Archive for the ‘Entrepreneurs’ Category

I recently read a great blog post by a fellow name Bob Jenkins – also known as the Bob the Teacher.  He tells a great story on why you should never rent office space from an employee and how it relates to hiring a web designer or webmaster and how they setup access to your domain name and webhosting account.

You can tell from the comments how many people have had issues of the same sort and how it affected them.  And then there is the other side from webmasters and why they have this preference.

All good points, however based on personal experience I am one who recommends and prefers when working for clients that accounts get opened and setup in their name, not mine. In most cases you can add admin access as well.

Working as a virtual assistant for my clients entails a lot of trust because it requires in most cases to have password access to a myriad of their accounts. This is the norm; access to email, social media, newsletter system, website, blog and many more….however, when our contract is complete or the client and I decide to part ways I always recommend they also go and change their passwords and any assigned admin access.  This can be a royal pain for the client, but really it is for their protection as well as mine (*Tip* I use Roboform to store and update my passwords – saves tons of time).

As Bob mentioned in his blog post, having password access is the same as having the key and alarm code to your brick and mortar store.  If someone is no longer working there – would you allow them to keep a key to come and go when they please?  Not likely. Too much is at stake – your business name, reputation not to mention the contents in the store. The same goes for your website and other accounts they have access to; your business name is your domain name, your reputation and contents of your store are dependent upon the content on your webpages, your newsletter has content and even access to email all your contacts.  These are all part of your online store and should be treated with the same respect for security.

This is not meant to say that your virtual assistant or anyone else hired to work for you, anyone with password access – will go and ruin your reputation at any chance;  it is meant to make you realize that having access is a risk. A risk you need to take seriously and protect as you would the key to your store.

When starting out, start right and have control of the online parts of your business that you will ultimately need to have ownership and control of.  If your accounts are not setup in your name then now is the time to question the setup and change it – while you are still working with the other party.

Technorati Tags: office organization, outsourcing, password security, virtual assistant

I have always been one to talk and question people to find some sort of connection – You know the game of Six degrees of separation. Having moved a ton in my life with a military Dad and then a call centre Husband – I am always making connections, linking someone I meet now to someone or something in my past.

Some of my favourite stories are :

• Seeing a girl at a park in Prince Edward Island who I was sure I skated with when living in Ontario – sure enough later that Fall she was a new member at the skating club and we continued our friendship
• Talking with a girlfriend in high school in Nova Scotia about our past homes and discovering when we were 7 we were playmates and friends on the base in Ontario.
• Ran into an old work colleague in the mall in PEI just after we moved into our new home. We had worked together 12 years before when I had lived there in a previous move. Turns out she was my new next door neighbour.

Anyhow, when I meet new people,  I really enjoy trying to find out if we connected through someone else we know … it’s a sad life I live sometimes!  *hehe*

So last week, when I was being interviewed for a promo piece for the OIVAC conference I am speaking at this week, I got to play the game again! Kind of.  It was a little variation but made me chuckle none the less.  Lyn Prowse-Bishop, a Virtual Assistant from Australia, was doing the interview and afterward we were chatting a bit.  One of the things she said was, “Now many years ago my husband and I were in Nova Scotia and we went to the this great bar in Halifax but we can’t remember the name. Maybe you can help because it has been driving us crazy.”

Well, my ears perked up, partly because my husband used to own a bar in downtown Halifax, and I immediately started thinking – “Oh I wonder if we met somehow” –   but, Australia is a far hike from Nova Scotia, the odds are slim.  It turned out not to be the case this time.  But I did get the name of the bar in one guess.  Lyn started to describe it (Keep in mind, our downtown and waterfront area in Halifax is pretty famous for all its pubs, bars and more; many with grand Maritime atmospheres – ie. beer and music and friendly people). This is as far as Lyn got describing it:  “Well, it was on the waterfront and… ”

I immediately jumped in (mostly because I love guessing games) “Aha! The Lower Deck!”  I was right and extremely proud of myself because I guessed a bar on the waterfront correctly – there are tons but few as memorable as the Lower Deck.  Lots of maritime music and beer as well as fun times with people from all over Atlantic Canada. We had a great laugh and the whole experience added a dimension to the connection she and I have.

When I see her online through Facebook or Twitter, I feel I have a bit more insight into Lyn and that just adds a little more depth to our virtual connection.  It really turned into another example of how working virtually, I do not find myself at all feeling home and alone with no other people contact.  I’m connected virtually to many people and it keeps me feeling very much in touch and enjoying the reach of people I can talk to.

If you work or network virtually, what pros and cons do you encounter?

Technorati Tags: home office, networking, work from home

I invited Donna to blog today because I felt her message could be transposed to many industries not just Virtual Assistants. There are many industries where clients and business owners have similar relationships, and this is great advice!

Guest post by Donna Toothaker, CEO, founder and coach of  Step It UP VA Coaching

——————–

The phone rings.  It is who you think it is, calling AGAIN.  How many times has it been today?  Three?  Four?  You know you should answer, but you dread the conversation.  You slump in your seat and sigh.  Is that an e-mail from her now?  Is this a headache coming on?  You can no longer avoid the inevitable.  It’s break-up time.

Just about every VA has had a client who presented challenges that proved too much to deal with for too little payback.  These challenges were not about difficult projects or tasks, but about difficult people, making the issues more personal, and therefore harder to resolve.

You may be afraid of confrontation, or of losing income; however, as in a dating relationship, the worst thing you could do for your business would be to stay with the wrong person.  Continuing to let such a conflict persist will sour the way you feel about yourself, and your business.  So, if you’re involved with one of the following client types, come clean about your feelings, and if you can’t make it work, make a break!

