Since my last post on What’s in a Name? it seems that confusion continues regarding what a Virtual Assistant actually is.

The most recent misconception appeared in Productivity501′s post on whether to hire a remote or local assistant. Whilst the author raises some great points, he incorrectly states:

“The most common perception of a virtual assistant is someone working in a call centre from India”.

I would argue that this is not the most common perception – but more correctly, the most recent.

VAs have been around for a lot longer than call centres in India and unfortunately the emergence of Tim Ferris’ The 4 Hour Work Week and the use of the term on freelancer sites like Elance and Guru.com has diluted its value and changed the perception.

There is a distinct difference between a professional VA and an Indian call centre operator as I pointed out in my blog post referred to above.

Whilst the author raises some great points, it’s important to point out that a professional VA/client relationship works best with open communication. The POINT of a VA is to free up clients for those tasks their time is better spent on – like business growth and leads. If your time is worth $200/hour why spend it booking travel when a VA can do it for much less and your time is more productively spent working on your business?

There also seems to be some confusion between a VA and a personal concierge or professional personal organiser. The latter do the onsite running around type jobs you might need done like car servicing, banking etc – plus a whole lot of other tasks that are beyond the scope of this article. VAs provide remote secretarial/admin support with many specialising in certain niche areas (eg transcription, bookkeeping, website design, desktop publishing). That is what the definition has always been since home-based secretaries first emerged in the late 1980s – with the actual term first being used by Thomas Leonard, founder of CoachU and the ICF, to describe his then remote secretary – not an Indian-based call centre operation.

I currently provide VA services for clients in Australia, the UK, Singapore, Canada and North America. These services include traditional secretarial type roles like transcription and document production but have also entailed appointment scheduling, email response, newsletters, online database management, contact relationship management, travel arrangements and even buying tickets to Cirque du Soleil in New York.

What a VA can do for you is limited only by your imagination and your ability to communicate your needs effectively.

The primary benefit to you as a business owner is in cost savings. What might seem like an expensive hourly rate at first glance, can actually cost you less in the long run, not only over hiring onsite staff (with the associated on-costs) but in your own productivity and better placement of your time resources where they can do the most good for your business and its bottom line.

© Lyn Prowse-Bishop, http://www.execstress.com/