Should I hire a VA or a PA? Part One

When weighing up your options, this may not be as easy as you first thought when it comes to making your final decision; about whether to hire a Virtual Assistant (VA) or a Personal Assistant (PA).

You may be influenced by various factors. Ranging from the size of your business, to how much work you have, to whether you know what your actual needs are.

Let’s break it down…

You are a sole proprietor. You love what you do, but you are working long hours and struggling to find that happy medium between work and play.

You are also doing all of the admin,
but not what you went into business to actually do yourself. You need the time so that you can do what you love!

First, look at your finances, if you are able to hire a permanent staff member, then possibly this is the option for you.

Before you do though, think about the following:

– Whether you will be able to keep this staff member busy eight hours per day, five days per week?

– Can you afford to pay them a monthly salary, which is competitive with market-related salaries?

– Are you then also able to afford all other costs and overheads involved with having an employee? Some of these include – paid leave, hardware and software costs and maintenance, training, HR expenses, stationery, a desk, a chair, other office equipment, UIF, PAYE… The list goes on.

Let’s take another scenario…

What if you are a larger business? You already have an office and other staff in place, but you still have work overflow that no one has time for.

You will need to look at the same three points as the above to assist in making your decision.

Remember that a VA can work well for both an individual, as well as a bigger business. Where the real decision comes in, is whether your needs justify someone full-time, or someone on an hourly basis.

If you are considering using a VA or trying one out, why not start on lower hours. For example, five hours per week and see how it goes. After a month if you are comfortable with costs and the work feedback then up the hours accordingly.

In our next blog, we will look at some of the Pro’s and the Con’s for each type of assistant.

Cathy Haumann
Owner | Virtually Admin
Virtual Business Administrators