STP 29 | Hiring a Virtual Assistant
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Do you like to get things done quicker, faster, and with less effort? So do I. So I created a Facebook group called assistants, automation, and, and AI for mental health providers. You can search it in the Facebook search panel. And I created this because I love to talk about this topic. I love, , talking about assistance and how to hire them and manage them.
I love automations that do things for me quicker, faster, better. And then AI is just exploding on the scene. And I feel like I'm talking about all the, about it all the time and my friends are talking about it. So why not create a community group where we can discuss these things together, share ideas and get things done quicker.
I'd be, uh, humbled. If you joined the group and started contributing your favorite tips and tricks on assistance, automation and AI for mental health providers.
Go to the show notes, find the link for the group, or just search up assistance, automation and AI for mental health providers in the Facebook search bar. We'll see you there. Welcome to the Scaling Therapy Practice. This is James Marland with Dr. David Hall. Hello David. Hello James. This is the show where we encourage you to take small steps towards big growth. This week we're gonna be talking about, uh, hiring a virtual assistant. We're gonna actually dive deeper in with David because he is thinking about hiring a virtual assistant, and I'm gonna ask him some questions to figure out what, what type of course or service.
James Marland: I could help him with, um, for hiring a virtual assistant. So, we'll, we'll dive deep into that, but first we're gonna do our tool tip or tech of the week. Uh, I'll go first. My tip is from a book, uh, um, from Jim Collins. It's called, uh, uh, I wrote it down and now it is not where I wrote it. Okay, well I'll remember the book in a second, but the tip is the 20 Mile March.
James Marland: And what David's laughing at me, but. Anyway, the 20 mile march, it's a concept of where if you take a, a goal and just say, this is how much I'm going to do, whether it's a good day or a bad day, and I'm gonna, you know, March 20 miles on the good days and March 20 miles on the bad days. The, the, the principle is you'll get to the destination faster than if you marched.
James Marland: Um, 50 miles on the good days and no miles on the, the bad days. Mm-hmm. And, uh, the book, uh, it's called Great By Choice. See, I figured it out. I'm just
David Hall: looking it up. Yeah,
James Marland: well, it's on, I see it on my webpage, but, uh, that's why I didn't write it down. I looked it up. But, uh, great By Choice is, it's, it's a wonderful book about how businesses.
James Marland: Did things to eliminate or reduce the luck, the luck factor. Mm-hmm. Like, uh, are you ju are you good or are you just lucky? And so one of the concepts was the 20 mile march where the, this w there were two teams hiking to the Antarctic or something, or, uh, I forget the exact place they were hiking to. And one team did exactly what I said.
James Marland: They, they did 20 miles. Good days, bad days. And, and reached the destination months ahead of the team that took, you know, on the hot days and the sweltering days, they would, you know, march less. And on the cold days they would march less and then they would try to make up for it and like work really hard on the big days.
James Marland: It's all about sustainable pace. Like that's what spoke to me, the sustainable pace. Because in, in work and life and business, you know, if when you're responsible for all the things you, you feel, you, there's a, there's a, there's a tendency to feel like I have to do all the thi, you know, today's a good day.
James Marland: I'm gonna work till 10:00 PM or 1:00 AM and, and then not get enough sleep. And then I'll feel bad the next day. So maybe I'll take it easy. Like there's just this tendency to, uh, burn yourself out. And, and then, and then justify not working on the days when you don't feel working. So I don't know. Does that, does that relate to you, David?
David Hall: Absolutely. I mean, I, I talk about the proverb a lot, which starts, how do you eat an elephant? Mm-hmm. Which is one bite at a time. And the sense of what feeling overwhelmed does, how it affects our work and how it affects the things we accomplish. And it's something historically in my, my life. Uh, the paralysis of feeling overwhelmed is crept in at times.
David Hall: I struggle more and not sprinting. Because I'll do that and it exhausts me. Yeah. I'm very bad at, uh, running over, kind of running like, oh, like I, if I do all this and do all this, then I can relax later. Well, the truth is for me at least, I don't very easily typically when I, like, I have to force, um, I have to force myself into relaxation.
David Hall: It's not an easy thing and it is weird cuz I enjoy it, but I al always feel guilt about it. That,
James Marland: that's, that's one of the things that I struggle with too. Uh, the, uh, I know all these things in my head that I need to do and I feel guilty for, you know, taking, you know, stopping at five or
David Hall: six and travel is one of the things that really helps me with that, because what I'm taking physically out of a place where I, I, I just can't accomplish it, makes it much easier for me when I go camping or things like that.
