How To Onboard your Virtual Legal Assistant

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Whenever you add new personnel into your team, you want them to be up-to-speed as soon as possible. Thus, your onboarding process plays an important role in ensuring that everything runs smoothly with the addition of the virtual assistant.

In the past, I have used several contract, part-time virtual assistants in my practice, but recently I brought someone on full time and it has definitely taught me to tighten up my onboarding process.

Here are 5 tips that will help you onboard your virtual legal assistant:

1.     Introduce the new virtual assistant to your team

A lack of onboarding can feel like a lack of care within the team or as if the new employee is set up to fail. Even if your team is based virtually due to the current circumstances, it is still important to introduce the new team member promptly. Wouldn’t it be awkward having to work with someone whom you don’t even know the name of? 

Apart from the warm welcome, it helps to break down the awkward barriers. A virtual office tour can also be arranged with each employee introducing a little about themselves and what they do within the company. It helps to form more personal connections, allowing remote employees to be more engaged and invested within the business.

If you are a solo or work with contractors, it can also be helpful to introduce your virtual assistant to anyone else they may be in contact with. For example, if you have a paralegal or a contract attorney you work with regularly.

2.     Give your virtual assistant access to all your programs and systems they will use to complete their work.

This includes access to the shared drives, email, management software, and permission to enter other relevant programs or software they might need. Your assistant needs to know the projects that are currently ongoing and allowing them access to the project or client management systems as well as your inbox helps in facilitating efficiency. Your assistant might not be the one replying to customer inquiries on your behalf, but with them being able to see what goes on behind the scenes in your business will help them to learn more about the trade to help you better.

I added my assistant to my case management system (MyCase) and gave him access to other tools used regularly to run my practice such as Dropbox and Acuity. A great way to do this is to LastPass. It’s a free and easy way to share passwords without really giving out your password. I love it because you can simply revoke access instead of changing the password on everything.

I also found it helpful to send him links to tutorials for using the software to review during his first week. Or better yet, use Loom to record yourself using the software to show them exactly how you want things done.

3.     Creating a task list and following up with your virtual assistant.

You want to make sure you have an easy way to delegate tasks. Do you want to send emails? Use Slack or Asana? For contractors, I use Trello or email, but for my full-time assistant, I use MyCase. I prefer this because he can add questions/comments/notes to the task and I can see at a glance what has been done and what is outstanding.

I’ve found it easiest to show him what I want by recording a short video on Loom that he can refer back to again and again if he forgets or does not understand. It takes a few minutes to do but saves me time, in the long run, to just point him to a video or to record a quick video to answer a complicated question.

One of my most useful tools is the End of Day Report. At the end of the day my assistant sends an email telling me 1) What they accomplished that day 2) What they struggled with 3) What I can help them with. This gives me an overview of what they did all day and gives me insight on where they need support.

4.     Prioritize time for a weekly meeting.

This weekly meeting includes the whole team and the virtual assistant to put everyone on the same page. It is also a good time to bounce ideas around and brainstorm for any solutions to problems discovered or solutions for your client’s needs. Use this time to also:

·       Follow up on the progress of any concurrent projects.

·       Update the team on completed work.

·       Raise any concerns from the previous week.

·       Report on the progress of unfinished work/projects.

·       Share what’s your workload like for the upcoming week.

·       Reassign tasks for the week.

Weekly meetings are more productive and efficient compared to daily meetings as a strategically planned meeting eats away lesser time and gives your assistant more time to learn and work without you micromanaging them.

5.     Setting clear expectations

This is very important starting from the beginning of your relationship with the assistant. You want to start on the right footing so let your assistant know what to expect from you as the boss and what you expect for them to deliver as an employee.

This can include expectations on the standard operating procedures of your company, and other matters such as:

·       How should feedback be communicated

·       How deadlines are set

·       What happens if you miss a deadline? What should you do?

·       If they need time off, how should this be communicated?

·       How progress is tracked.

·       Key responsibilities of the assistant

·       Payment systems and measures

·       Expectations on the quality of work provided, etc.

Each business has a unique way of operating, so don’t expect your assistant to know how you would like things done. It would be a great practice to take some time in your first meeting with the assistant to share other details such as your brand guide, the vision of our business, etc. This helps the assistant to get a clearer idea of the concept of your business.

You might also want to record the training video call of the onboarding with your virtual assistant for future reference. This saves you time when onboarding future virtual assistants and could also help in answering any questions your assistants may have in the future.

The onboarding process is crucial in helping your assistants get started with your business while feeling valued and welcome. Keep an onboarding checklist with these 5 items for your employees to start off on the right foot.