Virtual Assistant and Outsourcing Properly | Michelle Thompson

Today on the show with fascinating guests. Her name is Michelle Thompson. We go into ethically outsourcing virtual assistants in the Philippines, paying ethically but cheaply how to streamline using outsourcing and the tools needed or money.

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Transcript

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and record the cloud. No, I haven't paid for that. So actually, I'm curious before we actually start serious, you said you have become a master in automation. Yeah, automating a lot of business processes that save business owners a lot of time. Like how, like in what aspects? Yeah. So a lot of times, there are tools out there that can do something almost as good as another, another human. And so what we do is we combine like virtual assistants with automation. And by doing that, we're able to basically automate all of the processes for the business owner. So for example, let's say social media, right? That's like a huge time sucker. There are tools out there like buffer and Hootsuite, social B, that you can basically put everything in buckets, and it'll just set it on autopilot and just run. For me personally, I use a company called ontraport. And so it's, it's like Infusionsoft or keep or something like that. But what it does is it integrates very well with Zapier. Are you familiar with Zapier? I've heard the name. I know buffer. It's actually what I recommend a lot of my entrepreneurial friends from martial arts because like, we don't have time for that, and Mike, just write out a message and tell him when to go Can I think? Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so ontraport is kind of next level stuff, right? So you're, you're putting that social media out to probably get them to some type of lead magnet, right. And so then what ontraport does is once they go to that lead magnet, it will set up a follow up email sequence. But the cool part is, that's that's nothing. really all that awesome. It will actually categorize how hot your leads are, based off of what they do inside of that email. So did they click on it? Did they click on an actual link in it? Then there are human triggers. So we don't send the next email until they click on the link. So it's not time based, which is pretty awesome. Yeah, that is actually really awesome. Yeah. So if somebody so like, how many times have you had somebody who like missed an email, and then three days later, they get the next one, and they never open the first one. And then you know, it just looks bad, or what's even better is, somebody didn't show up for a zoom meeting. And then it sends them the Hey, thanks for meeting. Um, and, and so inside of there, it'll automate all that. So if they didn't show up for the zoom meeting, it will send them a real rebooking link, if they did show up and ruminating that it sends the thank you and mine actually goes to a service where it mails them a card automatically. Then from there, it'll actually send them a link to book the appointment to become a client. They'll fill out all the information that they need to onboard, and it gets sent right to my team and actually create a folder for them. So the onboarding process is all automated as well. So I literally have probably automated 80% of my business. So I've also noticed, you had an assistant contact me, so how would you be let's say for me, how would I vet out a good assistant because you could pay someone but are they actually going to do what they're paid to do kind of thing? Yeah. So that's actually what we specialize in. So the automation was just a necessity for me building a lean company. Our company has actually, that's what we do. We've we find hire train virtual assistants for people. And so there are lots of ways that you can do that. So I actually last week, kicking the dog. Last week, I just launched my book that is basically a tizzy on how to find, hire, train, and manage a VA in the Philippines. So how to know you're getting a good one, how are you going to vet them? How are you keeping track of what they're actually doing? Are they doing the work that they're saying they're doing? Yeah, so that's kind of all in there. created a course that goes over that too. And then we have the the easy done for you button where we actually do it for you. First nominal fee. So it depends on what you're looking for. So the book is 1997. The course is 997. And then for us to go find you a VA we charge 575 to go Find and hire them, then the deal is they stay on board for three months while we help with the training and go through the bumps. That is 1354 20 hours a week, month, that's the monthly price, right? Or 2700 for a full time assistant, then after three months, you have the option to buy out their contract, which is basically three months of whatever the fee is. So it ranges from 5000 to 8000. Then, at that point, instead of paying the 1675 an hour that we charge, you would pay their hourly rate, which is typically six to $7 an hour. Wow. That was my next question, what would be the typical rate for one? Because like, for me, I'm not cashflow heavy with this whole thing. So it's like that what was a humanely won't be the lowest price they can pay? So yeah, so humanely? Probably $4 an hour. But if you want somebody who's good quality, who's going to really get your stuff done and be like the expert that you need them to be? You're looking at five to six. That's less than half of what you eat normally make a hearing minimum wage, at