David Hall: And like, there's no right. I can't respond to emails. That's just what it is right now. And, uh, that's, that's actually a good, I know,
James Marland: Um, So, yeah, 20 mile March. Uh, it's a, it's a great concept. I think it's great for keeping, uh, sustainable, a sustainable thing. And it also gives you permission. To know you've done your good work and tomorrow you're gonna do work, and the next day you're gonna do work to give yourself permission to be able to take that time to self sustain.
James Marland: So that was my tip of the week. Yeah. What
David Hall: do you got? My tip? Yeah, my tip. Um, something I like a lot of things I find that like I'll just rediscover stuff mm-hmm. Because I'll learn something and get interested in it, but then life moves on, new information comes in. It, it, it's rarely that I, that I deliberately discard the previous thing.
David Hall: Just more of like other things, get on top of the pile. Then every once in a while I'd go through the pile and rediscover something. I'm like, oh yeah, this was interesting. So one, this was, this initial discovery was three years ago for me, and he had been around for a while. But the millennial money man, Bobby Hoyt, h o y t, uh, as a blogger does online courses on personal finance.
David Hall: But someone in my age range and, uh, Yeah, I just, I, I rediscovered some of his things and it was listening to a podcast episode where he was a guest on, and, and it just reminded me like, oh, like this, it's, this is really good and I really like what this person has to share. And, and, you know, for. I, I think for sometimes when I, for informational sorts of sources, whether it's people or a product or something, um, sometimes every once in a while I will discover something that really speaks to a need that I have and I have, and the knowledge that's that's being presented is completely novel.
David Hall: So I was just, that was something I was listening to this morning and it kind of reminded me of some things that I'm like, oh yeah, this really is good and that is a good habit. And that what was
James Marland: the, what was the author?
David Hall: Who is he? Uh, Bobby Hoyt, h h o y t. And he's, he's a, the millennial Money Man's brand. He has a blog called The Millennial Money Man, that's been going at this point for I think eight years and has of 2023. And he has some online courses. Uh, one of his brands is Laptop Empires, but it's a lot of, and it just, it's a neat story.
David Hall: Like he, uh, he was an educator and, um, But began studying personal finance and also just different gig economy sorts of things. I think he has a course on teaching people Facebook ads. Mm. For small business. And, um, cool.
James Marland: I'll put 'em in the show notes. Sounds, sounds, uh, up my alley. Yeah. Um, all right, so we're gonna move into the, the main segment, which is, uh, I'm gonna be doing an interview for David about hiring a virtual assistant.
James Marland: And this is, uh, this is kind of like. Hits on two of the things that I like to do. One, I worked for a virtual assistant company for three years and I probably interviewed hundred, 200 virtual assistants and hired 50 of them. So, and reviewed thousands of, uh, applications and things. So I, I, and, and after I left the company, I have like hundreds and hundreds of documents and things about, um, Onboarding virtual assistants and hiring them and what they should do.
James Marland: And so, uh, David was asking, you know, well, maybe we should, uh, you know, do, do, uh, he's thinking about hiring a virtual assistant. And so, um, trying to put all that together with my, the courses that I make, uh, maybe we can make a course out of this. So one of the things I do for making a course is I. Do research.
James Marland: Research is important when making a course because you don't want to make something that isn't going to meet the need or the transformation of the audience that you're going for, and. I found a, a, a skill, a process of getting some great information from people in eight questions. And the, the questions come from the ultimate course formula, and the author's name is Amman, A guy, I believe that's how you say it.
James Marland: And r the last time I checked it was like 99 cents on Kindle, or $14 on, you know, um, audible or something. So it's a really good, it's a really good, cheap book to pick up if you're interested in, in the, the course creation stuff. So that's where this, this, these eight questions came from. And I'm just gonna go through these eight questions.
James Marland: I also have this in my course. Um, beginner's Guide to create, uh, for creating knowledge income. So I go through videos on how to do this, but I'm just gonna ask David these eight questions to get some information about what he's looking for with, uh, hiring a virtual assistant. You ready for this, David?
James Marland: Sure. Um, so the, the first question is, when it comes to hiring a virtual assistant, what are some of the biggest challenges you are facing?
