Virtual Administrative Assistant

What is a Virtual Administrative Assistant

  In today’s fast paced business environs, a successful business venture also tends to expand broadly in scope and spectrum, thus making essential, day-to-day operations overloaded and their handling, more complex and difficult. Enter ‘Virtual Administrative Assistants’ (VAA) who make life much easier for the people who head such businesses. A VAA can either be an individual expert or a team of experts that are well versed in the routine admin operations and activities, and who work offsite from a remote location.

The routine administrative activities can include but are not limited to,

·         Basic customer support

·         Basic HR duties

·         Data entry and management

·         Accounts and Payroll management

·         Handling of mail and communications

·         Organizing calendars

·         Arranging meetings

·         etc..

Now we arrive at the important question of who or what businesses are eligible and can make the most out of VAAs. VAAs are typically better suited for small or micro businesses that have very small workforces and office spaces. With the routine administrative tasks outsourced to VAAs, the remaining workforce can be optimized for other or much more critical operations. Since VAAs work remotely, they also save a huge chunk of money in terms of costly office space, which may cost even more dearly in prime real estate locations.

Imagine a scenario where a recently created start-up is growing steadily, and it is increasingly difficult for them to meet their weekly and monthly targets. One way to overcome this is to hire additional employees to fulfill the increasing workload. But that would cast a strain on the finances as additional employees mean additional wages, not to mention the training costs and the additional hardware equipment required for them. An easier solution would be to hire VAAs who neither require any office space, nor any new equipment like computers. Thus the increasing workload of a growing startup can be easily delegated to remotely working VAAs. Moreover, since VAAs are already fully developed in their respective skill sets, with enough experience in the field, they also negate the need for any training as well as the associated costs. And VAAs can also be paid on a hourly basis, which means more bang for your buck, or in simpler terms, makes every nickel you spent, a worthy one.

 

VAAs improve the workflow of your business.

Efficiency:

Recent studies conducted in the UK and elsewhere indicate that short term employees are more productive than their longer-termed counterparts. The comfort of job security can also result in complacency and self-assuredness in employees sometimes, thus affecting their performance adversely. But, since sheer results determine the recurring work availability for VAAs, complacency can be too costly a mistake to overlook for them. And this can prove to be a main driving factor for VAAs, which in turn can have a direct bearing on their effective output.

 

Round-the-clock availability:

Since VAAs can be situated anywhere around the globe and across different time zones, you can get your work delegated to appropriate VAA teams around the globe. This way, your work gets processed and done 24/7 literally, thus effectively cutting waiting time and hence the overall turn-around time.

 

Reduced cost of hiring:

Hiring of new employees can often prove to be a cumbersome process, with great costs attached to it. Firstly, a job posting has to be made in leading employment portals, and then, potential candidates have to be screened and interviewed. This often involves great costs and numerous productive work hours that could have been spent elsewhere. This entire cycle could be removed by just delegating the administrative tasks to already skilled and established VAAs, thus saving a great deal of time and money.

 

Reduced risk of scaling:

   As a business grows in size and scope, there will be a natural demand for upscaling the workforce, to meet the growing work-demands. But the scaling of the workforce along with the corresponding infrastructure, also involves a considerable risk in terms of your financial investment. It necessarily mandates an assured and sustained growth of the business to compensate for the upscaling costs incurred, which in turn puts enormous pressure on the existing workforce. Outsourcing to VAAs instead of outright hiring of new employees can avoid the financial risks involved with upscaling.

 

Vijay Ramalingam

+91 9444019793

Vijayram19@gmail.com

Skype id: Vijay_ram79