The Pros and Cons of taking on a Virtual Assistant (VA) vs. Employing Staff

When your business begins to grow, you might need more help to manage it. You have two options: either hire a virtual assistant (VA) or take on a full-time employee. But how do you decide between the two, it’s not always an easy decision. Making the wrong decision could cost you a lot of time, money, and energy you probably don’t have.

Both can carry out many of the same duties, such as basic administrative tasks, office management, personal assistant duties, and social media management. But how do you determine which is the best option for you?

In this blog I discuss the pros and cons of hiring either a VA or a full-time employee and help you compare the options. We’ll explore their advantages and disadvantages and help you find the best option for you and your business.

Virtual assistant vs employee

A virtual assistant (VA) is an independent contractor who typically works from a home office to provide virtual assistance and services.

Virtual assistants are a flexible workforce available on a more “as needed” basis. They can work either part-time or full-time, depending on the job requirements. Some VA’s offer their services at a weekly or monthly rate while others are happy to work on an hourly basis.

They have access to all necessary planning documents (such as shared calendars), essential hardware (laptop and mobile), and software tools. You can contact them to undertake specific tasks for you from a remote location (home or virtual office).

Tasks can include:

• Administrative work
• Personal assistant tasks
• Content creation
• Customer service
• Social media management

And more.

Payment may be an hourly rate or fixed monthly rate (depends) and is based on work/task completion or performance.

An employee is an individual who works full-time or part-time under a contract of employment (oral or written). They have specified rights and duties.

This individual (traditional employee) is a permanent team member of staff and has a specific duty to perform. Typically they work with you while they’re physically present on office premises. However, they can work remotely (from home) as well.

As a business owner or employer, you have to pay permanent employees a salary (with a fixed monthly or hourly rate) and offer a range of employee benefits.

Virtual Assistant (VA): Pros and Cons

The Pros

• Most virtual assistants have a diverse skills set. In addition to carrying out administrative duties (scheduling appointments, data entry, scheduling meetings with clients, bookkeeping, etc.) they often have a wide variety of skills. Some are experts in SEO, copywriting, digital marketing, logistical planning, social media marketing, photo and video editing and even technical support. So you can easily find one to fit your specific needs.
• Depending on your needs, you can hire a VA on a flexible work schedule. This means you only pay for only the hours they work or tasks they complete.
• For project-based, part-time, and short-term contracts, a freelance virtual assistant is ideal because you wouldn’t need to make investments in overhead. So help you remain within budget.
• You can contact them depending on your need, such as during peak season, a weekend, at night, or during a holiday.
• Virtual assistants increase their knowledge and skills to be more competitive. This means that as a business owner you don’t have to pay for any training unless you wish to do so, perhaps for a specific piece of software you use.
• An employer can hire a virtual assistant from anywhere in the world. So there is a big talent pool which increases your chances of finding one to best fit your needs. Although do bear in mind time differences and language barriers.
• If you need to find a new VA, financial losses are limited to lost productivity during the transition period.
• Virtual assistants are quite affordable, and sometimes even cheap.

However, virtual assistants are not entirely the perfect option. Before you find a quality virtual assistant let’s look at the cons of a virtual assistant.

The Cons

• It can sometimes be unreliable to track the working hours, mainly if the VA is on an hourly schedule. This is the same issue you will have with anyone who is working remotely. There are varying time recording packages available that you can ask a VA to use, and you can ask them to submit timesheets in support of invoices if paying hourly.
• It can be challenging to maintain constant communication with virtual assistants because they work mostly from home. If a project is available that requires urgent attention, the VA may not be available to attend to it as quickly as you need.
• The technical difficulties e.g. hardware issues, loss of internet connection, etc. on the VA side are outside of your control, which can impact productivity.
• If your virtual assistant belongs to a different time zone, you may have to wait for them to log in to work.
• If you hire a virtual assistant who’s a freelancer or part-time employee, they may have more than one client or job, so their focus may be split.

Even though the advantages of a virtual assistant are many, some business owners would rather hire a traditional employee instead. Let’s look at why.