David Hall: I would say some of it is kind of where to look cuz there, there are different places I've become aware of over the years. Um, so where to look, how to define what I'm looking for, my job description well enough to make sure that I'm getting the right candidate. How do I. Weed out. So there's multiple challenges.
David Hall: How do I weed out quality candidates or, you know, poor candidates from quality candidates. Yeah. I'll take a side note from there. Like I've, I've, at this point I've hired a number of therapists mm-hmm. Over the, over the life cycle of my practice, and I have made better hiring choices than others at times.
David Hall: And I'm, I'm better at hiring therapists now, but, I've only worked with one virtual assistant in the past. Mm. And it ended up, it was a very fruitful relationship, but not one that continued for a number of reasons. Uh, one of the biggest was, and this is something I communicated to, to my virtual assistant, he was a great coach and I really, he was very transformative for me in a certain place of my journey cuz he understood, uh, knowledge economy.
David Hall: Sales processes and things like that much better than I did. He really helped me develop good webinars and, and so many different things. He was a great online business coach, as a virtual assistant. He had, he, he there was lacking of he, and part of it is he would tell you he didn't like being a virtual assistant.
David Hall: He, we got connected cuz he worked for a virtual assistant company. And that's how we got connected initially. And that was just part of the gigs he was doing to provide for his family. He was much better as an online business coach and strategist. And so,
James Marland: yeah, to hire one. Did you get interview the company or did you get to interview him before you hired him?
David Hall: I, so I worked with, I realize this is tangential, but it's, it is related, so I. I hired my first virtual assistant. This was in 2020, later 2020, and it was when I started to have some, um, significant success with online courses, uh, in my, like I had, I had been part of my journey as I had been a, a teacher.
David Hall: For years in a, in a teaching business, but it was all, it was mostly in person and that's how I made my money. But then something happened in 2020. I'm trying to remember what it was. Yeah. Something
James Marland: I forgot. 2020. I don't know what, yeah, it was, was,
David Hall: anyway, 2020. I think something happened in 2020, but it made doing in-person things more difficult.
David Hall: And it'll come to me at some point, whatever it was. Yeah. But the, uh, I'll look it up. Yeah, I'll look it up. But, and so I, that's where I began. In 2020. I began doing some more things online. I'd done a little online before, but they weren't very profitable for me. I made some money. They weren't, they weren't money losers, they just weren't big revenue generators.
David Hall: But in 2020, My online offerings began to bring in significant revenue, and I talked up virtual assistants at that point. A lot of my friends were big into them and used them, and I saw the benefit. So my wife said you needed to hire a virtual assistant. You keep on telling people. But it was my first time.
David Hall: So I ended up doing a, from the recommendation, a friend of mine, I used a, uh, a larger US based company called Belay. Mm-hmm.
James Marland: I've heard of them. I've heard good things
David Hall: about belay. You know, I think it was generally my only complaint. I had two, I have two complaints kind of going on the other side. I, I will say on the positive, they were a great place to start, so they onboarded me.
David Hall: Okay. And they did an interview process and then they paired me. They're like, well find you. They, and they paired me. And then I did an introductory kind of meet and greet with the VA where I could say yes or no. Yeah. But it wasn't, they basically pre-interviewed my, I, I had two complaints. One is they didn't understand online courses.
David Hall: Which at 2020 even I thought was a little, I was trying to explain to them what I was doing and they were asking me questions like, well, do you need somebody to respond to your email for you or manage your schedule? I'm like, no, I need help in managing like online courses. And it was clear whoever was onboarding me didn't know what I was talking about.
David Hall: And I thought for a virtual assistant company with the, the knowledge economy aspect of courses being bigger, I'm, I'm, I'm a little disappointed you don't know about this. Now, that could have been the particular person, uh, was onboarding me and they may have learned a lot in the three year since. So I wanna give them the benefit of the doubt.
David Hall: The other issue was that they're very expensive. Um, I was paying in 2020, about $40 an hour. Um, and, you know, part of it was that they were only hiring US based based VAs, and so there was a pay, but I know in the end that they, that their cut was about half. Of that, that the VA was getting, you know, about half of what I was paying.
David Hall: And I don't really feel that their curation process was that, like, and when I quit them, that's what I told them. They're like, well, why are you, why are you quitting? I'm like, you know, I feel I got what I needed and this is too expensive to be sustainable and for, for what I'm getting for it. So that was my experience with them.
