Find a VA Verify a VA
Client FAQ
VA Ethics
Certification Discussions
Testimonials
Clients Say...
Referrals
The Registry
Good Reads
Virtual Moxie! The Virtual Wire
VA SpotlightMedia
News/PR Media Kit
Other Services
Be a VA
Partners Great Biz Stuff AssistU ShopAssistU
About Us
Contact Us
Privacy
Ethics
Copyright
Info
Find a VA
Verify a VA
Client FAQ
VA Ethics
Certification
Discussions
Testimonials
Clients Say...
Referrals
The Registry
Good Reads
Virtual Moxie!
The Virtual
Wire
VA Spotlight
Media
News/PR
Media Kit
Other Services
Be a VA
Partners
Great Biz Stuff
AssistU Shop
AssistU
About Us
Contact Us
Privacy
Ethics
Copyright
Info
Find a VA
Verify a VA
Client FAQ
VA Ethics
Certification
Discussions
Testimonials
Clients Say...
Referrals
The Registry
Good Reads
Virtual Moxie!
The Virtual
Wire
VA Spotlight
Media
News/PR
Media Kit
Other Services
Be a VA
Partners
Great Biz Stuff
AssistU Shop
AssistU
About Us
Contact Us
Privacy
Ethics
Copyright
 |
The Multi-VA Relationship
As your business grows, you may need more assistance than one VA can provide, and it may make sense for you to consider adding another VA to the mix.
This can work very well, with a few caveats:
You and your current VA have a well-established relationship before you add someone else.
A diad (a relationship between two people) is difficult enough to start and build. Trust, communication, patterns of working, learning each other… all contribute to what makes it difficult, although worthwhile, to begin a new relationship. If you try to establish a triad (a relationship between three people) from the beginning, it's almost a certain recipe for disaster. We heartily recommend you not try it.
You may be thinking that it shouldn't be, because you want to create two relationships – one between you and your current VA, and another between you and the new VA. You don't expect the two VAs to interact.
That can work, but you miss out on some really great stuff if you do it that way, including, but not limited to:
Keeping them apart is no less work for you, but you simply don't reap all the benefits.
What we recommend is that you work with one. Establish a solid relationship. And then, if you both think it's wise, jointly interview and choose another VA.
It will be important that the added person be someone you BOTH feel terrific about adding, since you'll both be working with her.
Once you've found the new VA, give her full access to everything the original two of you have about your relationship. Keep no secrets. Don't gossip. Don't triangulate (talk about one of them to the other). Secrets breed jealously. Gossip and triangulation prevent trust and safety from being built and/or sustained. Absolutely encourage them to talk to each other and to you. Make it a requirement for all of you that if one of you has an issue with another one of you, those two people deal with it directly — without including the third in any way. Open communication is key to the sustained health of an relationship, but especially with regard to a triad.
While you'll certainly interact with them individually, consider having a weekly meeting where you three discuss, or at least overview everything going on. This allows the VA not taking the lead on any particular project to consider if she might have something to add.
Also consider breaking work out and assigning it based on areas of your life, rather than based on the task type. For instance, have Mary handle all your personal work, and Beth handle all your business work. Don't have Mary handle word processing, while Beth handles invoicing. Having a specific person leading on any given project, or area of your work/life will allow for continuity and for that VA to build expertise.
If you break out the work based on type of task, important aspects of the project can be missed, or lost. Feel free to have the lead VA ask the other for support where appropriate, but give each their own “arena” so that the management and responsibility aspects of the work they do can be clear to everyone.
Treat them equally. Show them you value them equally. If sending gifts, send similar gifts. If sending a card to one for a job well-done, send a card to the other for another reason. While you're not “courting” them, you are maintaining what can be a fairly delicate balance of the relationship structure you've created.
What If I Need More Help?
If you find your needs growing again, and you need to add a third, fourth, or even fifth VA, everything changes. Our best advice to you would be to consider whether or not it's actually time for you to have a “real” office and a complement of employees. Only you, with the advice of your professional advisors, can decide that.
Should you decide that you want to pursue working with a larger group of VAs, know that you're no longer talking about the same dynamic you had with just three of you in the relationship. Now you have a “staff,” and they need a manager to oversee their work, and be the person through whom you communicate with the others. You can be that person, of course – creating a “team” approach. But think about how much of your time you might spend doing that? Perhaps that role would most appropriately fall to your first VA. She should, after all, know more about you and your work than anyone else.
If you choose that route, your primary relationship would be with the managing VA, and she would then have primary relationships with the other VAs. They would go to her with issues, or questions, or anything they need to discuss. She would communicate with you, get answers, collaborate, and then share the outcome of those conversations with you with the other VAs so they could then do the work needing to be done. She would, effectively, become the “gate-keeper,” who oversees everything you need, and everything they do.
Multi-VA relationships can work wonderfully well. They do require far greater effort and time, but if you can give that, you stand to reap powerful rewards!
[Want to read more articles?]
Back to Client FAQ
Back to Top
Copyright © 1994-2008 by Stacy Brice and Assist University, all rights reserved. Text, graphics, and HTML code are protected by US and International Copyright Laws, and may not be copied, reprinted, published, translated, hosted, or otherwise distributed by any means without explicit permission.