, and setting reminders. You can even use it to schedule recurring events such as monthly payments or weekly grocery shopping trips. But what about hiring someone to do something for you? Can you set up a job where you pay someone for a certain number of hours per week? The goal of entrepreneurship or just generally as someone with a busy family life, would be to free up time and have someone help with repetitive tasks, personal tasks and others. Hiring virtual assistants can be affordable, more affordable than US-based virtual assistants – you can find virtual assistant marketplaces like DigiWorks that enable you to hire personal assistants easily who are able to work US timezones!
How much does a personal assistant cost?
Personal assistants are becoming increasingly popular among busy professionals. They’re able to do things like book travel arrangements, schedule appointments, handle email, and even run errands. But what exactly are they doing? What’s the difference between a personal assistant and a virtual assistant? And how much does it cost? DigiWorks provides a range of virtual personal assistants from all over the world, so it depends on the country!
How do I find a personal assistant?
You’re thinking about hiring a virtual assistant. But how do you know whether it’s worth paying for such a thing?
Well, there are plenty of companies that help you with finding the perfect virtual assistant, such as DigiWorks.
Here’s where you can start looking for a personal assistant.
Step 1: Look at a virtual assistant marketplace
DigiWorks – DigiWorks is a platform for finding top remote talent from emerging economies, with talent from all over the world who are able to work US hours and it’s not about being the lowest-cost virtual assistant service as companies are, but a marketplace for you to find quality ones. Whether you’re a serial entrepreneur looking for someone with strong customer service skills or you would like essential skills for someone who can work as your personal assistant, DigiWorks has a lot of talent for you to interview!
Upwork – UpWork is another outsourcing marketplace. Like Amazon Mechanical Turk, UpWork lets individuals bid on projects ranging from small design jobs to full-time employment. Unlike Amazon Mechanical Turk, however, UpWork requires freelancers to register with the site and pass background checks before being allowed to bid on projects.
Fiverr – Fiverr is a gig economy marketplace that offers everything from logo creation to voiceovers to programming services. Similar to UpWork, Fiverr charges fees for each project completed. However, unlike UpWork, Fiverrs does not require freelancers to undergo a background check prior to bidding on projects.
Step 2: Create a job description, determine compensation, and hire!
The first step towards hiring a great employee is creating a job description. This document describes what you are looking for in a candidate and includes the following sections:
• Job Title
• Responsibilities
• Qualifications
• Education/Experience Requirements
• Skills Required
• Other Desired Attributes
Once you have completed this document, it’s important to determine how much money you want to pay for each position. Salary ranges vary depending on the industry, location, and experience level. You can use research online or look at DigiWorks’ articles on this! It’s important to have the skills in mind for the job in the job description, as for any assistant role, people will have common questions on the list of duties, which could include managing social media accounts to helping with pet duties!
Step 3: Recruit, select, and hire!
The hiring process begins with recruiting. You must identify potential virtual staff early on, because it takes time to build relationships with candidates. Once you’ve identified candidates, you’ll need to make sure they’re a great match for your organization or for yourself generally. Next, you’ll interview each candidate and select the best ones. Finally, you’ll hire those candidates.
Hiring is one of the most important parts of running a successful business. If you don’t do it correctly, you could end up wasting money and resources on poor hires. To avoid making costly mistakes, follow these four steps to a successful hiring process.
1. Identify Potential Candidates
You should start looking for candidates well before you actually need them. This way, you’ll have plenty of time to develop strong relationships with qualified candidates.
2. Build Relationships With Candidates
Once you’ve found potential candidates, you’ll need a plan for building rapport with them, schedule some calls to understand the way they work, looking at whether they are a calming person or an organized person. One effective strategy is to send personalized emails inviting candidates to apply. Include information about why you think they’d be a good fit, how much responsibility they’ll have, and how they can learn more about the position. These messages will give you a chance to show off your brand and establish yourself as a leader.
3. Interview Each Candidate
There is a learning curve as to how to do a remote interview which is not an in-person interview. The entire process is similar, except you gain back valuable time by not having to meet the person – and you’re able to have a good peace of mind as you can interview many more people than if it were in person. There is lots of extra time gained from hosting interviews virtually.
Ready to build your remote team?
Use the DigiWorks platform to hire, manage, and pay remote talent from all over the world.
Interviewing personal assistant candidates
Personal assistants are often tasked with handling many different types of requests. From booking flights and reservations to arranging meetings and appointments, it’s important that personal assistants are efficient and effective. But what about interviewing potential personal assistants? How does one go about finding the best person for the job? Here are some tips to help you interview personal assistant candidates.
1. Ask questions about their experience, especially whether they have been an office manager or an assistant for customer support (these are often good and relevant experiences, showing great positive attitude).
2. Pay close attention to how well they handle scheduling and ask them questions about scenarios.
3. Look for someone who is detail oriented and organized, who can handle life balance!
4. Be sure to ask about their availability.
5. Don’t forget to inquire about their skills and knowledge.
6. Make sure that they understand the basic requirements of the position and ask about their professional lives.
How do I choose between two quality personal assistants?
You probably don’t want to hire both. But how do you know which one is better?
The answer depends on what you’re looking to hire a personal assistant for. Someone to manage your Shopify flow? or simply someone who helps you with your busy family life. Whether you are an entrepreneur looking to delegate a complicated process, or whether you’re just looking to hire a personal assistant for simple tasks, it’s important to choose someone that will provide you with a positive experience.
We would recommend hiring both for a trial period, it’s worth being able to compare how both get on with your tasks, rather than feeling like you have to stick with one person! Often, even if you have a positive experience with the candidate at interview, you won’t know their abilities until you work with them.
What we do know, is that in the world of work, we no longer require dedicated US-based virtual assistants, we can now open up the personal assistant hiring role to everywhere in the world, and DigiWorks has the platform to do so!
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About DigiWorks
DigiWorks is an easy-to-use platform that helps small businesses and start ups hire amazing remote talent from around the world. DigiWorks offers a way for you to hire, manage and pay people from all countries. If you find an amazing virtual assistant from Philippines, a content writer from Nigeria, or operations manager from South Africa – manage and pay your entire team from one platform with no hassle.
If you’re looking for a more affordable and sustainable option you might consider making use of a hiring platform like DigiWorks. Virtual assistant companies or platforms like DigiWorks are amazing as they not only match you with pre-vetted and assessed remote workers that can take care of all your business needs but they will also handle all onboarding and payroll needs as well.