David Hall: And Andy, who, the VA I worked with, great guy. I would definitely recommend him for people for online business coaching and marketing help in a consulting sort of role, which is what I think you would want me to send to him. Um, but anyway, but that was my experience before. But I struggled with, part of it was I was still learning what a VA could do, and I was struggling with setting expectations and fulfillment.
David Hall: Deadlines and just, and I ran into certain things in different moments where I didn't know how to explain what I was asking for. Mm. And so I just made the, well, it's just easier to do it myself. So I ended up not necessarily taking as many things off my plate as I wish I did. And that's on me. But I didn't know how, I didn't know how to like decide is this person gonna be good at fulfilling this role and how to set the role for them.
David Hall: I'm just
James Marland: taking notes. You can probably hear writing notes. Yeah. My, my keyboard is very cliquey, by the way.
David Hall: I'm not hearing it, but, oh, you
James Marland: know, I, I know I'll hear it in the audio when I play this back, but, uh, how to get more things off my plate. Um, so. One of the, one of the tips for people who might wanna do this for, for course creation is you write down the exact words that people say, because the exact words communicate their, their message, their content.
James Marland: And if you get the right people that you interview, These words will speak to your whole, your whole audience. Like you won't have to rethink your marketing language. You won't have to rethink, how should I say this? What's the best way to say this? Mm-hmm. If you write down the problems that real people are having right now, uh, like how do I get things off my plate?
James Marland: Those are the words you're gonna use. For, uh, your marketing and creating your course. So anyways, I'm doing double duty here talking about creating courses and hiring a virtual assistant. Uh, were, were there other challenges? Um, what were some of the other challenges? You mentioned quite a few there, were there any others?
David Hall: Um, yeah, I had a hard time setting deadlines and mm-hmm. Because I'm. My accommodating personality was not great in kind of running, and he was working, you know, at the time I was working with the person I was, they were, he was in the process of a move, like from, from moving from Delaware to Tennessee, uh, had other projects and clients he was working with.
David Hall: So I've just one of several clients and we would really enjoy our conversations. I would at least, I think he did. And, uh, I, I would get a lot of helpful information, but like there was one thing I had where my audio, I had re recorded an interview and the person I was doing it with didn't have earbuds in.
David Hall: Oh. And I am echoing in his mic con. It was a really bad quality recording, but I couldn't redo it. And so I needed the audio as cleaned up as I could get it. And, I sent it to my, I mean like, can you clean this up? He's like, yeah, I think I can do that. Well, he was on vacation and then it was like he didn't get to it.
David Hall: Mm-hmm. And it wasn't like will neglect, but it was just sort of like, I was like, Hey, I need this. And uh, so those were things that kind of affected, you know, the workflow. And, you know, so setting boundaries, I, that was a struggle that I had on my end. But again, just expectations of like, what, um, what am I getting?
David Hall: What, what can I expect from this? Because it was such a new relationship from me. Like I learned a lot through that relationship with the things I could ask a VA four. But, um, but going into it, I didn't necessarily know. Like, what are the sorts of things that I, what are all, I knew some about what people use VAs for, but what are all the things that I need them to do?
David Hall: Um, and I think the last problem, and this is one just in a function, like I struggled with figuring out how to like, give people access to stuff. Mm-hmm. Of, because if I needed people in like accounts that I had, oftentimes there were accounts that, like there wasn't so many things I used didn't have like an admin login.
David Hall: So I just, with my login information, I was figuring out like, well, how do I, how do I share this information without losing control of it, without running the risk of somebody? Cuz ultimately the person I worked with was a trustworthy person, I believe, and none of my accounts have done anything weird in the year since.
David Hall: So I'm, I believe it's a safe bet, but, uh, but I would be very wary in the future going forward of like, well, what you know, How do I, how do I delegate in ways that, that I don't lose control? Right.
David Hall: Ultimately, James, you can just take the transcript we're recording right now and put it into chat. G p t.
James Marland: Uh, I, I, you know, I probably will at some point in the future. Uh, uh, it's, it's really, it's a good summary device. Um, yeah. So when it comes, so, great. Thanks for sharing the, the, the biggest challenges. Um, going a little deeper, I guess, when you're, when you think about adding a virtual assistant, what are some of the biggest fears that you're facing?
David Hall: Mm. Uh, so some of it relates to challenges. I'll, but I'll reiterate what I, I just said cuz this is fear. Like, how do I delegate in a way that doesn't compromise, uh, my assets? You know? If I'm having them run ads for me, how do I give them access to social media accounts of mine without losing control? Uh, you know, if I'm wanting something to do social media posting, like on an Instagram account, how do I do that without losing control?
