We’re so excited to share with you our newest episode of Candid Convos, where we discuss virtual staffing in the new remote economy with a lawyer or other business owners who utilize virtual staff. This time, our featured guest is Melanie Leonard; Clio Gold Certified Consultant and Attorney. She is the founder of Streamlined.Legal, a business that offers personalized consulting services, training, and education to law firms who are looking to create efficiency in their daily workflow and optimize the use of practice management software throughout their firm. We don’t always interview clients, yet in today’s episode, our guest is also one of our happy Get Staffed Up clients.
In this episode, Brett and Melanie discuss her experience working with virtual team members. Her entire practice is virtual! She is the only one in her team working from the Chicago suburbs, two members are working from the east coast, two other members are on the west coast, and she now added a GSU virtual assistant (VA) from Mexico. As a small business owner, her challenge was not the distance, but the skill to delegate. So she really appreciates that her VA is very proactive and reminds her to delegate more.
They also talked about how you can train your VA and what sort of tasks you can delegate. Anything from administrative tasks (i.eg. basic data entry, answering phones, customer service), to personal tasks (calendar management and travel arrangements), or others; you can also add a lot of bandwidth to your team and plug them into systems. These administrative/entry-level positions usually have the highest turnover rate, but by going offshore with GSU, you can find stable and affordable team members that will be loyal and working full-time for you and your business. Realizing that there are talented people all over the world is a big help… it’s just a matter of how much do you want to get done and how much do you want to do yourself.
What does Melanie say about her GSU virtual assistant?
“When I started working with our first Get Staffed Up employee — first of all, it’s going great — the issue of her being remote was really not an issue for us. She’s very good at making sure I remember to delegate more. She’s like ‘I did this, and that’s been done, what can I do next for you? What can I take off your plate?’. On top of that, she has learned exactly how we operate and therefore is very proactive in her daily work. I really appreciate it, because that’s taken some of the load off of me to have to find everything that I want to change and fix. I used to feel like I was the only one dealing with all the issues, but now she’s got my back. To have her constantly reminding me of that as well has been very helpful.”
“Delegation is definitely incredibly beneficial and addicting, that’s for sure. And my VA loves doing those tasks! We did a personality test recently, and it turns out she is very good at the things I’m not good at. She has really helped round up our team and made us focus on things that otherwise we might not have given the priority to.”
How to contact Melanie Leonard:
peaceofmind@streamlined.legal
Website: https://streamlined.legal/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/streamlined.legal
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/streamlined.legal/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanieleonardesq/ and https://www.linkedin.com/company/streamlined-legal/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpGa34ZypnIFcN4BAuseLtQ
Twitter: https://twitter.com/bestreamlined
P: (630) 590 – 9505
Watch our Candid Convos featuring Melanie Leonard here:
Quotes:
“To have my virtual assistant there, constantly reminding me of delegating more, has been very helpful.” — Melanie Leonard
“When you find a good assistant, they really are a life-changer” — Brett Trembly
“Realizing that there are talented people all over the world is a big help… it’s just a matter of how much do you want to get done and how much do you want to do yourself.” — Brett Trembly
For more information, contact Get Staffed Up HERE. Also, you can subscribe to our weekly newsletters HERE.