least for me in California. Yep. Yep. And that's that's the reason why we go to the Philippines right is because the US dollar to Filipino peso conversion rate is so profitable. So plus, English is their primary language, and they're very immersed in our culture. Yeah, I had a, I had a friend from the Philippines. And that was they were saying like, her mom was worked for the US government who lived in the Philippines, making 20 an hour and she's like, she lives like a king. Or queen. Like she literally owns a ton of land. Yep. Is that she invested in fish farms. And I'm like, yep. Well, you 20 here barely gets you a burger kind of thing. Right? Yeah. So on average, somebody working minimum wage in the Philippines will make $7 a day working full time. Geez, as legitimate the slave labor right there. So that explains to you why she makes so much money in lives like a king and can afford to invest, right? Because when. And it's it's it's just the difference in economics, right? So we pay two to $3,000 a month for rent. They're gonna pay $400 a month for rent. But that 400 is completely different to our 2000. Right. 400 us or 400 that they're paying us? Oh, yeah, US dollars. I thought it was the conversion, you haven't done the pesos yet. Nevermind. But that's still, yeah, like you'd make you $7 a day, you would have to work two jobs just to get a read done. Yeah. And that's why that's why I'm a huge advocate on why we built the company that we built because I won't pay anybody less than $5 an hour plus pay for their health insurance and their retirement. And in the Philippines, you can only get a loan for a house or a car through a specific employer sponsored program. So we pay for that too. We give them paid time off, and we pay the conversion fees, the transfer fees when we transfer the money from US dollars to Filipino pesos, which is completely unheard of. Because most people look at the Philippines as slave labor. I'm trying to do the exact opposite. And I'm trying to wait over pay them so they're, they're making about equivalent to $50 an hour in the United States pay for all their benefits so that they can afford to educate the next generation. So we're breaking the cycle of poverty. That's what we're trying to do. And still not sound like narcissistic, narcissistic or mean. You're paying them what they perceive as a lot but for us still it's like what a true middle and wage with all fees and stuff in the end. Correct. Yeah. That's that's actually impressive. I want to go more into that because I agree to to beat the cycle, you have to do something different. You have to if it's a circle, you have to go straight kind of thing. So just real quick, how does because I know the Philippines in general does not have a good health system in general. How does a orem I might have just heard it from the wrong region. Yeah, it depends on where you're at. Now, typically, so it's kind of the same as here, right? If you go into Manila, which is one of the largest cities in the Philippines, they probably they may potentially have better health care than we have. Oh, wow. Yeah, it's they have very good health care there. But it's also expensive. So but if you go to some of the other smaller towns, yeah, it's gonna be not good health health care. So what they have to do is they have to travel into the city to get good health care. Kind of the same thing as us like, tomorrow for instance, I'm going to Seattle to go see my neurologist, my Seattle or my neurologist lives eight hours away from me, but I'm willing to travel eight hours because he's that good. So you have when you know there's a doctor that good It doesn't matter if you need to go to like, like Germany or Japan like you just do it. Can I think? Yeah. So same thing happens in the Philippines. Interesting. Okay. So we were touched a little earlier on the virtual assistance integration. So you were talking to different prices from what I could gather is about 20,000 for the year to get everything done with you. kind of think of here too, I go on my own rough neck and hope I find a not sleazy v. Virtual Assistant. Right. Yeah. Um, so I had a stroke. So I end up. One of the things I was horrible at math, so give me just a second. Visualize math. It's all good. Give me just a second to add that up. Alright. So let's say we did part time, right? is okay, so it would be okay, so for part time, if we hired somebody, they worked for you for 20 hours a week, for three months with our agency, right? And then you paid the $5,000 to buy out their contract? That's 10,007 75. Right? So then we have three. So that's, so we have we still have nine months out of the year. So if we're paying $5 an hour, times 20 hours a week times four times nine. That is, that seems low. Hold on. Five times. Oh, cuz it's only part time. That's why. Yes, so times 20 3600 plus. So if you went through our agency, then hired them and paid them the $5 an hour, it would be 14,003 75 to have a part time assistant for an entire year. That's okay. I'm sorry. That's like super cheap. Very good. Yep. Wow. So then full time would just be double whatever that was, when you would include a little bit for health benefits and all that. Yeah. So typically, in addition to what I pay them, I give them an additional $80 a month. And that covers their health insurance, their sfss, which is kind of a combination of our 401 K and Social Security. So if you put the two of those together, that's called SS s for them. That helps them put money towards that loan program. So we would do that. And then the last