David Hall: How do I, um, so there's, there's that, um, there's the fear of will I, um, get good value? Will the money I invest. Be worth it, whatever that is. Uh, will I make a good hire? How, what will keep me from, from making a poor hire? What are the things I should be looking for? Uh, am I looking in the right place? Uh, as far as sources, like, there's, um, there are a few different sources.
David Hall: You know, a common one, people will do like five or an Upwork. Um, there's, uh, an app or a web service that, um, was recommended to me that I haven't, I haven't done a posting on yet, but I do have a account. But it is, um, online jobs, dot pH it's a specific Filipino based, um, uh, uh, va, uh, uh, job board, I guess.
David Hall: Um, But, uh, but yeah, so that those, those are the questions that come to mind of like, where, where do I find them? How do I go about this? Um, yeah.
David Hall: Good.
James Marland: Um, so. The, the last question about like, what, what, what comes to mind when you think about a VA is what are some of your frustrations or what are the biggest frustrations you're facing and a frustration's different than a fear where you've, you've already tried something, you've done some research, and you've like hit a block or something didn't go right.
James Marland: So what are some of your frustrations with hiring a virtual assistant?
David Hall: So I'm just kinda making the time to figure out like to, cause I know that some of it is on me. Um, uh, is on me. Uh, hold on. We need to pause. I'll be right back. All right.
David Hall: We'll start. You just make a cut. Yeah. I just.
James Marland: Yeah, I do the clapper. Somebody suggests getting a little clicker or something. Something that clicks. But clapping works too. Alright, so, uh, so what are some of the, when it comes to hiring a virtual assistant, what are some of the big frustrations that you're facing?
David Hall: I'd say so some of it is, is I know that I need to take time to even write out what I'm looking for. Hmm. And the goal of hiring a virtual assistant is to save me time. But I need to have, like, cuz part of it is, is I need a, a job description and I need, I realize I have to lay out the role. It's, it's even taking time for myself to define like, what, what am I looking for this person to do?
David Hall: And might it be more than one person, cuz I've got a handful of things that I could consider. That. I don't know if that is one person or multiple people. So like
James Marland: scheduling social media, editing your videos, like all those Yeah. Editing
David Hall: podcasts. Um, yeah. Editing a podcast. Ads. Yeah. Ads. An
James Marland: ads person. Oh, ads.
James Marland: Yeah. Those are a lot of different,
David Hall: uh, skills. Well, and a different sorts of ads, like I'm looking at. Google ads and YouTube ads and meta like Facebook, Instagram, and oftentimes people will kind of specialize in right, one platform. They're not necessarily like all online ads. Um, does TikTok do ads? Like, I don't know.
David Hall: Um,
James Marland: maybe. Probably, yeah. So will people specialize in what I need them to do or do I need to hire.
David Hall: Do I need to hire multiple? Can I expect this from one person? Or if I put it in job description for one person, will I get a good candidate for all of those things? Or am I better off splitting the, the role between more than one person, but then it's more than one person to hire and manage?
David Hall: Uh, oh yeah. And going back to the like, so there's the frustration. Part of it is, is to make time to articulate what I need, so. Find a matching job posting for it. Either something I create or if I can borrow from somebody else or get from somebody else. Like, is this, what's a good job description for a Google Ads Word person?
David Hall: What should I expect? What, you know, what's reasonable expect? Because, you know, ads is something that I don't have experience in, so what's a reasonable ask? Mm-hmm. Is it reasonable to ask, uh, certain performance metrics? And if there are, what are they? Um, you don't even know.
James Marland: Yeah. Great. Those are awesome, uh, awesome insights to what you're thinking and some of what you've been struggling for, struggling with.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So, in, in a course on virtual assistants or hiring a virtual assistant, uh, what do you want to learn? Hmm.
David Hall: You know, I, I, learning's an interesting thing. I wanna learn those questions, but I, uh, uh, I want to, um, it's a weird thing, like I wanna learn, but I really want just stuff to be made easy. Like in the question of like, I, I, if a course can give me like, well, here's a good job description for an ads manager.
David Hall: I'd like to just have that. Mm-hmm. Which sounds lazy, uh, but, um, so I, I guess an easy button, uh, is part of it, and so. And I guess just this idea of kind of defining the parameters, like what is, what are, what are good and helpful parameters? Cuz there are different rules too that, you know, most people are hiring a virtual assistant on a contractor basis.
