Have you ever been told you need a VA? The first time I was told that, I thought they said I needed a v8 (the vegetable juice, ew, David). I had no idea what a “VeeAyyy” was, but I soon got quite the education. Fast forward many years, and I co-run, Sparent, LLC with Meredith.

As a business owner, you’ve probably shared various challenges with your business network. Inevitably, someone has given you similar advice that sounds something like, “You need a VA. I don’t know what I would do without my VA—she is amazing! You can’t have mine, but you definitely need one to take your business to the next level!”. You nod politely because you have a vague idea about what a virtual assistant is, but you aren’t sure how you would use a VA in your business.

An SOP is a step-by-step guide for every routine task in your business. The SOP typically includes the role or person(s) responsible as well as a timeline for completing each step.

On the surface, Standard Operating Procedures might not be the most exciting, but the many benefits of SOPs is where things get exciting.

Most business owners hire a virtual assistant because they desperately need to relieve themselves from the demands of their daily operations so they can spend more time on business development. During our discovery calls, we get requests from busy business owners who need virtual assistants that can help with social media management, scheduling, research, content creation, project management, onboarding, inbox management, customer outreach, file organization, billing, blog writing, editing, CRM management, and the list goes on and on.

As Sparent grew, and we got busy satisfying those needs, clients started sharing with us some of the surprising things they valued most about working with their Sparent virtual assistants. We now consider those needs and hold those benefits in high regard when hiring virtual assistants and onboarding new clients.

A busy consulting firm gets back to their core work thanks to the help of a virtual assistant.

As a society, we’ve navigated a global pandemic, social unrest, racial injustice, climate catastrophes, and political chaos all in a span of two years. It is no wonder we are all reevaluating our priorities and women (at twice the rate of men) are leading the Great Resignation because balancing a career with their life is not achievable.

Ironically, the pursuit of work-life balance has always been inherently one-sided, and therefore inherently flawed. The responsibility of achieving it is placed solely on the shoulders of individuals, not employers.

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We want to bring more attention to the strengths and benefits of doing business like a woman, so we’re launching the #dobusinesslikeawoman campaign.

We have found so much power, success, and profit in doing business like a woman, that we want to do our part to uncouple feminine qualities and characteristics from negative connotations and associations with being less.

We hope that eventually the business principals we listed above will simply be universal best practices.

Beyond The Resume

Because we work solely with stay-at-home parents, who often have resume gaps and a tendency to undervalue the bonus skills they’ve acquired during parenthood, our vetting strategy involves looking beyond the resume and first impressions. Instead, we collect a holistic picture of our applicants to determine if they have a combination of factors that will make them a great fit for our talent pool of virtual assistants and remote employee candidates.

Resumes, education, industry experience, and technical skills are the common benchmarks for qualifying a potential applicant. But, what if you are missing out on amazing team members by rigidly adhering to traditional, generic, evaluation practices?

I didn’t know a virtual assistant could do that!

We hear this so often from business owners that we decided it’s time to shed some light on the types of tasks that can be delegated to a virtual assistant (or virtual team) so you can concentrate on the growth and development of your business.

Since starting Sparent we’ve been doing an analysis of the characteristics of clients who stay with us long term and use their VA to great advantage, and those who…don’t. In the Venn diagram of clients that end services in three months or less, at the very center are clients who acknowledge they have an ineffective communication style while also expressing zero interest or intention of changing (that or anything else), and who want their virtual assistant to be a mind reader.

Talisa has been a high school teacher since 2007. Her most current school was an all-boys high school where she first learned about Canva. There she took a few professional development classes mostly focusing on Canva and all the different aspects of the program. When she found out she was pregnant in 2020, her school was still fully virtual which, unbeknownst to her, further helped Talisa prepare to become a Virtual Assistant.

I have gained skills and knowledge along the way that have helped me be both organized and structured, as well as flexible and able to think on my feet. I think this mix of skills is very helpful to have when taking on a role as a virtual assistant. I am very excited for the opportunity to flex these skills and even more excited that in doing so, I will be helping and supporting women who are making their business dreams come true!

Hello!

I’m Lindsay and I could not be more thrilled to be working with Sparent- the Mother of all virtual assistant agencies.

As a mom to five year old twins, I'm a pro at figuring it out, making it work, and making it seem easy, all while "having my hands full" (any other moms of multiples will get that one)!

I've spent the last 10 years working in real estate and loving every second. I’ve acquired a toolbox of skills that I enjoy putting in action to help businesses grow more smoothly.

Meet one of our Sparent virtual assistants, Carleen!! If you’re looking for SEO strategy or copywriting skills, Carleen might fit what you are looking for. She loves to help small companies realize their potential by drawing traffic to their websites and encouraging clicks! There’s nothing like seeing a client’s website show up on page one of Google for the first time!

CEOs are clear on the responsibility they have for the growth and development of their company. To succeed with that high degree of responsibility, knowing what they Don't Do is critically important in order to maintain their focus as leader and visionary.

My breaking points have always instigated the major changes in my life. And I don't think it's just me. One such breaking point happened when I was running my first business.

Slashing labor costs to improve revenue reports is a lazy strategy to a complex problem and a classic example of short term thinking with long term consequences.

Hi, I’m Meredith and I’m a quitter. But in my world, that’s something to be proud of. I was raised in a family that saw quitting as a perfectly normal reaction to things that aren’t a good fit, instead of a character flaw.

You’ve probably heard that the pandemic forced record numbers of women out of the workforce. What you might not know is that a record number of those women have started their own businesses. Women-founded businesses grew 27% in 2020, compared to 17% of male-founded enterprises. In other words, they quit and they aren’t looking back.

If you’re missing emails and feeling the stress of potentially missing important emails—this blog is for you! Stephanie breaks down her strategy on tackling her own Gmail inbox so you can tackle your own.

It's TikTok O'clock! Long revered as a platform for lip-syncing your favorite songs, dancing or acting out sketches, believe it or not, TikTok can actually teach us a lot about running a successful business.

Hiring a virtual assistant can be a game-changer for businesses with growing pains. But, when is the ideal time to hire a VA and when is the timing all wrong?

Marcia is the founder of the Connector Conference which will be experiencing its third year, virtually on September 25th from 8am–4pm. The event programming encourages and teaches women how to reconnect with themselves both professionally AND personally.

How do you know if you are ready for a VA? There are obvious signs that it’s time for you to delegate. These are telltale signs that your business is growing, but for it to continue to grow and scale, you just need some help.

Being interviewed on a podcast is a tremendous opportunity to showcase your unique experience and expertise to a new audience. As long as the podcast’s premise and content is a good fit for your brand, don’t worry too much about its audience size.

We recognize the value in remote work. Take advice from our virtual assistant Sparents—seasoned professionals who know how to honor what work time is and is not. We want to do our part in helping you and your employees mitigate the inevitable stress of wfh.

While starting and continuing to produce a podcast does require more time and effort than just writing a blog post, it is definitely worth considering if you are growing a small business. Here are ten impressive ways a podcast can grow your business.

Hiring a virtual team for your company is a smart business investment. Get the talent you need, when you need it, without the burden of employment expenses.