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Montag, 18. Juni 2012

How awesome is my VA?

I had a disheartening discussion about outsourcing some days ago. I was serously considering stopping my business out of moral reasons.

Location of Pakistan, including all areas cont...I asked my virtual assistance for his honest feedback for some really critical questions.

Example: How can I not know that if I hire someone in India or Pakistan, that I don't support anything illegal?

And the like.

My VA gave me some very solid answers. Very solid.
He wrote about 1800 words of text. With some very valid arguments. Of course, not all related to this one question, but many other critical points.

In short: my faith in my business model is restored.

He took about 5 hours for this research and writing. This cost me less than 10$.

Freitag, 15. Juni 2012

Is outsourcing just impossible to do ethically? Should I give up?

Until now, I was pretty much excited 100% about making a site about outsourcing. Recently, I run into a pretty serious and spririted debate, with the result that I should not do it.

Decision Making Skills When it Comes to Outsou...That was disheartening. I planned on this site for almost half a year. I have tons of value to share. I really meant well, I really did.


But still, there is a risk that I might do some damage that I cannot undo. What if I support bad stuff when doing outsourcing?

In the end, I'll be accountable. Even if I only wanted someone to send me the weather daily or answer emails. Or anything.

Is it as bad as I think now it is?

--

There is NO way I'll give up without a fight. I'll find the way to blog about outsourcing. Effectively and ethically.

And when the success comes, all the critics will know better.

Freitag, 8. Juni 2012

Synergizing with a virtual assistant. I blog, he illustrates

Now we are talking. Together with the resarch from my VA, I built a pretty huge webpage today in the new site builder from SBI.
He helped me pre-format the article in word. I copy pasted it into the builder, thinking of some unique information I cannot outsource along the way. Like a striking page description.

You can see the page here.

How does the teamwork continue? I point out which formatation I don't like - he fixes it. I ask him to illustrate the post with diagrams and graphics - he is on it faster than the speed of light.

Damn I love outsourcing :)

He has already started on a new project. In order to get more illustrations, we'll outsource the research again to even more providers. They'll jump on the team, he will give them the instructions, and I'll review the final results.

Easy? Easy.

Freitag, 1. Juni 2012

Working together with a virtual assistant that does transcription work for me and orders my thoughts

Yesterday I experienced serious writer's block. Nothing unusual for me.
Writer's Block
Writer's Block (Photo credit: Elemento Zeca)


My solution: "call up" my virtual assistant. Actually, I didn't really call, but just used an application from Catch.com to record a message.

I was 1.5 hours long..! But at least it got me over my writers' block.

Simply telling what projects I was thinking about, how I wanted items be ordered, while dictating pieces and parts of future articles for transcription was surprisingly easy.

I was very eager to find out that my VA had successfully worked through the gibberish to yield some nicely polished stuff to work with.

This essentially replaced my writing work with a polish-and-put-the-best-stuff-together work. Which is way easier.

Writer's Block: 0 - Virtual Assistant: 1