| In the recent movie, Iron Man, Tony Stark had an | | | | who has greater responsibility than just dictation. |
| invaluable assistant, Pepper Potts. Pepper | | | | A virtual assistant may also proofread, create |
| essentially looked out for Tony and made sure | | | | documents, perform research and do concierge |
| that he was not spending his time in less | | | | work, such as booking appointments and making |
| profitable activities. She handled his schedule, | | | | orders on your behalf. The Quench for this article |
| handled his laundry, responded to inquiries, and | | | | was assembled and sent to my subscriber list by |
| occasionally would “take out the | | | | the very capable U.S.-based team at |
| trash”. This allowed Tony to spend his time | | | | 3. Contractors may not work for you if you |
| in his most profitable activities, which in his case | | | | require greater control of the way things are |
| was inventing new gadgets. | | | | done. In these cases, consider hiring a part-time |
| Several weeks ago, I gave a presentation to a | | | | employed assistant; someone who can be flexible |
| group of high-powered executives. When I | | | | with their hours and work from home, but also |
| brought up the topic of having a personal | | | | give you undivided attention. Be sure to develop a |
| assistant, one of the executives shared a long | | | | detailed position description and systems to help |
| testimonial about the value of a personal assistant. | | | | this employee know what they should do. Also, |
| He talked about how he has always found the | | | | be prepared for the employment tax implication |
| expense of his assistant was well worth the | | | | of such a hire. |
| benefits. The return on the investment was huge. | | | | 4. Lastly, you may want to consider if it is |
| The assistant screened most all of his calls. In the | | | | appropriate for your budget to hire a dedicated |
| beginning he felt he needed to have a lot of | | | | full-time personal assistant. I call him or her the |
| control over all the issues in his life. Yet once he | | | | Alfred to your Batman (or Pepper Potts to your |
| delegated many of the items to his personal | | | | Iron Man). For a benchmark: if you are personally |
| assistant he found that of the vast majority of | | | | earning over $250,000 per year and work more |
| tasks he had been performing himself, he did not | | | | than 40 hours per week, it may be time to |
| need to handle many of them anymore. Because | | | | consider a full time personal assistant. The most |
| of this, he was able to spend a higher than | | | | important question to ask is, “What is your |
| average amount of time in his most profitable | | | | most profitable activity?” When you |
| activities. Where I see most business owners | | | | perform that profitable activity, how much are |
| spending less than 30% of their time in their most | | | | you worth per hour. |
| profitable activities, he was closer to 60%. | | | | You want to make sure that by hiring a personal |
| How can you find a personal assistant even when | | | | assistant, you are more than making up for their |
| it is not in your budget? Allow me to provide | | | | cost by doing activities that will add up in greater |
| several different options for your consideration: | | | | value than the cost of the personal assistant. Use |
| 1. You can invest in a dictation service. The | | | | the Rule of Three to create a budget. |
| majority of this article was dictated over my cell | | | | For example: if you are worth $100/hour, and you |
| phone using a service called MobiDic. For an | | | | determine that by using an assistant you may |
| ongoing monthly charge, it allows me unlimited | | | | gain an extra 10 hours/week in activities that are |
| dictations both in number and length. MobiDic will | | | | worth $100/hour or more (for a total of $1000 in |
| also create Outlook contacts, tasks, and calendar | | | | additional value). Your budget would then be about |
| appointments for me. | | | | 1/3 that increased value, or $333/week. |
| 2. You can invest in a virtual assistant, someone | | | | |