Do you feel as each new working day starts, that you’ll never get all the things done that you need to? Is it you? Is it the role? Is it your business or the organisation you work for? We can’t help sometimes wondering if we are the problem, as we reach out for solution after solution, reading, watching webinars, and looking for the answer.

That was me for many years. And I think I found the ideal solution for me back in 2011. So, let me share that journey with you, as it will set the scene, and it will help you too?

The Tasks v Time Trap

I’ve always been a bit of a workaholic, I guess. The sort of person who turns a 9-5 job very quickly into a 7 -6 job or worse. Surprising really for a guy whose first career was in the Military. Twenty years of structure, clear goals, and discipline you’d think would be a great grounding for life in Business.

The struggles really started when I left the Military and got into Business. First working in a Management Consulting firm, where I quickly rose to State General Manager, and then branching out on my own to start my own consulting business.

There just weren’t enough hours in the day! Always too many things to get done. Sales, Marketing, Service Delivery, Business Management and more. I’m sure you know that feeling, when it feels like you have 20 spinning plates, that all seem important, but you know in your heart that one will fall. That feeling of dread.

In my Military days I’d had formal training in time management, so it was time to brush off those materials and get serious. With a young family, I wanted to “get my life back.”

So, I tried a few things.

Managing Your Time Effectively

The first thing was to cut out all the time wasting. We all do it, I’m sure. Those petty things that fritter away our time. Lingering over that morning coffee, focusing on things that were merely cosmetic and not adding any value. Not that we had it back then, but social media would fit in here! I started recording what I was spending my time on, with the goal of seeking out that nonvalue adding activity.

Prioritising Tasks

Listing what I was spending my time on helped me prioritise. Priority One would be things like sales and service delivery. Whereas Priority Three might be signing off the stationery order! See what I mean?

I even posted up three signs on my office wall, that I would see ever time I looked up. They blunt and to the point.

1. Where’s the money in that? OK not very subtle. But the meaning was, will this move the business forward or backwards. Will it add to the bottom line?
2. Will This Help Us Grow? As a business or as a team or as individuals. Development of my team was a high a priority.
3. Will This Grow the Brand? This might be a marketing element or account management for example.

The simple point was that if the task I was working on did not meet one of those here goals, then I should question why I was doing it, or at least make it a low priority to be done at a quiet time.

Time-Management Tools – Pomodoro

I adopted some of my old-time management techniques, as well as some new ones. I particularly liked the Pomodoro approach. (Italian for Tomato).

Using this approach, that I now remember I used when studying for my master’s with great effect, I would allocate a specified time for a task. Say 45 minutes. I would clear my desk and my screen to only work on that task, and aim to get it done, or a section of it. At the end I would take a 10-minute break, to grab a coffee or some fresh air. Then into the next 45-minute session. I find these work best for me in the mornings when I have higher energy.

These types of tools helped me get much more productive.

Delegation of Tasks

Delegation really in an art. And sadly, one that I’m not that great at. “I’ll do it better and faster myself.”  Have you said that too? But I do recognise the importance of doing it and doing it well, particularly as you rise through an organisation and take on great responsibilities.

I’m doing some of that right after I finish this blog post. One of those things that “only I can do.”  I’m going to make a 30-minute video of me doing it, as a training tool for my team.

Will they do it as well as me? Maybe. Even if they only do it 80% as well as me, that will be OK, because it will give me back an extra 2 hours a week.

And hey, they might do it better than me! They often do.

Staff Training

As just mentioned, I do a lot of training for my team. But they are also great at self-training. If they find a good online training course or a seminar that will help them, they know I’ll say Yes and pay for it.

And will all the online tools these days, I’ll often just say “find out how we can do this.”  And a couple of days later, they have found out.

I never, ever, underestimate the value of training. I attend a lot myself too.

Working with a Personal Assistant

This was the biggest breakthrough for me! I’d never worked with a Personal Assistant before, but I was starting to drown in my work and could see no way out. Don’t be concerned about the cost, I’ll mention that shortly.

I hired my first PA back in 2012. And I wasn’t quite sure what they were going to help me with to be honest. I just knew I needed help and fast.

We started off slowly, with the simpler tasks. My PA, we’ll call her Jess, had never been a PA before, so we learned together. It was Jess’s first job out of university. But she had really impressed me at interview with her energy and smart questions. Don’t laugh, but I had my wife help me select my PA. After all, I was going to be working very closely with this person.

So, we started off with simple stuff like travel bookings, as I was flying Interstate and Internationally almost every week. Then we got into helping prepare client proposals, looking after our marketing systems, and it just grew and grew.

In those early days, I took the view that if the task I was about to perform, was one that I often did, that it was admin in nature and not directly customer facing, I could teach Jess to do it. She was a fast learner!  Note. When I started another business 12 months later, I made Jess the General Manager!

