Why Your VA Isn’t Performing

A lot of people – clients, prospects, and contacts in my network – come to me saying,

😤 “I’m frustrated with my VA, they aren’t doing what I want!”

😤 “Why isn’t my team more proactive?”

😤 “I have to pick up the slack and work keeps ending up back on my plate!”

If this sounds like your experience with your team, it’s probably not their fault. 😲

The secret to creating a high-performing team that is proactive, that gives you the results you want and can read your mind, is to tell them how to read your mind. 🤯

This is where your Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) come into play as more than just a task to cross off your list.

Here are common mistakes business owners make with their SOPs that make it harder for their teams to support them.

1️⃣ You don't realize that your SOPs are not one-size-fits-all.

You can search for templates. You can buy a book or you can make a copy of your coach’s SOP. But not all SOPs are created equal.

Your operation manual has to be created 1) So it’s specific to your business and 2) so it’s easy to digest the work, the purpose, and how far your team is empowered to act. If you don’t have all of those pieces built into your SOPs, you’re not setting your team up to own their work.

2️⃣ You're combining and skipping steps.

I do this as well – When we do things often, it feels natural and we discount how we really do the work.

BUT by combining those little steps into one vague big step, no one is going to be able to take over that work for you.

3️⃣ You’re forgetting the control points.

Sure, you want to delegate a lot of day-to-day work as you scale your business, but at the end of the day, the business still belongs to you.

If you’re someone who feels like:
you can never really unplug
you’re never really sure if your team is doing the work that they’re supposed to be doing
you have to micromanage or check in
you have to double-check the work to make sure it’s correct

… chances are you probably missed the control points in your SOPs. The points and processes where you’re being notified and work passes through approval and quality assurance.

These are the three big mistakes business owners make with their SOPs. If your team isn’t proactive and owning the work that you’re assigning, a major reason for that might be the fact that they don’t know the process and don’t have the SOPs to truly take ownership of the work.