In leaving our jobs and starting our VA business, changing our mindset is one of the most important things you can do to ensure your success and depending on your employment history this may be difficult some. In staying in the 'employee' mindset we are not doing ourselves any favours and definitely not doing our clients any favours.

My question to you is: how do you see yourself?

Are you simply the offsite person who 'gets stuff done' or are you an integral part of the client's team? Someone they just can't do without?

How we view ourselves most definitely influences how our clients view our business and may mean the difference between being treated as another employee to be used up and dumped or being treated as a valued member of the team with an opinion, skill-set and knowledge to share with the rest of the team.

Tell me, how do you see yourself?

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Kylie Short
Tilda Virtual Services - Making virtual personal

Great question Kylie,

I definitely see myself as an integral part of my client's teams. They all know that I am going to offer an opinion to everything and every project. They even come to count on my opinion and often ask for it first before deciding. Of course, that said, since it is their business it is totally up to them as to how things are handled ... or at least that's what I let them think (wink, wink).

I truly feel this is what sets us aside as Virtual Assistants is that we don't just "do the work". As fellow business owners we all understand exactly what it takes to run a business.

Nice thread Kylie
I definitely see myself as part of a team for nearly all of my clients and try to make myself availalbe in a way that lends to that sense of working together. The success of a client's business is realtive to my own!

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Awesome question that really made me dig deep.

I would say that I am definitely a part of the team. I couldn't imagine taking on a client just to get the work done. In all seriousness, where's the growth potential for ourselves and our businesses if we operated that way? I do not shy away from sharing my opinions with clients and always try to think of the end result of the practices in place. If I can help them succeed, how much more do I succeed?

-B

Thanks for this question, Kylie! It is an important distinction of VAs that we (often) consider ourselves part of the team, and maybe that's a big reason we're different and valuable. At a Chamber meeting the other day, I did my elevator speech and found myself saying the bit about 'your success is my success,' and realizing how meaningful that can be to a business owner. Employees don't really see things this way, but it's the natural thing for VAs.

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Mary H. Ruth/Virtual Writing & Communications
http://www.writingVA.com

Go to the top of the class!

Seriously though, you girls have changed your mindset from employee to business owner and it shows in your posts. Well done!

For me, this process took a couple of months for me and when I made that mental connection my business took off in leaps and bounds.

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Kylie Short
Tilda Virtual Services - Making virtual personal