Hiring a dedicated assistant can have a majorly positive impact in your life. Having someone to delegate work to can increase your productivity, give you time back to focus on what you’re best at, and reestablish your work-life balance. (Plus you get the added prestige of telling people you have an assistant!)
Once you’ve made the decision to hire a dedicated assistant, you need to determine which option is best for your unique situation: a virtual personal assistant or an in-person personal assistant?
Using a personal assistant can also be helpful if you are set in your ways and uncomfortable collaborating online. Despite online collaboration tools like Skype, Asana, and Google Docs, managing a virtual team member is not for everyone.
Where personal assistants can cause headaches is in added costs and workload items. For example, you may need to provide this person with office space and equipment like laptops or phones. Additionally, if you hire this person directly or as a contractor, you will need to be able to handle payroll and tax work.
Virtual assistants can generally complete any work which can be done using a computer. This includes tasks like appointment scheduling, data entry, research projects, and sometimes even design or website work. The wide range of services that virtual assistants can handle usually makes them the better option for someone looking to delegate work.
Virtual assistant services can also tend to be a little cheaper; a personal assistant’s median pay is about $14/hr, whereas some virtual assistants can cost only $12-$13/hr. On top of the hourly savings, virtual assistants do not require you to purchase equipment or incur additional overhead costs, like office space.
Also, if you think you really need someone in person to pick up your dry cleaning, it’s likely (if you live in a larger metropolitan area) that your virtual assistant can get that taken care of via TaskRabbit, Amazon Pantry, or any other on-demand services!
Ultimately, the choice between hiring an in-person or a virtual assistant must be whichever will maximize your productivity for the price you’re paying. For example, if you decide the area in which you need the most help is completing personal errands (like grocery shopping), you will need to hire a personal assistant who can be physically present.
On the other hand, if you decide that most of the work you need to delegate can be done online and that you can manage someone remotely, virtual assistant services will likely provide the biggest productivity improvement due to the variety of skills and services provided.
If you’re interested in learning more about what types of work you can delegate to a personal assistant and if it’s the right choice for you, please request a consultation.