Employee: Pros and Cons

The Pros:

An employee is an individual an employer hires to do a particular task. The employer hires an employee after he or she goes through an interview process. The employee must be the best qualified amongst other applicants to do the job. Below are the pros and cons of hiring a full-time employee for your business:

• Employers can evaluate prospective employees’ character, capabilities, and work ethic because they meet them individually in person.
• Personal interaction with a full-time or even part-time employee is ideal for building a mutually beneficial relationship between the employer and the employee. This is invaluable for improving productivity, business growth, and smooth workflow.
• When staff are physically present (although many employees work at home / remotely these days too), an employer can better keep track of daily, weekly, and monthly productivity and find out if there’s a need for improvement and, if so, in what area. The employer can easily monitor their team’s performance because their employees are physically at work.
• Hiring a full-time employee facilitates effective communication. Therefore it’s easy to address any misunderstandings, mistakes, issues and errors more adequately and quickly.
• It’s easier to effectively fix technical or customer-related issues so that there is little or no productivity loss.
• Employees are likely to feel committed and loyal to you as an employer and strive to give their best at work, in return for job security.

However, hiring a permanent part time or full time employees isn’t entirely perfect either.

The Cons

• It’s an expensive investment to hire a full-time employee. It’s notable to mention hiring comes with the additional overhead costs including maintaining an office space and providing employee benefits and compensation such as sick leave, holiday pay, performance bonus, healthcare, life insurance, wellness programs etc.
• Employers usually handle the financial responsibility of any training their employees undergo to improve their skills and knowledge. Moreover, it doesn’t help when the training takes time away from work hours.
• A full-time employee may not be flexible enough to adapt to last-minute changes. Since most daily business operations rely on an established routine, it may lead to poor work quality.
• You’ll need to pay the employee a regular salary, regardless of workload. This may be a disadvantage if you have long periods during which there is little for the employee to do. In addition, you’ll need to pay the employee overtime if you need work completed outside of regular working hours.
• If you want to replace your full time employee, you will suffer some financial losses from lost productivity during the turnover period and even from advertising or recruiter expenses.

Virtual assistant vs full-time employee: the main differences

There are some significant differences between a virtual assistant and a full-time employee. Here are the main ones:

• Working Hours
• Location
• Overhead Expenses
• Cost

Cost is one of the most significant distinctions when hiring a full-time employee or a virtual assistant. And price plays a significant role for many business owners, mainly if the budget is limited. Generally speaking, it costs less to hire a VA than to secure a full-time employee’s services.

Virtual Assistant vs. Employee: Which option is Best for You?

How do you decide which is the better option for you? As a business owner, you need to carefully weigh up the pros and cons of hiring a virtual assistant vs hiring an employee, by considering your short- and long-term goals.

The best way to choose between a virtual assistant and an employee is to decide exactly what services you require. Then take the above pros and cons into account, consider your budget, goals, and whether you need someone to be in the office with you.

Virtual assistants and full-time employees are like apples and pears. There are risks and benefits to both.

Finding the right person for your business is daunting. In-person assistants are hard to find, and thousands of vendors make choosing a virtual assistant a challenge.

The simplest way to find the right fit and decide between a virtual assistant and an employee is to ask yourself a few questions:

1. Do you need an assistant on a long-term or short-term basis?

You can rely on an employee for dedicated assistance (long-term support), while a virtual assistant is great for short-term projects.

2. What is your budget?

If you’re a small business owner with a small budget, maybe hiring a virtual assistant is more cost-effective. But if you have the budget to hire an in-house assistant and pay for overhead expenses, then an employee is the right answer for you.

3. What is the complexity of your daily tasks?

If your daily tasks are simple but repetitive, a virtual assistant is a good option for you. However, if your tasks need them to work with other team members or needs on-the-job training often, an employee is a better choice, especially if your projects are ever-evolving.

Answering these questions should help you understand your requirements and whether to hire a virtual assistant or an employee.

Conclusion

So a virtual assistant (VA) can perform many tasks and give businesses extra value, all while saving you a great deal of money. But a full-time employee is easier to keep track of, thereby improving overall productivity.

To make a decision you should assess both options. Weighing up both the advantages and disadvantages of both will help you to determine what would work best for you.

If the right solution is going to be a virtual assistant. Why not arrange a call with me to discuss your requirements.