thing is, typically, they're paid in Asia, they're played something called a 13 month bonus. Are you familiar with what that is? You've never heard of it till now. Please explain. Okay, so a 13 month bonus is something in Asia that is, is a bonus at the end of the year. So whatever they would make for one month, that's basically their bonus that they get the beginning of December, and they use that to pay off their debt, buy their Christmas presents, and be able to have their holiday season. And so we call that a 13 month bonus so that if you chose to pay that you don't have to but it's usually a really good idea. It would be$400. So I'm taking it the one very good v virtual assistants, I was gonna say VA the same thing but literally would just cost you out of pocket, what, four 500 a month. So if you wanted somebody full time that's Could it be 800 plus 80? Is 80 a month? times 12? Is 10,560. Plus the 800 for their 13 month bonus app? So your second year, right? Because you because you already have them in as employee, you don't need to pay us our fees anymore, right? It's $11,360 for full time for you 1600113603. I didn't hear the three at all. Wow. And so then actually, I'm not I'm not trying to, like bypass you. But it's like, let's say someone goes to the fiver, and they promise it and that's where I've seen this. And it's get scary seeing how much people willingly just give up their information, is fivers better route or truly is to go to like an expert like you and just pay the nominal fees up front to the good one. Yeah, so what I do is just a skill set, right, it's the same thing as being a good graphic designer, being able to do a logo, my skill set is I'm really good at being able to find a good VA. And so I have a five step process that I put them through when I interview. So they have to pass like six hidden tests that they don't even know they're going through. And then we're going to actually pay them to test them. And so not only so I'm going to I'm going to hire based off of personality type, right? So I take a look at the disc profile, and make sure that you guys are compatible. I take a look at what is their skill set? Can they can they do the job? What do they need trained in? And how what's it going to cost me to train them? And then, you know, how are we going to track and manage them? If you know how to do all those things yourself? You should not hire me? Absolutely. Because it's it's would be much less expensive to go do it yourself. But yeah, I have no idea. That's why you're here explaining this. And probably a good portion of audiences now just sitting there going, what the heck. Yeah, and see, that's the cool part is like everybody kind of has their superpower. Right? And so, you know, the the time that you would spend learning that skill set? How much time could you take that and do what you're really good at and turn that into? More money, right? So for me, I deal with a lot of six and seven figure business owners and for them, it's a no brainer, right? Because, for me charging a $5,000 fee, that's peanuts for them to be able to find a really good VA that's going to plug into their system, they don't have to spend the time to vet them to learn the skill set. And so it's really all about, you know, where, where do you want to spend your time, right? Because you're either gonna spend time or money one of the two. So it's easy to get money. It's not easy to get time. Correct? Yep. So then I'm curious, because this is one thing, just off handily, other guests have mentioned, like you should get an assistant but like, I'm sitting here going, I'm minimum wage turned up for me to pay for right kind of thing? Yeah, am I gonna afford a system but from what you're saying that I'd have to live simpler, but I could actually pull it off. So the integration of your VA to whatever system, let's say you fully vet a good one for whoever? Like, do they have to know MailChimp? Or something like that? Or is it like I asked for this kind of thing within the 5000? Yes, that's the nice part about working with us is I'm going to interview and ask you, what are the pieces of software that you use? Right, then what I'm going to do is I'm going to go out and find a VA who may have experience in that if they don't, then what I'm going to do is I'm going to go to MailChimp. I'm going to find their tutorials and I'm going to put the VA through those tutorials is what's going to happen. But um, a lot of times like for instance I last week, I hired a gentleman for a company who needed somebody to know Salesforce inside and out. And so what I did was I went when I went and hired that was my you know, one of my top qualifications must be an expert in Salesforce. And so what I did was I actually found a guy who had seven years of customer service and four years of Salesforce experience for him. What So literally, mean bliss any anyone else listening could just be like, hey, I need someone good. Like mailinglist not required would it be nicer they know website and could maintenance the website And whatever. And you could you could go that those basic three, like I said, the second one's not required, but it'd be nice kind of thing. Yeah. So how I handle that is because everybody's websites different, right? There's like 1000 plugins that you could use. So what I do is I have you sit down with me and walk me through the process, step by step, how do you do it. And while I'm doing that, I'm actually extracting information from your brain that you don't realize I'm doing. Because as, as entrepreneurs, we