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Businesses must assess their virtual assistants (VAs) and external teams correctly. This evaluation can be challenging at the onset. You often do not get a trial period; hence, you cannot know whether your chosen provider can deliver the expected results.
A BPO company in Phoenix that matches you with pre-vetted VAs and staff can help solve this problem. It can help you measure the performance of your third-party team.
This article discusses key performance measurements for Phoenix businesses’ virtual assistants and external teams. It also explores ways you can identify areas for improvement in these roles.
Eight Key Performance Measurements for Virtual Assistants
A VA is an affordable alternative to a regular full-time employee. Depending on your location, their hourly rate is often cheaper than employee salaries. Most VAs operate as independent contractors. However, you can also hire a team of VAs by partnering with outsourcing companies that match you with pre-screened candidates.
So what is a business process outsourcing (BPO) company? This term refers to a third-party service provider that handles and administers delegated functions on behalf of clients.
Keeping track of performance metrics is important for high-quality service. Here are essential performance measurements for third-party virtual assistants and teams in Phoenix.
1. Efficiency
Efficiency applies to different areas of the VA’s role. Efficiency can mean properly researching and filtering data or processing order information, depending on their function.
Similarly, an efficient staff member can anticipate low staffing levels at certain times and instantly collaborate with the appropriate department or team to cover their needs. Concise correspondence is a must in this case.
When you correctly measure efficiency, you bring the proper management of team performance into fulfillment.
2. Time Management
Time management is a crucial performance measurement for virtual assistants in Phoenix businesses. For virtual assistants and back-office outsourcing teams, keeping track of tasks assigned and other duties they are responsible for is vital.
You can improve performance by measuring VA’s priorities and progress each day and tracking what lies ahead each week, which require excellent time management skills. Enhancing productivity with proper time management will make your staff more successful in their roles.
3. Communication
Impeccable communication skills are crucial for businesses of all sizes. It is especially vital for virtual assistants and outsourcing teams that handle personal data and other critical information that passes through personnel.
For example, an executive VA needs communication skills to properly collaborate with other administrative members. Good communication ensures that they understand how the admin team runs.
Good communication is vital for other types of VAs and back-end teams when scheduling appointments and relaying information to other staff, as communication may be verbal or written in various channels. To measure a VA’s communication skills, assess their responsiveness to your assigned work and whether they ask for clarifications.
4. Collaboration
Properly collaborating with other departments, such as finance, human resources (HR), and information technology (IT), improves the seamlessness of your business functions and operations. Depending on your BPO agreement, third-party teams might need to collaborate with people inside or outside your immediate business.
Moreover, they must show strong emotional intelligence when dealing with end customers, especially when delivering complex messages. Hence, collaboration is an important performance measurement for virtual assistants that businesses in Phoenix must consider. You might also want to provide continuous training on collaborative skills.
5. Coordination
VAs and back-end teams often handle coordination, so they must deal with multiple departments when setting up meetings and training, relaying information, or handling various tasks and projects. They need to coordinate all functions properly since numerous staff members are involved.
You can evaluate the virtual assistant’s coordination skills by getting feedback from related parties. Post-coordination feedback lets you determine additional metrics you might need to set later. It also helps with the overall office dynamics.
6. Organization
All VAs must have stellar organizational skills to ensure high-level performance. Furthermore, they should know when and how to assist during peak demand. So, you must observe how they handle strategic planning to maintain a smooth office dynamic.
Excellent organizational skills also involve emotional intelligence since VAs must maintain tact to reach operational achievements and deal with difficult clients.
7. Scheduling
Scheduling is another important performance measurement for virtual assistants that businesses in Phoenix must gauge. Correct scheduling is vital for any company. It is even more important for an executive VA to ensure that C-level staff allocate enough time to deliver employee appraisals, attend meetings, and finish daily tasks.
Establish calendar dates for a competency assessment to check whether the VA meets the training manager’s expectations. Doing so gives you more accurate feedback about the VA’s performance.