The Manager / Personal Assistant Relationship

I’m not sure how others see the Manager / PA relationship, as I really only have my own experience to draw on. But it’s been a resounding success.  I’m now on my fourth PA. Each one has gone on to bigger and better things with my encouragement. And each one trains their successor before they move on.  Though a couple of times, it was an internal promotion for one of our other team members. That worked well, as they knew what they were getting into!

What to Delegate to a PA

As just mentioned, I took the view that if the task I was about to perform, was one that I often did, that it was admin in nature and not directly customer facing, I could teach my PA to do it. The time that it gave back to me is hard to quantify.

In the early days I’d say at least 20 hours a week.

Now it’s much more.

But it’s not just about saving me time. That’s the first and most immediate impact of course. The longer-term upside is even greater and it’s maybe where the magic happens. Because now, I’m able to do things that I could never have imagined before. Because I just never had the time. And my PA is managing others too. See the leverage?

My PA is my right hand. They help me primarily with Sales focussed activities, contacting clients, helping draft client proposals, managing my diary, dealing with routine emails, managing my support team, and making sure I’m doing my job!  More on that shortly.

Personal Assistant v Executive Assistant

Whilst I started off in 2012 with a Personal Assistant, I now have an Executive Assistant.  What’s the difference you might ask?

For me, these are the differences:

Personal Assistant – Helps me with my own tasks and mainly interacts with me on a day-to-day basis.  Basically helps me to do my job.

Executive Assistant – A much greater level of responsibility. Communicates directly with my clients, deals with external organisations, manages my business finances (credit cards etc) and manages my internal support team.   They even do team hiring for my support team.

Managing Up and Down

Obviously, this is a very personal thing, and all Manager / PA / EA relationships will differ.    It also takes time to develop and to trust each other 100%.  We do.

Managing Down – There are certain tasks that I delegate to me EA on a route or one-off basis.  We are chatting throughout the day on this.  Then there are tasks that my EA is performing that I don’t even get involved in, and nor should I.

You get to the point, quite quickly, that you are not delegating and dictating how a task gets done.  You just ask for an outcome, and it gets done.  My EA might do it; they might delegate it to a team member. I just know it’s going to get done.  I manage outcomes.

Managing Up – We joke about this!   And some Managers will do this differently.  But I like to be “called out” if I forget something or do something wrong.  Example. I’m not allowed to manage my diary.  That is my EA’s domain.  She is constantly juggling meetings and balancing commitments that I have.    So, for any meetings, people know to contact my EA.

Likewise, if I’m falling behind on a deadline, I’ll get a reminder.  From a blunt “you know that’s due on Wednesday” to a more subtle “Do you need some help with that?”

I think it’s a great strength in our business relationship.  We’re like “Business Buddies” who look out for each other and help each other achieve our objectives.  I’m very lucky, all my Pas have been like that.  Great to work with, but very professional and committed.

Where to Find a Great PA

So, this is the $64,000 question.  Quite literally.  Where to find a great PA and how to afford one.  I’d almost say, you cannot afford not to have one if you are a Business Manager or Business Owner.  What are your options?

Hire a Local Assistant

I looked at this back in 2012 but quite frankly couldn’t afford it.  I was a small business owner running a consulting firm and cash flow just wouldn’t support such a role.

Obviously, your situation may differ.  Perhaps you are working in a larger business that has the budget for a PA.  I’d suggest you put together a bit of a business case to justify the cost.  Show how much time it will save you each week and how that time can be put into much more value adding activities.   And also, activities that just don’t get dome now through lack of time!

A local assistant will also have he benefits of understanding your country, culture, language and business environment.

Hire an Offshore Assistant

This is what I did initially.  I hired a PA through an agency in the Philippines.   The initial attraction was the cost.  About 10-15% of a local PA.

But the agency was not a great working environment sadly, and so I took a gamble and started my own “back office” in the Philippines.  My PA became the General manager.  That was “Jess” aged just 21.

We started with a team of six that quickly grew to twelve.

Then Business colleagues started asking me how they could access such good business support staff, and so we expanded to look after other businesses.

So “Virtual Done Well” was born back in 2012.  We’ve moved office three times due to expansion as more Businesses and Managers seek out our services.

Virtual Done Well also remains the “home” of my own support team, who now help me with Marketing, Finance, social media and a dozen other things.  I’ll write about their roles in future blogs.

As well as managing my consulting firm, Virtual Done Well is my “baby”.  We have a local General Manager, but I’m also involved day to day. We run it as a Social Enterprise, but that’s a story for another day maybe.

If you think you might benefit from having a highly professional offshore Personal Assistant, working in a modern well-equipped office with great local support and benefits why not reach out for a chat?  You’ll probably end up chatting to me.