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When we try to do everything in our business on our own, we end up overworked and exhausted. We spend so much time and energy on the mundane minutia that we rob ourselves of any opportunity to work on strategies that actually move our business forward.

When we’re constantly tired from doing the detail-oriented tasks we’re not naturally good at, the quality of our work tends to pay the price and we end up making stupid mistakes.

On the last post, we talked about how using a virtual assistant is one of the best ways to gain ‘mental altitude’ — the clear headspace where we can focus on what’s really important to our business.

Hiring a VA is the easy part, though.

For a VA to work really well for a coaching business, one of two things has to happen. Either a coach spends hours (and hours, and hours…) manually training the VA on every task before they let them get started, or they use a proven, streamlined system for onboarding the VA quickly.

Since most coaches hire a VA when they’re at their busiest, they simply don’t have the time to manually train them up to their standards. Quite frankly, spending hours and hours training a VA on each task isn’t the best use of your time, anyway.

Also, they lack the proper onboarding system needed to get a VA up to speed quickly, so the whole thing becomes a disaster. We’re going to change that right now by looking at the first of three keys needed to make VAs work well for you, whether you already have one or are planning to hire one soon.

Get Free First

When coaches first hire a virtual assistant, the immediate question is, “What do I get them to do first?”

Should they run your technology? Your Ontraport/Office AutoPilot, Infusionsoft, landing pages, webinars, or social media?

I know all of these things are important. You probably hate the technology and want to offload it as quickly as possible. I get it… but hold your horses. Here’s the best piece of advice I ever heard about working with a virtual assistant: The very first tasks you should have your VA do are the tasks that get you free first.

No matter what else is going on in your world — no matter how much tech stuff you want to get done — the first job you should give your VA are the tasks that help you rise up above the day-to-day crap on your desk and give you some altitude and time back.

It’ll be different for each one of you. When I first started with a VA, ‘getting free’ meant offloading the repetitive tasks I hated doing. I outsourced my calendar and diaries because, honestly, I sucked at managing them. Then I outsourced my email because I wanted a buffer between myself and the world’s demands on me.

Too many coaches make the mistake of hiring a VA and, as soon as they start, saying something like, “Great! I’m so glad you’re here. Here’s all the stuff I want you to do. First, set up this landing page, then register this account, then build this email sequence, then…”

If you get this wrong, you’ll end up overloading them with tasks — some they can manage, some they can’t. When your new VA hits a roadblock, you won’t have the time or headspace to help them overcome it (much less, get good at it).

When you first hire a VA, I want you to think of these two words: Routine and Dislike.

Any daily, weekly, or monthly tasks that you don’t like should be outsourced first to get you free.

The larger, more complicated tasks will come later, but without time, energy, and altitude, there’s no way you can set your VA up for success. You need your VA to free you up now so you can help them free you up even more, later.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Share them by leaving a comment below.

P.S. Whenever you’re ready… here are 4 ways I can help you grow your coaching business:

1. Grab a free copy of my book

It’s the roadmap to attracting prospects, signing clients, and scaling your coaching business. — Click Here

2. Join the Coach Dojo and connect with coaches who are scaling too

It’s our new Facebook community where smart coaches learn to get more income, impact, and independence. — Click Here

3. Join our Implementation Program and be a Case Study

I’m putting together a new coaching case study group at Black Belt this month… stay tuned for details. If you’d like to work with me on your client-getting and scale plans… just send me a message with the words “Case Study”. — Click Here

4. Work with me and my team privately

If you’d like to work directly with me and my team to take you from 6 to 7 figures… just send me a message with the word “Private”… tell me a little about your business and what you’d like to work on together, and I’ll get you all the details! — Click Here

Learn more here.