“I need to create SOPs before I hire someone”
That’s fine. You can.
But you’re wasting your time.
Why?
Because you don’t know what the VA doesn’t know until you hire them and try it.
Hire first. Create simple training second. Skip the SOP.
Use Snagit. Or Loom. Or TinyTake. Or whatever…doesn’t matter. Just find something to record screen capture videos.
I know…this goes against all conventional business advice the regurgitators give.
It’s so easy today to just record a screen capture video of what you want them to do.
Writing out the whole process is so painful you probably won’t do it.
Why tell them what to do when you can show them what to do in a recorded video?
How does writing an SOP before hiring introduce problems and delays?
With a new VA hire, they’re going to be afraid to ask questions. That’s a given. You will need to earn their trust in order to empower them to ask questions.
When your new VA doesn’t understand your written SOP, they are going to assume it’s their problem. This will make them want to put off asking you for help as long as possible because they don’t want you to think they’re stupid.
In they’re mind, they’re already thinking, “Oh no, my boss will think I’m dumb and is going to regret hiring me. Oh no, I just got this job and I’m going to lose it! I can’t afford to lose this job. I need this job!”
To save face, they’ll keep putting it off until they either gather the courage to ask you for clarification or just quit.
Training videos are usually very clear and easy to understand, which makes it easier for your Filipino VA, even new virtual assistants, to ask for help without losing face.
“Sir, I didn’t understand this part of the video because my screen shows something different from what you showed me.” Then your VA proceeds to send you a screenshot.
“Sir, I didn’t understand your explanation about this process because the audio was cut off. Can you send me another video?”
They’ll be more forthcoming because their questions won’t be about how they understood the instructions; their questions will be about the video.
Lastly, another reason why SOP would just introduce delays is that first drafts of SOPs are rarely perfect.
There’s always going to be something wrong. You’ll always want to improve it or update it.
You’re just giving yourself another job that will take up more of your time.
If you created a training video, you’ll only need to revisit it if you made a mistake (such as losing audio or forgetting to record something) or if you need to update it.
Both are easier and faster to do than writing and updating an SOP.
If you want to make it easy to tell your VA what to do, skip the written SOP and just make a training video. If you don’t want to make a training video, you can use the training materials we have at VAsMadeEasy.com.
John