Can you believe The Matrix was released almost 18 years ago? Most modern high school students weren’t even born when it first came out. Does that make you feel old, too?
In case you haven’t watched it in the past decade, here’s a quick recap of one of my favorite scenes.
Our main character, Neo, is ready to start his training. While flipping through futuristic looking floppy-disks, Tank the operator says to him, “We’re supposed to start with this operation programs first, but let’s do something a little more fun — combat training.”
Then he uploads file after file of martial arts training into Neo’s brain. When they finish, a wide-eyed Neo looks up at Morpheus and says, “I know kung fu.”
We all remember his epic response — “Show me.”
Then they battle it out for a while to test out Neo’s new skills.
It’s an amazing scene, but why am I sharing this with you?
Over the last several posts, we’ve been talking about how to properly onboard a virtual assistant so they can perform at a high level with minimum effort from you. This lets you offload the routine tasks you hate doing and focus on what really matters for moving your business forward.
The first key is to get free first. This covers which task your VA should do for you when you first bring them on. Then we talked about how to find your rhythm with your VA through weekly meetings and daily check-ins.
The final key is to install kung fu. We want to get our VA up to speed, just like Neo.
Install Kung Fu
Since we can’t literally plug into our VA’s brain like they did in The Matrix, I reckon there are three tools we can use to train them quickly.
First, Black Belt members can use the VA Training Library on our membership site. Just give your VA the login credentials and have them watch our training videos on how to be a great VA. They’ll learn how to manage your calendar, your email, set up webinars, etc. All of the basic, fundamental tools are in there.
The second tool is to use a screen capture program like JING.
It allows you to record quick video screencasts of you performing a task. It’s super simple — hit record, talk through the task while doing it, and share the video with your VA. Now they can follow the instructions and document the steps for you.
It doesn’t cost you any additional time, and now you have a documented process that can be shared with other VAs in the future.
Third, if there’s something you need from your VA that you don’t actually know how to do yourself, have them search for it on YouTube. There are YouTube tutorial videos for nearly everything you could want your VA to do. It’s the second biggest search engine in the world for a reason.
“Show Me”
Installing kung fu follows a very simple framework: Me. Us. You.
In my business, I’ll record a video with Jing. That’s the ‘Me’ part. Then, I share it with my VA and as they watch it, I have them document the process of the task. That’s the ‘Us’ part — doing it together, step by step. Once they have the process written out, they can run it by themselves.
Me. Us. You.
To quickly recap, properly onboarding a VA follows three keys.
- Get free first. The very first tasks you offload are the ones that free you up for at least a half day each week.
- Find your rhythm. Onboard your VA for six weeks by establishing weekly meetings and five-minute daily check-ins.
- Install kung fu. Get them up to speed with some quick training videos from Black Belt, your own screencast, or YouTube and have them document the process.
Here’s the deal: Going virtual is the best thing you could do right now to get free from routine, day-to-day operations. When I first got started I was completely overwhelmed. I didn’t have a clue about how I working or what I should be doing. So I hired a virtual assistant but had no idea whether I could keep her busy or not.
I made a stop-doing list of all the crappy stuff I never wanted to handle again. Managing email and voicemail were the top and they became the first tasks on my VA’s to-do list.
Now we’ve evolved into a high-performing team with five VAs and it’s still growing. We have process managers who handle the routine tasks and a special-ops team that helps me with the individual, one-off projects. Without following these three keys, none of it would’ve been possible.
Do you have a VA? If yes, how did you train them? Share by leaving a comment below.
P.S. Whenever you’re ready… here are 4 ways I can help you grow your coaching business:
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