David Hall: And if you're not used to working with independent contractors, there are different rules of what you can expect and things like that. Like you can't, right, you can't set time with an independent contractor per se. You can set, as I understand, you can set boundaries. You could say like between these times, this is what.
David Hall: Needed. Uh, and so it's even figure out the rules of what am I allowed or not allowed to do there. For sure. Yeah.
James Marland: Because there, if you treat a contractor like an employee, there's some penalties for that. Mm-hmm.
David Hall: Mm-hmm.
David Hall: But yeah, I mean, that's. So I'd wanna learn like what are, what are the different defined roles? Cuz they're, you know, like I'm talking about like is, you know, an intake coordinator would be a role, a social media manager would be a role, a social media marketer I think would be a role possibly overlap with two.
David Hall: A podcast manager. And what does that define? You know, an ads person. Those are the main silos I think about. And then the question is, you know, these might be individual job descriptions, but do I put that as a single post? Do I do it as multiple? Um, and then figuring out like sustainability long term, like how do I, and it is everything.
David Hall: Like what do I pay? Mm-hmm. Like, because a lot of virtual assistants work in an international context, and so as I was highlighting before, resources of like the Philippines, um, What is it expected to pay there? How do I pay in an international sort of thing? Like is it, how do I, uh, what, what are the, the transfers to of payment and how does that work in taxes and all those sorts of things.
David Hall: Mm-hmm. Those are the things, you know, do I treat this as a service? Do I, do I, you know, do I give them a W nine? And like, if they're in a different country, they'll need a different tax form. So those are questions I think about.
David Hall: Great.
James Marland: Very good information. Mm-hmm. So if everything worked out perfectly and I could teach you, or I could give you the results for the things, um, that you're looking for, mm-hmm. What would you hope would happen? Like what, what is your blue sky day for the, the results or the transformation of this, you know, this
David Hall: learning event that I'm able to kind of take what.
David Hall: I've been given and it simplifies that. I, it's, it's almost like a, you know, a, I don't know if computers still do this quite in the same way, but defragging. Oh yeah. And, uh, if, if I'm clearing out the hard drive, like I want space freed up. Mm. And. Oh, that's
James Marland: a great, just that's to, to me, defragging is taking everything that's all over the place and lining it up in a logical order.
James Marland: Yeah. And so when you're talking about that word picture for a virtual assistant, you wanna like get the things that are, like, gumming up your schedule and put them.
David Hall: Remember it. Get to my brain. Yeah. I wanna be able to, I wanna be able to offload things on my brain and I want it to work in a certain way.
David Hall: So, for example, ads. That's probably the my biggest thing I'm looking at right now. Cuz right now I, I run, you know, my, uh, continuing education online course offerings that I do, you know, it, it's the, you know, I, I do multiple six figures in revenue in that a year right now. But I'm not doing ads, which I feel pretty good about being able to accomplish what I have without doing ads.
David Hall: And this is just kind of organic marketing and growth. But it doesn't change the fact that I think I could grow even more with ads. But I don't wanna manage ads. I don't think I wanna be able to know enough to be able to kind of check in. But I want somebody I can hand that to and they run that and that they're making corrections and they're making, so I just wanna see like a weekly or monthly report.
David Hall: This is what it's, look, this has been our ad spend. This has been our, you know, uh, this has been conversions. You know, that's what I want. Yeah. And if someone can give that to me that Yeah, but it's, it's the sense of like, It's less about what I wanna be like, I, I wanna learn enough, I wanna be given the templates and the tools to be able to streamline the process of me bringing somebody on.
David Hall: I wanna know the things to look for in the hiring process and the ongoing management process. I wanna know how to set expectations. And the, the transformation is, is I want something in my life to be easier. Because of this. Like, I, I don't want more work. And that's been my f that's going back to a fear.
David Hall: One fear I've had of going back to, cuz in my virtual assistant journey, what I, what I did is I reached a natural endpoint for the VA I was working with. I felt it was reaching the end of the year. I was looking at what, you know, the, the kind of costs were, I was looking at. I was getting less out of it because I was, I had learned what I needed to learn.