Control freak.  Your client is an entrepreneur who, until now, has had the reins on every single aspect of her business.  Unfortunately, over the past few months, you have discovered they have no plans to hand them over.  Why did they bother hiring you, anyway?  Micro-managers are time- and energy-vampires who display little respect for your time and abilities.

Needy. Another sort of time- and energy-vampire, the needy client does not micromanage, but requires a lot of hand-holding and constant communication throughout the course of a project, sometimes expecting you to take on more than your agreed upon workload.  Needy clients require extra boundaries.  Discourage telephone calls with the needy type.  Keep it a strictly online relationship if possible, so you have control over how and when you respond to questions and requests.  If that doesn’t work, it’s not worth keeping the client.

Inattentive. The opposite of the needy client, this client makes it difficult to get anything done because of their lack of communication.  They’re often wondering why a project isn’t getting done, when all the while it’s because you can’t spend your days chasing them down for answers, information and approvals.  You shouldn’t have to jump through hoops and spend excess time trying to do your job.  If communication is a one-way, dead-end street, it is probably a good idea to reverse direction!

Penny pincher. This is the client who wants to cherry pick your services, or negotiate you down from your hourly rate or minimum monthly hours.  This client will make your life very difficult, nit-picking, disputing bills and expenses, or asking for you to do extra, all the while taking extra time to pay your bill!  If you sense a potential client is a penny pincher, take hourly rates off the table, and offer only package services.  If you are currently serving a penny-pinching client, consider letting go.  Their money issues are holding you back from enjoying a prosperous, fun business.

Establishing boundaries with clients early in the relationship AND becoming clear on who is an ideal client for you will help to eliminate having difficult clients but some will sneak through on occasion, and these difficult clients will eat up your time, energy and passion for your business…but only if you let them.   Identifying these behaviors early on will give you the chance to either ask your client to make some changes, or get out before they take a toll on you and your business.  Do not be afraid to let go.  You’ll be freeing yourself from negativity, and opening up an opportunity for better clients to come in.

Donna Toothaker is CEO, founder and coach of Step It UP VA Coaching. These highly sought-after VA coaching programs have been created for established, successful VAs who wish to now create the 6-figure business of their dreams. Visit www.stepitupva.com for a free report, The Top 3 Mistakes to Avoid in Creating a 6-Figure VA Business.

Technorati Tags: business plan, efficient business, Small business

The past few weeks have been very busy for me as I complete client work but also prepare to head to a conference for nearly one week. It has made me appreciate the systems and processes I have setup for my business. These systems help when interruptions, new contacts and other things not written in my daily planner happen during my workday, I can easily deal with most of them and not get off task.

Staying on task for me is vital, I have many different things in my daily work that must be completed for each client. If I get backed up or behind then it is not affecting only me, but my clients.

What can get you off track? When you work from a home office, it’s a myriad of things and not just clients. For me it can be the dog, the kids, my home phone as well as contact from new clients, new requests from present clients, computer issues, internet issues … the list goes on and on.

What systems help me? The main ones are:

• New Client Inquiry procedures/info packets
• A 10 minute per hour break time
• My own business scheduled time each day

How do these help?   The new client inquiry packets save me time in that I have the info ready when someone asks for it. The hourly break time allows me time to grab some laundry, a coffee, check on the dog or deal with other items that happen. Having time for my own business allows me to stay on top of my own social media tasks and blog writing and other marketing efforts for my business. This time also gives me space in my day to deal with the unexpected that may take even more time.

All of this helps keep my stress levels lower as I have time set aside to deal with the planned and the unexpected. When things are on a roll and your hours are filled every day it is important to be able to deal with new business/contact or other tasks that pop up, and deal with them in a way that does not adversely affect your day.

What is your top tips to handing the busy-times of your workday?

Technorati Tags: busy, Time Management

Here it is the end of December and I am in the organizing mode again… happens every year to me.
Through the busy-ness of the year there are some things that keep getting left on your to-do list and they build up.  You get to a point where you HAVE to deal with them so they are no longer a distraction.  Time on Task surpassed my expectations this year, my first full year in business and now I find that I will use my time over the next couple weeks to take stock of ME!
It might be an out of date expression – taking stock, but I am definitely one of those Year-end, gotta get everything in order – types of people.

My plans are to:

• Look over my business plan – which is about a year and half old now and make changes and updates. I know I have moved into a couple different areas than when I wrote this plan, plus I will look back at what I projected for the first two years and see how I did. Hard to move forward unless you know where you have been.
• Brainstorm some new ideas for business and changes that I want to make, in a week I will be launching an eBook I wrote – Talking on Twitter – meant to help people learn to use Twitter themselves.  I have another book in my head waiting to get out on paper as well as several other ideas that need to be written down and logistics worked out. New plans!
• I clean out my filing cabinet, shredding what is no longer needed and filing away my taxes and other files that must be kept for a certain amount of time.
• and this year, I plan to torture my husband (hehe) and work through a plan together for the future.  I bought a book earlier this year from Dr. Ron Arndt, a Dental Management Coach who has a Couples Planning Kit.   As a couple, we rarely sit down and talk about finances and plans for the future – personally, for business and for the family.  This year we are going to do just that using Dr. Arndt’s book as a guide. I have already peeked through it and it covers almost anything you would think of to plan for your lives together.

Well, those are my plans… what have I missed?  What areas of your life do you find yourself taking stock of at this time of year?  Leave a comment here so others can get ideas from you!

All my Best to my readers for a Happy and Prosperous Year in 2010!

Technorati Tags: business plan, Entrepreneurs, Organization