What Are the Top Tools For Managing Virtual Assistants?

Introduction

Once you realize you need help with your daily tasks, you need to determine whom to hire, and, something some people overlook is having the top tools for managing virtual assistants. The idea of working with a virtual assistant or a team of virtual assistants (VAs) is to make your life easier while making your business or professional practice grow. And it works! However,  without the right tools for managing virtual assistants, you won’t get the most of this collaboration. 

You hire a virtual assistant because your secondary tasks were demanding too much time and you need to focus on your money-making activities. So now you start the working day with a  to-do list that your VA will take care of. Yet, soon you’re asking: “Did you send the bill?” “Have we finished the draft?” “Did we schedule the meeting with the client?”. When work day is over, everything has been done, but you still haven’t worked on your priorities as you intended. 

This doesn’t mean your assistant didn’t do their job. It means you need to optimize the workflow. You need to have clear guidelines and processes and avoid communication issues. The solution is proper management. And for that, there are helpful tools for managing your virtual assistants that will make a big difference. The right tools help you manage your VA effortlessly and help your business work smoothly.

These management tools include time-trackers, project management platforms, communication tools, and many others that will optimize your assistants’ work, and let you manage them without spending needles time or falling into micromanagement. 

Let’s use an example to illustrate the importance of the tools for managing your VAs. Imagine Sarah, a marketing lead that hired a virtual assistant to work content strategy, content scheduling, and client outreach. During their first month of collaboration, Sarah finds herself submerged in countless back-and-forth messages to confirm the work done, on progress, or yet to be done. Then Sarah introduces a project board on Trello, with a shared calendar and a password manager. Suddenly, they are both on the same page, each of them focusing on their tasks. They are advancing in their duties and are updated in real time on the project’s progress, although they live in different time zones.

At Virtudesk, we’ve seen that happen many times. That’s why we adopt the top tools for managing your virtual assistant and train all our VAs , at our academy, on how to use them proficiently. If our clients are not using them yet, we help them select the right ones for them. 

Some businesses or professionals prefer to hire our management services to manage their virtual staff, while others choose to do it themselves. And with the proper management tools, they successfully achieve it. 

Today, we’ll overview some of the top tools for managing your virtual assistant.  These tools are designed to help you solve specific problems or tasks. This time we’ll review these tools by categories, we’ll see the most-used categories of management tools, based on their functions. Please, note that there are other categories, and sometimes some of their features may overlap or a tool can fall into several categories.   

Disclaimer: Unless otherwise indicated, we have no association or receive any benefits from the platforms or apps we mention. We only provide examples for illustrative purposes.  

1. Time-Tracking Tools

Every business person or manager recurrently wonders, “Are my employees spending their time wisely?”. That question is more frequent when their staff is working remotely. 

Unlike what many may think, using time-trackers it’s not about micromanaging, it’s about working with effectiveness and transparency, and finding gaps for improvement. You want employees with good time-management skills because this helps them grow professionally, lets the team collaborate coordinately, and helps you accomplish your business goals. 

Time-tracking tools are one of the top tools for managing your virtual assistant because they show how time is spent. 

Time trackers let you see how your virtual assistants distribute their time across their different duties, find out where delays happen, and based on the info obtain, define priorities. And, when paying by the hour, a time tracker is an unrivalled tool for managing your virtual assistant. After all, you want value in return for the money you pay. 

At Virtudesk, our assistants know how to use these tools. They can even help clients configure them to get optimized reports and identify the weaknesses and strengths of each team member and of the entire team as a whole. 

Some examples of time tracking software include:

• Clockify: A free time tracker and timesheet that allows unlimited users. 
• Time Doctor: It tracks time, gives you insights on your workers' productivity. For instance, it spots unusual work behaviors, sends inactivity alerts, and performance scores. It’s free to try. 
• Hubstuff: This time tracker is actually a workforce management tool with built-in payroll management features. 
• Timedly: It’s Virtudesk’s exclusive tool for managing virtual assistants, and overall remote workers, in-office employees, and hybrid workers. It provides screenshot monitoring, attendance tracking, timesheet approval, and task and project management features, among others. Explore its unrivalled features following this link.

2. Project Management Tools

Once you delegate more tasks to your virtual assistant or your team grows, you’ll need a project management tool. Delegating smartly goes far beyond just assigning work to virtual assistants or other remote or in-site staff. You need to keep everything organized, clear, and progressing flawlessly and coherently. 

For example, to launch a new product, you’ll need at least:

• text content
• graphics to be created and approved
• send and respond emails
• schedule meetings

So, a myriad of tasks and files start to accumulate. Unless you have an organized structure, tasks get missed, files get lost, deadlines might not be met, and updates or urgent messages vanish. A project management tool transforms that chaos into an organized workspace where any team member can easily find anything. It’s a space where you, your VAs, or any other stakeholder can work in one place. And if you only work with a single virtual assistant, simply check in at the tool for managing your virtual assistant, and you’ll have an instant view of their work.

Some examples of project management and virtual assistants managing tools include: 

• Asana: Lets you create and assign tasks, set deadlines, and organize activities or projects by priority. It offers a basic free plan for small teams and premium options., increasing their price depending on the number of users. 
• Trello: Its intuitive interface offers a visual and user-friendly card-and-board system. It’s great to map out workflows and monitor progress. You can add attachments, checklists, and due dates to each card. 
• ClickUp: For a highly customizable tool, ClickUp is a great choice. You can manage tasks, goals, documents, and track time. It’s a good option for teams with numerous projects and departments. Consider it if you need a tool for managing several virtual assistants simultaneously. 