make micro decisions instantly, and we don't even realize it. And even though we think we're awesome, we're really bad at communicating usually. Because we're running mock 12, with our hair on fire, and we're trying to get all this stuff done, and we don't slow down enough to take it out step by step. So what I do is when I do my onboarding process, I actually force you to slow down. And when I say, all right, Josh, we're gonna get on a call, and you're gonna show me step by step, how you do each task, then what we do is my team takes those videos, and we actually turn them into standard operating procedures for you. And here's the super cool part. So we're going to go through, and we're going to take that video, we'll post that video at the top of the standard operating procedure, then we're going to go through and have it step by step with pictures point here, click here, do this, so that we could then take that document, hand it to a complete stranger on the street, and they should be able to duplicate the task exactly as you showed us how to do it in the video. And the reason we do that is a couple things. A, it's really good for every business owner to have standard operating procedures. We all know this, but nobody takes the time to do it. Right? Right. So what we do is we just do it for you. So we're creating your business manual as we're going through the process with without it actually being cumbersome for you, right, because it takes a lot of time to put those slps together. And so we actually hand them to you. So we're like, Here you go, Josh, you know, here's the tasks that you gave us. Here's the manual to do it. And here's your VA. So if for some reason, your VA, I don't know doesn't work out something like that goes on maternity leave, you have a document that shows someone else step by step how to do it. And so what I've done is without you even realizing it, I've created a training process, so that you never have to train again for that task. So then actually good point, like you said, someone might have gone out on maternity leave, and you have nothing against it. But still you still need assistance, but I just call you up again and be like, Hey, can you give me a narrow one? Would it be the same 5000 fee? Or was because within a certain timeframe? You're okay. Yeah, so what typically happens is if something like that would happen, we already have the slps, we just plug you into our system rather than finding finding you your own personal VA, right, because if it's maternity leave, they're only gone for 10 weeks, and then they're back, right, so you just need a temporary buffer. So we would just fill you in with our team. And so that would bridge that, that gap. The other thing too is I have some business owners who actually never want to pay the fee, they just want me to, they would just rather mail me a check at the beginning of the month, I'm going to handle all the management of the employees, I'm going to take care of payroll, I'm going to do everything and they don't even want to mess with it for 1675 an hour, it doesn't make sense for them to have to bring it on to their HR deal with all that stuff. So a lot of times people don't even buy out the VA. And so when when they stay with our agency, we train three deep. And so we actually have a project manager who's trained on all the tasks. And then there's another VA who can overlap with the task. So if somebody does go out on maternity leave, we have somebody else who's already trained, who can just pull up that SAP for you and do that task. This is just absolutely fascinating and stuff I just would never have thought about could actually be achieved. So actually, I want to pivot a little to tie into why you're such an expert. You were I was actually watching your matchmaker FM video. I've so can you go into more about the show and what happened? Yeah, sure. So I'll preface this by saying I used to be the world's worst delegator. Okay, because nobody could do it as good as I could. And they weren't going to do it right. And so, if I did hand something off, I ended up redoing it myself. And so I didn't believe in delegation. I was like, whatever. This is just a waste of time. And then and then I had a stroke. And when I had that stroke, I literally went from an MBA and finance to a second grade education overnight. It was like somebody had just taken an eraser and just erased what was in my brain. It was gone. And when that happened, at that point, I didn't have I was working a full time job and had like a little side how So going, and I realized I was gonna lose my side hustle if I didn't figure out how to delegate. And but in addition to that, I had to figure out how to delegate every single part of my life because I don't I live in a super controlled environment. Now. I don't remember in the morning to brush my teeth. I don't remember to feed the dog, I don't remember. So I actually have systems set up in my house, that will tell me Hey, Michelle, it's time to take your medicine. Hey, Michelle, it's time to drink eight ounces of water. Hey, Michelle, it's time to let the dog out. And so what happened was, it took actually three years to get better. And during those three years, what they taught me in occupational therapy and physical therapy was, how to systematize my life, and how to rely on either other people or other pieces of software to be able to help me to do that. And so what happened was when we had outsourced my life, like my personal life, we realized, well, heck, why can't we do this for business? And, and