David Hall: And I didn't. And, and honestly, the, I was at the point where I didn't need a lot of VA help in that moment. I, I, I kind of developed internal systems to be able, and so it was just a natural conclusion. But the, the hesitancy in getting back into it is I don't want a VA to represent more work for me, and that's a fear that I'm, I'm gonna take somebody on to make my life easier, but in a different way.
David Hall: It will make it harder. And it will cost me something.
James Marland: Yeah.
James Marland: Yes. Listen to the sounds of my keyboard, uh, typing. I am a, I'm a slower typer, um, than I'd like to be. Great. Um, So what, when, when you describe th these types of things, what would you like to see in a course or a package that makes you supported enough to get the results that you're
David Hall: asking for? I mean, I don't know if I have anything add beyond on what I just said, like that I want templates, I want kind of.
David Hall: The guidance to say like this, you know, see this, not that like pay attention to this, not this thing. Because part of not knowing something is, is that of like what is um, cuz when you don't know what's important or what matters, you can spend a lot of inefficient time in that. So if you're asking me like what features I want in the course, I don't know.
David Hall: I want the transformation, I say the features.
James Marland: So is this something that would be like a one, if you were thinking if it was taught, would this be like a couple hours, a couple videos? Like how much, how much training do you think would be required to get you some of this information?
David Hall: I don't know. How much training do you think would be required to get me this information?
David Hall: Well, I'm a student in this situation. Yeah.
James Marland: Were you thinking this would be a live course or a video course or just some emails?
David Hall: Um, I'd like something. I mean, emails offerings are, are not, they're fine, but it's not necessarily what I'd be looking for in this. I'd like something in a single place, um, that I can reference again.
David Hall: Um, like a vault or something. Yeah. And you know, Live or not? I mean, it, it's just more of, uh, I, I think there's a benefit of some being live if I have the opportunity to ask questions in the middle of it and then, uh, have that and then be able to kind of come back to.
David Hall: So an
James Marland: opportunity to ask questions is something that would be of value to you? Yes. Okay. Uh, so other options would be like a cohort, like going through this with other people who are, do hiring virtual assistants with you. Is that something that's beneficial? Possibly.
James Marland: Um, how many, so you mentioned templates. Um, are there other written documents that would be helpful? Like a template for, um, Um, a job description, uh, things to look for. Uh, what other templates or written documents would be that, like you're, you're, you'd be like, oh, I need to grab this. I need something to look at.
James Marland: What would be helpful there?
David Hall: I would want job descriptions. Mm-hmm. Um, for the different roles I would want, um, uh, You know, uh, standard operating procedures for when the role's fulfilled that I could manage or update, I would want contract agreements of like, what would I get, you know, templates, like what's, what's a common sort of thing.
David Hall: Mm-hmm. I would want guides to, different technology tools to like manage passwords or uh, mass uploading or things like that. Like, uh, and some suggestions there. And the
James Marland: roles that you're specifically looking for, if you could narrow it down to like two, well, however many you want. What, what were, would be some interesting roles for, for, that you, you would want a virtual assistant to fulfill
David Hall: for you?
David Hall: Well, I've said this before, but like I think the roles for me would be, I think of a few different silos of like, if there was an intake coordinator, that's not a huge need for me right now, but I think it would be for a lot of therapists and something I, I do, but somebody who was managing intake flow. So that would be for my mm-hmm.
David Hall: Counseling practice. That's one for, um, uh, social media manager, uh, whether that's for my practice or for my online business stuff. Somebody who is doing that. Possibly a podcast manager and that would be someone doing editing, recording or like taking raw recordings and doing edits and things like that.
David Hall: And that may overlap with the social media manager role, uh, and basically kind of getting it set to go. Uh, and, you know, marketing ads, whether and in the different platforms for that and whether that's an all in one. Or here's what it would look like for a Facebook ads person. Mm-hmm. Here's what it would look like for a Pinterest ads.
David Hall: Here's what it would look like for YouTube or Google.
James Marland: I just think having somebody to deal with that so you don't get distracted Yeah. Is a, is a huge benefit. Yeah. Uh, any other roles? Not that I can think of. Okay. Uh, is there anything else? As far as like accountability and support, that would be helpful to you?
James Marland: We talked a lot about documents mostly. Is there, is there something, I
David Hall: mean, there's a certain amount, like if there is like accountability and, and just even, um, feedback sorts of things. I think that could be, that could be good. Like just like, like review this
James Marland: job
David Hall: description for me. Yeah. Or if other people kind of share where other people are sharing their experiences of like, this is, this is what I've struggled with or not.
