Task Virtual Blog

A Virtual personal assistant is a person who handles tasks on behalf of the company. A company’s responsibility is divided among different segments, which we call departments. Though there are many tasks that need to be completed but are tedious.

Therefore they are outsourced, to Virtual Personal Assistants who can complete the tasks remotely at the comfort of their homes. Furthermore the tasks outsourced are time-consuming, detail-oriented, and repetitive. Hence it requires a dedicated resource, with access to a phone and the internet, to work on it and deliver results. All medium to large-sized companies has certain tasks outsourced to a group of people or organizations, who complete the tasks on the organization’s behalf.

What Can You Do With A Virtual Personal Assistant?

Hiring a reliable virtual personal assistant eases out the rigorous tasks that an organization is ought to perform on an everyday basis. Some of the common tasks for Virtual personal assistants are as follows:-

Data Entry Work:

Data Entry is mandatory to work for all organizations, big or small, but is the least favorite task of people working in the organization because it affects the completion of other important tasks at hand. So, data entry tasks are generally outsourced to people having good command over Microsoft Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Photoshop, etc., to complete them within a small span of time. Thus outsourcing allows you the time to focus on other important tasks.

Personal Tasks:

Personal tasks such as fixing an appointment with someone, customer support, initiating refunds on your behalf, attending to queries and service provided by you etc. are time-consuming tasks, which need to be attended on a daily basis, but focusing on them would mean compromising on your main task. So outsourcing them to a virtual personal assistant sounds to be a better alternative.

Online Research:

Researching is very important before taking any decision for yourself or on behalf of your organization. Research requires time and patience -to study, compare and finally take a decision. A virtual personal assistant can make the task easier for you. They also provide you with sorted comparative data which can help you take your decisions better.

Calendar Management:

We have all heard about time boxing, which helps us to segregate tasks based on priority. Timeboxing also requires proper calendar management. But to do it perfectly, you must take the help of a virtual personal assistant, which can also relieve you off the stress of getting bogged down by work, without being able to manage them perfectly. Also with delegating Calendar Management, you can strike a better balance between your personal and professional life.

Tiny requirements of business: – A business works in a flow, and we get to know about the challenges as we keep moving forward. These challenges are adhered for the smooth functioning of the organization. A virtual personal assistant who works as a freelancer and not as a regular employee may efficiently manage such tasks for you from time to time.

Taking Calls:

There are dedicated call centers with dedicated telecallers working in shifts to take care of such projects on behalf of other organizations. Attending and making calls, sending and receiving emails, addressing every big and small query, closing sales calls etc. can all be done by virtual personal assistants to make your work easier.

Taking the help of personal assistants can make your life much easier and improve the quality of your work, being handled by professionals and being paid for it. Let us look at a few examples on how a virtual personal assistant can do this for you :-

Adding Productivity:

There are certain mundane tasks that require attention on an everyday basis, and dominate our lives. For eg. Cooking, managing laundry, deep cleaning etc. If we do not delegate these tasks, we would lose out on other important tasks that can make our lives better. Similarly, from an organization’s point of view there are several tasks that need attention, but we all know that focusing on them would lead to compromising on those tasks which are more important. Delegating these tasks adds up to our productivity on a daily basis, making things easier and our lives better.

Becoming Your Own Boss:

If you keep busy throughout the day, you can delegate tasks such as booking your tickets, buying groceries for you, taking care of new leads, attending to them and converting to sales etc, and you can find a better grip or hold over your own life.

Eliminating Distractions:

In order to eliminate distraction and focus on important tasks that require your intervention and decision-making, the regular tasks needs to be handled by others, often not regular employees to avoid even distracting them. Online personal assistants can better handle them and deliver results on time.

Why Virtual Personal Assistants Are Increasing?

Opportunities for personal assistants are increasing, because of rise in demand of such workers. Additionally, many people love having flexible work hours and working at the comfort of their homes. It is estimated, that on average, a full-time employee works only for three productive hours. When calculating, you will find that you are paying a lot more than the productivity that you are getting in return. Hiring a freelancer to work as your personal virtual assistant will save you lots of money. Freelancers take payment based on amount of working hours. You can clearly see the hours versus productivity ratio.

For assistants too they do not have to commute from home to the office and they can easily take up multiple tasks to be completed from anywhere, with the help of the internet, a laptop or phone.

Difference Between A Personal Assistant And A Virtual Personal Assistant?

Whereas the role of a personal assistant exists since ancient times, the role of a virtual personal assistant is a new invention. Personal assistants also work as full-time employees of an organization, working as secretaries to higher officials, and managing mundane tasks on their behalf. Virtual personal assistants work in a remote setting, as a freelancer.

Personal assistants are salaried employees of organizations, whereas virtual personal assistants are freelancers who work based on the hours of service that they provide. Working with virtual personal assistants are lot easier since we can directly measure the work assigned vs the productivity received and the amount paid.

Apart from handling the mundane data entry tasks, personal assistants are also responsible for tasks such as maintaining daily registers, arrangement of papers in separate files, tracking everyday letters received and sent, daily wage laborers’ payments etc., i.e. tasks which require sitting at the office and managing them. Virtual personal assistants work on tasks that are done in remote setting.

Why Online Personal Assistants Are Increasing?

After the Covid 19 pandemic, there has been a significant rise in the number of personal virtual assistants available in the market, because of the flexibility it offers, and the ease with which money can be earned. Particularly for working mothers, such job roles have proven to be a blessing in disguise. After the pandemic small startups, have also seen a rise. These small companies further encouraged hiring virtual personal assistants, calculating the cost and productivity of hiring virtual personal assistants vs physical personal assistants.

The job role of personal assistant in a company has seen a gradual decline. This took place owing to the cost that it incurs versus the products it delivers, which can be easily done by a personal assistant in a matter of few hours at a lesser price. Only challenge of an online personal assistant is lack of physical availability, which hardly is a matter of concern today. Unquestionably most work takes place online. Even if physical presence matters it can be managed in most cases. For eg in food delivery it can be sent through food delivery apps.

Some More Facts About Online Personal Assistants

When personal assistants take a day off, it becomes a hassle to manage tasks handled by the PA. With virtual personal assistants, the chances of day off are minimal since they are already working from home. Only under exceptional circumstances a VA can take leave.

Online personal assistants work on different tasks from time to time based on need. This must constantly acquire new skills, to stay relevant and marketable. Personal assistants on the other hand acquire very little set of skills in their lifetime, owing repetitive nature of their. There is lesser room for learning, acquiring and mastering new skills.

Personal virtual Assistants are smarter when compared with personal assistants. They work on projects and switch from one project to another. Each project comes with its own set of challenges. Meeting the needs of the products from time to time requires skills. Personal assistants, majorly work for the same department and perform repetitive tasks, throughout their tenure in an organization.

When you are a business owner, no one will tell you that you require virtual personal assistant for delegating tasks. It’s really your call. Hence the faster you delegate, the better you will be able to focus on important tasks. Moreover decision-making which require your intervention, and the better productivity you can see. Business owners or entrepreneurs must take calculated risk from time to time for the growth of the business.

Along with that, they must be adaptive to current changes. They should quickly adapt and implement new changes, in order to increase productivity and profitability. Some companies totally delegate their salary computation, incentive workout, and travel allowance payment to other organizations. This helps in saving the cost of establishing an HR department, which otherwise stays idle except.