that's how the vendor? Yeah. And that's how the business actually got was built, it was completely on accident, right? Because my friends saw me have a stroke, and get 80 hours worth of work done in a week. And I hadn't done any of it. And they're like, Michelle, how the heck are you doing this? And I said, Well, I'm not doing anything. What do you mean, you're not doing anything? Well, I outsourced it all. Well, what do you mean, you outsource it all? Can you teach me how to do that? Sure, why not? And it just kind of took off from there. So interesting. What did you for your 80 hours a week? What did you outsource? Like, was it writing social media, etc? Yeah, so my little side hustle was actually a blog. And so what I was doing was I was before the stroke, I was writing blog articles with affiliate links in there. And when I had the stroke, I'm, I'm not able to write anymore, which is an interesting story, I'll tell you how the book got published. Because I didn't write it. I did, but I didn't. So. So I actually hired a full time writer. And then I hired two part timers, one to do graphic design, and one to build a website. And so what had happened was I had somebody doing blogs full time, then I had somebody doing the graphics, not only for social media, but also for the blog posts. And then I had a web designer, who would take the blog posts, and then upload them on onto the website and do the keyword research and all the SEO stuff that that needs to be done. Right. And so what had happened was by doing that, I was able to put out roughly four to four to five super high quality blog posts a week with the social media posting, and again, I use social base. So what they did was my team was trained that once they made the graphic to upload it into social B, so that it pushed out to all the channels. So it went to LinkedIn, it went to Instagram, it went to Facebook, right. And so what happened was, we were just generating free organic traffic. And, and it just slowly started to grow. You know, it started out as you know, 10 or$20, in commission, a month turned into a couple 100 turned into, you know what it is today. So, that was kind of where I started was with with the writing. And then I realized the writer can't do the graphics, or if they can do the graphics, it's going to be real minimal, right. And I wanted something that was was good. And then what ended up happening was once the website was built, actually taught my writer how to do the keyword research and how to upload everything. And so what happened was, it started out as three positions. And as we got good at each one, I taught my writer how to do the other two, I taught him how to do the graphic design. And I taught him how to upload it to the website and how to do the SEO and the keyword research and stuff. And so I was actually able to turn that, that whole thing into one job. And so it slowed us down a little bit. Right now we only get like three blog posts a week, but they're super high quality and he knows how to do it start to finish. And it also means you can indirectly pay him more because he's doing the work of two other people. Oh, absolutely. Do Yeah, he's the second highest paid guy on my team. Wow. I'm assuming you're the first. Oh, yeah. Okay, third, third highest. say wow that he must have been with you since like day. That's that's the Yeah. Okay, that's another topic for another day. Okay. But I'm curious No Actually this one thing I've always funny. In general I can write and is fine, but like sentence structures grammar, not my thing. So I've thought about doing a ghost writer, but of like going to different sites and like, Oh, this is like 50,000. Or it's gonna cost you 30 cents per word. And I'm like, but how do I know you're actually going to do something and not plagiarize a book? And I think so how did you go about it? Yeah, so I used software. Um, so I used Grammarly premium, to help my VA with sentence structure, commas, things like that, then I'm trying to think of, there was a plugin that I put on my website that I paid for. And what it does is it goes through every single blog post, and it checks it to make sure that there's nothing else like that on the internet. So they couldn't have used an article spinner, they couldn't have used, they couldn't have plagiarize, it catches all of that. And so I knew when he uploaded it, it would send me an email and say, Hey, this is 98% original content. But in addition to that, I had also the, the thing that I hire for his personality team and ethics. And so when I interviewed Nouriel, I had basically put him through the grill, how are you going to find information? How am I going to make sure that, you know, it isn't plagiarized? What? And he had actually been a writer for five years for a newspaper before I found him. And so for him, like it was kind of a no brainer, like, Oh, yeah, that's really good way to go to jail. And so, but I not only not only was it a culture fit, but I also use the pieces of software to keep him honest. So I'm curious, because you mentioned earlier the disc, personality, why then we went over my rubrics? Well, honestly, price. So for disc, there's a lot of it, it doesn't cost very much to have somebody take a disc profile, whereas Myers Briggs, I believe it's like 60 to $100 per test. So it's just a financial thing. Myers Briggs is actually a better test than disc, I would guess. Because it well, it's it's more in depth. I don't want to say it's better. It's more experimental. I just from what I've noticed, is like I took disc one of my, the