3. Communication Tools

Another of the main categories of tools for managing your virtual assistant, especially if you have personel located in different regions, are the communication tools. When managing a VA, you can’t risk relying on messaging tools that are usually used with family, friends, groups of interests, or school parents’ groups. Your assistant could easily skip your messages among an invasion of notifications. You need to stay connected in real time without generating an overwhelming torrent of messages and without sinking among them. 

Dedicated communication tools facilitate having daily real-time talks and ensure your text messages don’t get lost. Although email is still being broadly used, these specific and broad communication tools will prevent you from getting involved in the well-known email ping-pongs, where you also risk an unwanted deletion. 

Furthermore, specific communication tools facilitate team interaction. These are some of the favorites our clients rely on:

• Slack: It allows real-time text and voice messaging, file sharing, and easily integrates with third-party apps. It’s organized by channels, and you can create distinct threads for different users or topics; a valuable feature when you share info with your VA you don’t want others to see. Here’s a quick video guide on how to use it. 
• Zoom: Video calls are still the preferred tool when clarity and connection are mandatory, mainly when important topics are at stake. It allows one on one meetings or multiple participants. You can record the sessions, send chat messages, and share screens during the call. 
• Microsoft Teams: If you use Microsoft 365, you’ll most likely make it your choice to manage your virtual assistant as it allows text chat, video calls, storing files, scheduling meetings, and collaborating on documents. 

4. Password Management Tools

When working with virtual staff, granting them access to your accounts may be a concern. You need your assistant to handle your emails, modify your website content, update your stock, or access other account’s. But you are reluctant to share them in simple text or through a phone call for security reasons. This is why, when managing virtual assistants, this category of management tools becomes indispensable: You can share access without exposing your login info. You can grant access to certain tools, keep track of their usage, and revoke any access instantly. 

At Virtudesk, security is a priority. We train our assistants on password-sharing tools, and if you have your own internal system, they’ll work with it. 

Some of the most used password management platforms our VAs support include:

• LastPass:  You can share your logins with just a few clicks, and your assistant will never see your actual password. It supports multi-factor authentication (MFA) and keeps logs on who accessed and when. 
• 1Password: A favorite when the teams manage various sets of credentials. You can organize logins into vaults and give permissions depending on the roles.
• Bitwarden: This open-source tool provides strong encryption and password generation. It’s free for individual plans, and is has budget-friendly plans for teams. 

5. Automation Tools

Are you looking for tools to manage your virtual assistants in such a way that maximizes their time and skills? Then take advantage of automation tools for optimal VA management. For example, if you let your VAs use email sign-up flow with automation tools, they’ll have more time to concentrate their efforts on their specialized skills. This will give you a higher return on investment as they will use their skills in what’s directly linked to their role while doubling their lead response rate. 

• Zapier: It connects with over 5,000 apps with simple workflows.
• Make: Provides advanced logic for complex workflows. 

6. File Sharing and Storing

Business owner or leading your professional practice, you’ll want an organized file system to avoid having to work twice and waste time. File sharing and storage tools will help you create a shared safe workspace for you and your assistant. You’ll also realize how proficient your virtual assistant is when it comes to structuring, organizing, or securing files, crucial for effective VA management. Some tools you can use when managing your virtual assistant are:

• Google Drive – Ideal for real-time collaboration on Docs, Sheets, and Slides.
• Dropbox – Excellent for syncing large documents and media files across devices.
• OneDrive – This sharing and storage tool faultlessly integrates with Microsoft Office tools.

7. Note-Taking and Documentation

A big part of successfully managing your virtual assistant is taking the most of your time and your VAs’ time. Instead of explaining things three times, or once to each of them, document your message once. This category of tools for managing your virtual assistant  helps to share the knowledge required for task delegation and quality control easier and 24/7 available. 

• Notion – A powerful, all-in-one tool for wikis, SOPs, and organized information.
• Evernote – Great for individual note-taking and sharing with your VA.
• Google Docs – Provides real-time collaborative editing capabilities with version history.

8. Training & Knowledge Base Tools

Training doesn’t need to be exhausting and time-consuming. These virtual assistant management tools let you build a living book of how your business runs, so your VA can learn and refer back at any time. Besides providing the training material, most training tools  keep records on how much your staff actually trains, and you’ll have access to their test results and reports. Some popular examples include:

• Loom – Record quick training videos with screen and voice. Teach once, teach wisely.
• Trainual – A formal platform for training programs and SOPs.
• Google Sites – A free, easy way to build a custom internal knowledge base.

At Virtudesk, our virtual assistants receive constant training at our Virtudesk Academy. It offers continuous training for the trainees and graduates of our training program for virtual assistants. 

Final Thoughts

Managing a virtual assistant involves much more than just delegating tasks; it implies creating a working relationship that contributes to your peace of mind and business. And that relationship depends not only on good intentions. It depends on systems, structure, and the right tools for managing virtual assistants.

The tools we saw here aren’t just apps or platforms. They’re pillars for building clarity, consistency, and expansion across your team and, ultimately, on your overall business advancement. They help you improve your operations, free up your time, and give your virtual assistants the tools they need to work efficiently and hassle free.

At Virtudesk, we make this process easy. We train our VAs  on top virtual assistant managing tools, and we customize our support around your existing workflows. Yet, if you are still unsure of how to manage a team or virtual assistants or a single assistant, we are here for you, with comprehensive management services to fuel your remote staff. 

If you're willing to enjoy the advantages of what a truly prepared assistant along with the top tools can do for your business, we’re here to help.

Schedule your free discovery call today, or call us at +1 (800) 470-8136 and let us match you with the right virtual assistant, the right tools, and the right support for your next phase of growth.