David Hall: All right.
James Marland: Um,
James Marland: all right. So and how long, how long do you think this course should be? As far as like time? Maybe as far as like, should it be a couple hours long or
David Hall: as short as it needs
James Marland: to be? As short as it needs to be. Okay. And
James Marland: the, the other, the other question on time is how long of like one month, three months, six months, like how long do you want access to accountability and support? Like either if it's a group or,
David Hall: um, I mean, I, I would say I want access to the material forever. Forever. Yeah. And as far as like accountability and support, like, I would think like a good three to six months.
David Hall: Okay.
James Marland: Yeah, it does take at least it, I feel like it takes at least one to three months to get the, the hiring, you know, from beginning to hire and interview people to actually making the hiring decision. It takes a while. Uh, all right. So, uh, thinking about the, just the program that you just described, how much would you be willing to pay for that type of service or package?
David Hall: If it delivered. I mean, part of the, the idea of like, if I had a vision that like, yes, I could get these things that I'm asking for, for that, um, would, I'd be willing, I'm not gonna say what I'm, I'd be willing to pay because I'd be willing to pay more than I think we're gonna talk about charging. So I don't want this to be like an infomercial.
David Hall: Like, how much would you expect to pay for this? 3 million? No, no.
James Marland: 2 million out. So you get it. Take out the, take out the, if you can take out the, uh, thought that we're gonna make a course, like what would it be worth it to David Hall? Sure.
David Hall: Well, but, but it's a different sort of thing too, because like, this is, this is because this has been an ongoing struggle for me.
David Hall: Mm-hmm. I'd be willing to pay a lot, but if I were to think about like, what feels like a right price for this, I'd say $400. If I saw this for $400, I would feel really good about that as a price. Okay.
James Marland: All right. And if, if, uh, if, uh, if you decided,
James Marland: if I decided to offer this course, which we know I am going to, would you be willing to be one of the first people to join the pilot course?
David Hall: Yes. Okay. I'd be willing to, to, to do that.
James Marland: All right. And, uh, so I ask, I ask that question, um, to help. To help me understand, am I getting enough information? Like if people say no to that question, then you're, you're either not talking to the right people or you're not asking the right questions, or you're not getting your, your topic isn't defined enough.
James Marland: And they're not, they're not seeing the value or the transformation. So, um, that's one of the key questions down there is if people are saying, you know what? This, this is something I just described, something that could solve a problem, I'd be willing to take it. So that's, uh, it's one of the big reasons you ask that.
James Marland: Yes. Or for, for the Yes. At the bottom. Um, All right. So those were the, the eight questions. And this, this, uh, if you ask this to enough people, you start seeing patterns, then it goes to the age old adage. Um, what, uh, how do you, how do you, you know, sell you? Well, you ask people what they want and then you make it.
James Marland: So this is, this is part of that process. Um, Before we go to the one thing, anything else you wanted to say about this, uh, this interview, David? No. Nope. All right. So what's, uh, what's one thing that you want people to remember from this episode?
David Hall: Um, just to clarify what you know, what, what would move you on and what's your goal for a virtual assistant?
David Hall: I can say for mine, I'm wanting to defrag. I'm wanting to offload, create memory and capacity and storage. To think about other things and not think about certain things that take up space now. So that would be for me.
James Marland: And my one thing is, is David reminded me, um, you know, people, people don't necessarily wanna take a course.
James Marland: They don't, they don't want, they don't want anything to take anything longer than it needs to be. They just want the results. So when you're making something, get, get the results to them as soon as possible without making them like, dig through. All the videos and work that you're doing. If, if I, I had got the sense that if David could do this without watching a single video, that that's his, that's what he would want.
James Marland: Uh, he'd just want the vault of information with like, do this, this, and this. Let me hit that button and if I need it, I'll ask you. Alright, well, uh, David, thanks for, uh, helping us out today for the episode. Um, this is James Marlin with
James Marland: Dr.
James Marland: David Hall. Remember reminding you to take small steps that will lead to big results. We'll see you next time.
James Marland: Thank you for listening to the scaling therapy practice. I hope you enjoyed the show. I want to remind you that the content shared today is for general information and entertainment purposes only. Opinions given should not be considered as legal or tax advice. If you need a professional advice in those areas, please consult with a licensed attorney or accountant, but thank you so much for listening.
James Marland: The scaling therapy practice is part of the psych craft network.