reason I asked for that one of my martial arts training buddies, he's in assurance and how we vet people is the disc. And he just hasn't go on whatever free website and he's like, do it. Be honest, send me an email of it. And we'll continue from there. Yeah. And so I took it real quick front of him. And I said, Oh, I'm the DC. He's like, Oh, you like observing? and monitoring? And I'm like, Yes, that's so weird. How do you know that? He's like this, because the combination from see you like being in the trenches kind of thing? Yeah. So interestingly enough, the majority of entrepreneurs are usually, if they're visionaries, they're usually di, right? And then if they're observers that they're usually DC. And so what I have to do is I usually have to hire somebody who is s c. Because they're the person that is okay, with finding the needle in the haystack, making sure tracking everything, making sure that it gets done, making sure that it gets done, right. they're okay with tedious detail and consistent repetition. They don't like change. They want things to be exactly the same all the time. That's impressive. I've never thought of it that way. You're right. I think of things in a general picture where you tell me what the tree looks like. And I don't know it's a blur over there. kind of thing. Yeah. See, I'm the same way like if I have to, if I'm balancing the books, and it's a penny off, I would rather give you a penny then go find that penny. So what I need to do is I need to hire somebody who they think it's fun to go find that Penny Yes. Um so that's what I do is that the so when I'm pairing people together, what I do is I take I find out what your strength is strengths are and then also what your weaknesses are and so I go hire a strength where your weaknesses that okay, just just from that whole story from earlier and now company When you if you do have the $5,000 to send around completely worth it to give it to you. Plus what in our 2000 for the training period? Yep. So worth it. Yeah, this is something I would probably never figure out in my lifetime. Or by the time it's too late, then it's like, oh shit, well, could have just saved me a headache, or two, we should just call it What up? Yeah. Yeah, it's the funny part is outsourcing really isn't difficult. It's just a time consuming skill set, and most people don't have the time to learn it. And so that's where we come in. We help you save that time. Interesting. Okay. So I'm assuming you specialize in specifically VA. When I say I came in and said I want to hire to but I want specifically VA, truly just do a Student Assistance, work, the details and all that. But I also want a full time writer in the Philippines kind of thing. Could you can you do that? Or you just prefer this assistance? Yeah. So I can hire a writer. Things that I'm not good at hiring and I'm happy to tell everybody this is if you need a coder. If you need somebody who is I tried once to hire an illustrator for a gentleman, and he wanted like a book Illustrator. And that is just not my superpower. Right? Because I could care less that the line is like, not exactly parallel to, right. I'm like, it's good enough. Right. So um, so I wasn't I was not, that was not a good thing for me to hire for. So virtual assistants, writers. basic web designers. Yes. Anything more technical than that? Not your girl. Yeah, no, I agree. Like coding. That's just you got to know someone's in the group and just understand you're paying a premium because they've spent pretty much their whole life learning this so cough up, but you're gonna get the best kind of thing? Yeah, yeah. pythons, not my thing. No, I tried learning that during the lockdowns. And now it's just, if you put one period in the wrong place, the whole code breaks itself. And you're like, what did I do wrong, though? Yeah. Yeah, not. Yeah, that that is a special skill set of people who can do that. And it's not me. those are those are truly the attention to detail. They like staring at the Abyss and watching the stars move and be like, I got you now. Yeah. So other than that. So you were saying earlier, you said you had a finance degree, a master's in finance. So what were you doing for work before you started this business? If your degree, I was a project controls engineer for a large construction company. So it was my job to make sure that the crews that were working were on time and under budget. So kind of what you're already doing now, but not as stressful? I would say what I do now is less stressful. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. I was free bad freezing. Oh, seeing what you did before was more stressful. What you're doing now is less? Yeah, much the same thing? Yeah. Cuz where I worked. We usually spent through a million dollars before 10am. So if you so it was pretty stressful. Oh, my God. 10 or 110? In the morning? Yeah. So we would start at six and four hours into it. We already had a million dollars in costs, typically per day. So if we if we close down for like a snow day, it typically cost us about$4 million. That's one thing people don't realize about construction. It's millions are just that's casual. That's like chump change now, right thing. As I said, I listened to podcasters who do hedge fund work. And they just casually throw 100 million on Mike. The fact that you don't flinch when you see $100 million just disappear. Right? You have way too much money to play with. Right? Yeah. Yeah. So. So that's, it was actually a great job. I loved my job. It just was one I was supposed to do. So