Managing Your Multi-VA Team: Project Management

For team building, you need an effective way to delegate the items and also a place to keep your client information in one area so that your assistant(s) aren’t always asking for the information. In my own business, as I’ve mentioned, I use Basecamp and have added all of my clients and all of my team members to it.

Basecamp is great because I can assign to-dos to my team members, include them on important messages to my clients, set milestones as reminders for them to do recurring tasks or when deadlines are looming and upload files for them to access.

Full Access or No Access?

Before you create a system, you need to think about something. Do you want your assistants to be able to interact with your clients or do you want to keep them as someone you communicate with but your clients do not? Let’s look at the pros and cons in a moment for this but just think about what you would prefer.

If you wish for your assistants to communicate directly with your clients, you will spend less time managing that person and doing the back and forth communication that can become time consuming. However, you do want to make sure you are checking in on their work from time to time and check in with your client to make sure he/she is happy with that person.

If you don’t want them communicating directly to your clients, you will spend more time managing but you will also have a close handle on what goes on in your business and with your clients.

I firmly believe that people are more empowered when given a particular task or role within your company so for me, I let all of my assistants communicate directly with my clients. I also let my clients know, right from day one, that I have a team and that my team helps me grow my business and get the work done quickly.

Time Tracking Systems

Other systems you will want to look at it will include time tracking systems. It’s really important to create a system for yourself that eliminates your duplication of recording time. I use Freshbooks and they have a really neat company area where you can connect assistants and any time they spend on projects gets tracked in your system and to the appropriate client! It’s genius.

Bringing Organization to E-mail

Another thing I do is keep a folder in my inbox called “Subcontracted Work” or, now that I’m in Gmail, I use a label called Subcontracted Work and anything I send to them, I tag with that label or file into that folder. It then keeps it organized so managing it becomes easy. I also add those to-dos right in Basecamp so I can pull up their list at any given time.

Fast Communication

Make sure you are also communicating with them well. All of my assistants are on instant messenger with me so if I need them quickly, I can send them a quick message. It’s also great for me to be able to check to see if they are there before sending them something urgent to do. This way, if they are tied up, I can send it to another one of my assistants.

Your Long-Term Strategy

When you are deciding on how best to utilize your team, it’s really important to think about your own long-term strategy. What is it that YOU want out of your business and what do you want in your life. For me, the answer to that question is more free time and a high-level income. To be able to have both, I need to stop trading my time for money and come up with ways to leverage my knowledge and my ability to manage a great, talented team.