As part of the International Year of the Secretary/Assistant 2014, participating organisations are developing themes for their members in order to raise awareness of Secretaries and Assistants throughout the world… This month is:

The role of training in staying relevant

Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.
– Benjamin Franklin

When I first started as a VA, in order to answer clients phonelines, you needed to have physical telephone wires coming into your building and a huge piece of ISDN kit to sort out what phone number was for which extension – it cost over £5,000 to install.  Now the same sort of system can cost as little as £100 to set up thanks to VOIP.

As virtual assistants we must evolve or die… Clients will ask for new services and if you aren’t able to offer social media marketing or updating WordPress sites, they will find someone else who will.

Most UK VAs are self-taught – 69% (Source: UK VA Survey 2013) but which courses add value to your business?  And which might actually be sabotaging it? We did a blog post a while back on VA courses, but what have you found useful in continuing your professional development?