was that one were you were predominantly in the office calling people would be like, hey, why the hell is like the crew over by so many hours? Were you actually in the trenches going like, stop? Like, we need you all to clean up your act because we're over budget kind of thing. Yeah, I was actually in the in the trenches. So I was on site every day. And so a lot of it was reporting, right. So we were at the computer, taking a look at the report and then we would have to figure out okay, these numbers aren't right. Something's off here. You guys build for you know, 10,000 linear feet of pipe, but there is no way that you did that in eight hours. So we'd have to go out and take a look at the pipe and and figure out, you know, Okay, wait, all right. You're funded, you're fudging your numbers. Like, what really happened? Kind of a deal? So? Yeah, no. And that's, that is good, especially because you were using copper pipes, right? Oh, it didn't? Do we were building a nuclear power plant. So we use all kinds of white matter. Okay, should we build a nuclear power plant? Okay, yeah, that would make more sense to save for a home like a construction for a home is usually copper. Oh, yeah, no, no, this is trillion dollar. That explains the the four to 10 million a day just nothing? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Much, much larger project. That's the deep money that will never in normal lifetime see. So then, actually, I want to tie into something. This is sorry, my brain makes the weirdest connections. So with all this streamlining, because ultimately, you've learned to vet people to trust them, let's say someone with trust issues, because they've hired before, but they didn't know your knowledge for approaching this? How would you call them down? In a sense that like you just like, if you pay me the money, I will make sure your virtual assistant or writer is honorable kind of thing? Yeah, so that's an interesting question. And usually it's the opposite. Usually, I have to work with the owner, and and deal with their trust issues, versus finding somebody who isn't a scammer in the Philippines, for instance. And a lot of times, the reason it didn't work the first time is, because without even realizing it, they set their VA up to fail VA up to fail, because they didn't take the time to slow down and explain. And they expected their VA to be a mind reader. And when they didn't do things exactly the way that they thought they should have. Rather than explain and try to help them, they just got frustrated and did it themselves. And so my job is to actually pin down the entrepreneur, and painfully walk them through the steps so that they can become a good, a good communicator. And by doing that, what happens is, it's almost like the blinders fall off, and they realize, Oh, that's why it didn't work the first time. And, and so it's not necessarily, I need to find the good VA, it's, I need to retrain the entrepreneur to think differently. Interesting. Now you have most of the guys in my studio, they're, they're all in their head, you tried it, you could literally give them the meaning of life. And there used to be like, that doesn't make sense. I'm gonna keep going. So it would, they said, they're so stuck in their head, like, you could give them the definition, the meaning of life. And they'll look at you and be like, that doesn't make sense and just keeps going. Yeah. And that's, that's where my job comes in, right? Because I have to sit down and I have to play devil's advocate with them and say, you know, okay, you told me this. So if I go do this, that's okay. And they're like, Well, no, that's not what I meant. But that's what you said, You know, I can infer that you actually mean, go post this on social media. But that's not what you said. And so I have to actually get them to slow down and break it down. And because what's happening is because I'm an entrepreneur, I think like they do. Right, right. And so they're skipping three steps. And so they're saying, here's the graphic, okay, I need them to people to click on this link to go to this web page for the traffic, right? Well, you skipped about seven steps in there. And so and what happens is, when we hire a VA, who is an S, see, they like detail, they want to know exactly what to do, and they want to they that's exactly what they're going to do. So if you tell them, I want you to take this graphic, give it to people to click the link. They're going to email it to somebody. Right? They don't you know, it's, and that's probably a bad example. But no, I get what you're going for, though, more often than then you would think because we skip steps. And so that's where I kind of have to stick my thumb on you and say, okay, slow down. This is what we do. And so then I can translate. That's the reason for the three months of bringing the VA on, because I can translate what what the entrepreneur is saying to the VA. Okay, he actually means this and then you go back and I'm like, okay, Josh, you skipped these three steps. And so and so what happens is, the three months is not even so much training the VA, but it's also training you. So, right. So then I'm just curious, is it kind of like one big zoom call like this? Where you just that we have had, essentially, let's see whoever they get on Enter talking to you. They just spill their guts or is it through a series of months and calls and being like, hey, so thank you for saying this. But actually, you you needed to explain one, two, then you skipped four went back to three kind of thing? Yeah. So