8. Financial Documentation
Virtual assistants who work closely with executives will likely be responsible for managing the latter’s email inbox. Often, emails contain confidential information that team members should not share. The VA might also need to handle payment receipts, travel expenses, and other administrative work.
Budget management skills are necessary when working with the company’s financial resources. Fiscally sound budgets help the managerial team monitor expenditures and revenue increases. Hence, regular assessment of your staff’s financial documentation is a must.
Importance of Performance Measurements for Outsourced Virtual Assistants
As the number of people choosing remote work increases by 24%, more companies can expect to see the nature of work change. Businesses in Phoenix can hire a VA from the other side of the world who performs as well as full-time on-site employees.
Despite not having the same benefits or contracts, the VA accomplishes its assigned tasks as efficiently as in-house staff. So companies should establish key performance indicators (KPIs) and assess third-party staff using the same standards as the internal team. Maximizing your outsourcing engagements’ return on investment (ROI) is also best.
Here are the details:
- Measuring efficiency. You cannot see what your VA is doing, so you must measure efficiency differently. KPIs help with this. How the virtual assistant relates to you and your team impacts their efficiency. So you can measure work experience, knowledge, and attitude instead.
- Ensuring reliability. Since remote work has no physical interactions, excellent delivery is crucial to compensate for the lack of presence. It improves responsiveness and must be a part of your KPI. Give VAs target communication response and turnaround times to see if they can meet these.
- Avoiding misunderstandings. Your expectations become clearer when you set KPIs. Virtual admin assistants play a vital role, so performing with high standards is necessary. Having the right performance metrics prevents potential misunderstandings.
- Assessing long-term working potential. Hiring a VA is an investment, so you must check profitability and ROI. Setting up KPIs helps you evaluate the VA’s potential. Consider setting specific and achievable targets for your assistant directly related to their tasks.
Establishing the correct KPIs helps you evaluate your virtual assistant’s job performance fairly. Just be sure to use correct and realistic performance metrics.
How to Identify Areas of Improvement
Studies show that remote workers are 30% to 45% more productive than on-site staff. You can take advantage of this by hiring a virtual assistant. You can pair up with a qualified virtual assistant to oversee your tasks and increase productivity.
An effective virtual assistant is game-changing, so you want to help them improve by identifying areas they lack. Here are a few ways to do that:
Identify KPIs
Solid KPIs are necessary to ensure the VA meets the right milestones. So, the first step is to decide which KPIs apply to your workflow. For instance, you can examine the time they need to accomplish a task, assess planned hours, or check how often they make mistakes.
Some virtual assistant agencies and BPO companies can assist you with performance tracking. Your vendor might have success managers to help you establish a more detailed metric breakdown.
Set Regular Reviews
Once you have your goals and KPIs, you can set up regular reviews to measure their effectiveness. For example, if you are under a year-long contract, you can perform quarterly KPIA reviews. Conversely, you can perform a weekly review to determine your progress toward your monthly goals.
You might also measure VA’s technical proficiency in using the software you have in your company, such as contact center as a service (CCaaS). Remember that your VA can finish all their tasks but still not reach your expectations. In such cases, check whether you have assigned the right task or whether the work quality is problematic.
Include a Process for Delivering Feedback
Finally, you must have a routine for delivering feedback. This step is vital to ensuring you and your VA are on the same page. Not having a feedback process makes it harder to determine whether they are doing well and whether they need to change something in the workflow.
The process for delivering feedback depends on the company. You can do so via email or video call. You can decide which is most comfortable for you and your staff.
The Bottom Line
As a business leader, you must monitor the performance metrics above to ensure a successful working relationship with your chosen VA or third-party team.
Some companies are reluctant to hire a VA. They are afraid because they think the process takes a long time, and they cannot properly assess the worker’s performance. However, when you partner with a BPO firm, you can find the right candidate without the hassle of recruitment.
Let Unity Communications manage the hiring, training, and management of your virtual assistant for you. Let’s connect for more information!
