Welcome to The Delegation Download: Grow Your Business, Enrich Your Life

Welcome to the first edition of The Delegation Download, a monthly newsletter with tips and tricks to help you grow your delegation skills and maximize your partnership with your VA.

Our goals and dreams drive us to work hard and accomplish big things, and effective trust-filled delegation makes getting there more fulfilling.?

Delegation Fast-Track Cards are designed to help you optimize your impact, no matter the size of your team or your annual revenue. You’ll receive a question, a delegation tip, a recommendation for a free tool, and a challenge to help you flex your delegation skills a little more each month.

Delegation Fast-Track Card #1

?? Mindset: Delegation Starter

Think about the #1 Thing you know you must accomplish this month.?

What obstacles might prevent you from achieving this goal, and how will you ensure you have the appropriate time to overcome them and crush your goal?

?? Tip: Lead Through Letting Go

Freedom is more affordable than you may think. If you want more freedom in your life, the actual costs come in the form of discipline and structure. Your VA can help you achieve both! Here’s how effective, trust-filled delegation supports discipline. (Next month, we’ll talk about structure.)?

Discipline: Commit to investing in yourself through personal and professional development every week. View this time as non-negotiable, not flex-time in your schedule. Protect it like your future depends on it because the future you, living an abundant life of freedom and success, needs the present you to level up and learn new things.?

Listen to an audiobook, read your favorite newsletter, attend a mastermind, or take an online course.?

Delegation is critical to creating space in your schedule and can be something your VA helps hold you accountable to protect. Create a meeting with yourself each week, and use this time to learn something new. With access to your inbox and calendar, your VA can decline meeting requests that interfere with your commitment to yourself.

?? Tool: Equip to Empower

Doodle - Create a poll with suitable time options for your meeting, then send it out to your participants. They vote, and you’ll know the best time to meet.

? Task: Your Delegation Challenge

This month’s Delegation Challenge is to give your VA access to your inbox and calendar and ask them to help you keep a 30-minute meeting with yourself each week.

?? When planning your schedule, create a 30-minute “Keep Growing” time block on your calendar each week.

?? Delegate your inbox and calendar to your virtual assistant. (See this post for links to instructions.)

?? Ask your VA to help you protect this time on your calendar by declining meeting requests that interfere with your commitment to yourself.

?? If in-person learning and collaboration are your thing, ask your VA to research upcoming conferences and workshops. Delegating research allows you to review your options and make choices quickly, reducing the threat of decision fatigue.

[Download the Card]

Around The Treehouse??

Deep Roots: Partners in Productivity

Meet Craig Martin, CEO and Founder of Martin Global Leaders, Inc.

Craig Martin and his team at Martin Global Leaders are based in the San Francisco Bay Area and develop leadership teams and executives around the world. With clients leading North American, European, Asian, Australian, and Chinese companies in industries spanning from tech to food and beverage to construction, Craig’s coaching impact reverberates worldwide.

Craig’s mantra and call to clients is, “Do your most important work.” His coaching methods include advanced topics such as organizational culture, powerful mindset and habits, and resilience. Also recognizing that top executives are facing incredible pressures, he includes a focus on time management and personal care practices – all of which are critical to the overall health and success of leaders at any level.

Craig knew the power of working with an executive assistant because he had a great assistant before finding us. When her capacity changed, he conducted extensive research on VA options and decided to work with us because he liked that we were US-based and offered a quick onboarding process.

Craig discovered Trusty Oak through a referral from a fellow member of Vistage Worldwide, the world’s largest executive coaching organization for small and mid-sized businesses. He started working with us in July 2022 and initially started with one virtual assistant, but later added a second VA to his team.

Craig’s primary VA is Ashley Holmer , based in Oregon, and his secondary VA is Amanda Boyd , based in Florida. Both of these VAs have strong skills in administrative tasks, project management, inbox and calendar management, and travel booking.

Amanda helped Craig set up systems and create documentation for business processes, keeps this updated, and serves as a backup executive virtual assistant as needed. Ashley organizes Craig’s work life and maximizes and protects his time with high-touch calendaring support.

Craig shared that “Trusty Oak VAs have helped to transform MGL, creating greater efficiencies, capacity, and sustainable operational processes. This is allowing us to scale the business and expand our impact in the world.”?

[Connect with Craig]

It has been 365 days since I quit drinking alcohol, and I’m noticing some incredible benefits that have helped me at work. Now I’m one year AF, and the advantages continue to abound throughout my life, including how I show up at work. I am still relatively new to leadership and have considerably more to learn. In reflection, I recognize these seven ways teetotaling has helped me grow as a leader.

[Read the Post]

Podcasts offer many opportunities for entrepreneurs and business leaders seeking to amplify their voice and brand, but navigating this landscape can be time-consuming. That’s where your virtual assistant can help you gain more visibility and grow your audience. Explore effective strategies to leverage your VA’s skills to get you booked on podcasts and solidify your online presence.

[Read the Post]

• Managing Interruptions: Here’s what to do when your calendaring system breaks, or you get off track from your time-blocking plan. (By Susan Fennema )
• Time to Amp Up The Customer Success Muscle: A number of companies are seeing a slowdown. Here are some reasons and predictions as to why the emphasis on customer success should be a major focus in 2024 and beyond. (By Kathleen Lucente )
• LinkedIn Says Past Carousel Posts Will Be Deleted in December 2023: Update your LinkedIn content strategy accordingly!

We proudly celebrate Trusty Oak anniversaries for our VAs and the leaders we serve. Thank you for partnering with us! Here’s who is celebrating.

Virtual Assistants

1 Year: Celestine Crews , Sunshine Jones , Amanda Ireland

2 Years: Jennifer Szpak , Jennifer Richardson , Ashley Holmer , Djeneé Dunn , Erica Sharpe , Nitin Khanna

Leaders We Serve

1 Year: Vera Gutmann (Ursa-Minor), Thomas Hay (TechKnowServe), Natasha Kaufman (Professional Boudoir Photographer), Lori Lovens (Innovation Savvy), Sarah Cotton Nelson (High Flying Strategies)

2 Years: Nikk Nguyen (Austin Wedding Photographer and Real Estate Agent)

3 Years: Felicia Reed (Portrait Photographer and Business Mentor)

4 Years:? John Riley (VP of Finance and HR at Clayton Christensen Institute)

Wondering what you can accomplish by partnering with a US-based virtual assistant? Schedule a Discovery Call with Rebecca (Bex) Howell to learn more.