typically, what happens is, we have a couple onboarding calls in the beginning, and they're usually about an hour apiece. And then after that, what happens is, as they give us more tasks, then we're going to go through them, and I'm going to send back that an email and say, okay, Josh, this is what you said. Did you mean this? And if you meant this, these are the steps that are missing? Is this what you want us to do? Please confirm. So it's usually a call or an email for those labels, social and email, okay, at that point, because at that point, you've got the idea of what I'm trying to do. And so we can send, and usually I'm not sending that email, usually our project manager is, and so tonight is gonna send you an email, and she's gonna say, hey, Josh, I just need you to confirm, this is what you want us to do. Is this correct? And then you'll take a look at it, you'd be like, Well, no, that's not what I meant. Okay, I meant this, then we go make the adjustment. It has you okay. I'm just curious. Now, on a story principle, have you ever had like a version where you just keep saying, No, I met this and then you've adjusted now like, no, I met this, then you just kind of thing. And it just keeps going, ah, usually I will do that a couple of times. And then I fire the client. Or you fire a client, very easily. This is not a good fit. I'm sorry. But I need to teach you you're not being trainable. And so if you really wanted to learn this skill set, we could do this. But I don't think this is necessarily a fit, you're looking for the exact identical copy of you. That's never going to happen. And so this probably isn't gonna work out. So good. I'm just curious. Now I'd like refunds to do to get a refund or is it because your all your time and effort and paying the person they don't get the money back? So any hours that we've put in, they don't get a refund for that? Anything that's extra that they may have paid ahead of time I issue a refund for that? That's extremely fair. Yeah, I was gonna say you, you're taking what, like three months pre paid. And let's see the only use like a month. So it's like, but then you got to take your fee. So maybe you only get 1000 back from the 5000 kind of thing. Yep, yeah. So we don't even I don't take the three months up front. We build monthly. So interesting. Let's say it's two weeks in and I'm like, hey, Josh, you know, this isn't gonna work out. I'll just give you the two weeks back. That we didn't use. It's extremely fair. I'm assuming your assistant does a billing for you. I have a person who does the billing full time. Yeah, that's her job. I'm gonna see at this point, it sounds like we just all the entrepreneurs listening just gotta call you like, Okay, I got these, like, these free people. How much is going to be a month for us kind of thing? Yeah. You'd be amazed how many people actually do that. They'll start with one and they'll be like, okay, now I need somebody to do bookkeeping. Okay, now I need somebody to do this do lead lead generation is another big one that we get. I need I need somebody full time to do LinkedIn lead generation for us. Okay, no problem, you know. So then same process, like the monthly or if, let's say, for some reason, the entrepreneur, like you said, the big wigs, the six figures a year, they just say, Hey, can I just pay you annually? And didn't they we get a small discount kind of thing? Or is that just the pay annually? They don't think about the rest of the year? No, we just, we we like to make things nice and simple. So we just put them on auto bill. And the bill just goes out monthly. And typically they have their credit card on file. So it's not like they have to even think about it. It just auto bills. They just pay whatever the bill is at the end of the month for the credit card. That's some genius. Yep. This has been brilliant. I'm definitely gonna have to get you on in the future. Just to go into more details and trends and future. Anything you want to plug your talk about in the layout? Well, I'm just maybe a tool to help you guys. Right? Because a lot of times the question I get all the time is, you know, that's great. Michelle, you told me I should delegate but I don't know what to handoff first. And so what I did was I went through and I created a very simple way to do that. It's just an Excel spreadsheet. That takes inventory of everything that you do for a week. And then we figure out okay, is this something I can delete? Is this something I can delegate? Or is this something that I absolutely have to do myself. And so what I do is I actually have three videos that walk you through the whole spreadsheet, and they're they're short, they're five minutes apiece. And so by the end of that week, you'll know exactly how many hours you can get back and you'll know exactly what tasks to get off of your plate. So that you can then take that time and move it into where you're actually making money. So if you go to awesome outsourcing comm slash task, hyphen discovery, that will give you that Excel spreadsheet and those three videos for free, there's no cost. I will definitely have to follow up with your assistant for all the social media and all that to get absolutely no problem tonight, it'll hook you up. Well, thank you again. And like I said, we're definitely getting you on the future. This is a this is a very powerful topic that many entrepreneurs and just people in general should know about. Awesome. Hey, thank you so much for the time I really appreciate it. I appreciate it to stay safe and stay well. Take care Bye