Maintaining Trust and Communication During Your Busiest Season
In the final stretch of 2024, business owners are planning out tasks and goals for Q4 and gearing up for the holiday season. While crossing things off the list, however, we may sometimes forget to communicate with our team, whether that is the virtual assistant or the client.
When communication falls by the wayside, the subsequent concerns of the business relationship begin: “When will I hear back from them? Should I reach out one more time?” Eventually, frustration sets in even more, leading to a lack of trust in the client or VA.
On the other hand, perhaps you are the party responsible for the communication breakdown. You are backed up on your tasks, life happened, and you still haven’t answered that email.
During your busiest season of the year, there is still hope of getting back on track. Here are some ways to maintain and rebuild trust in your client-VA relationship.
Take Action and Extend an Olive Branch
If you have been ghosted, don’t worry! Now is definitely the time to take action so you can get back to business.
If you are the client, use your VA’s schedule link to set up a meeting. Make sure to send the VA a message that you want to reconnect and get through the pile of tasks together. Sometimes, extending that trust beforehand can lighten the burden and set the tone for rebuilding communications.
If you are the VA, ask for support from your network, whether that is your virtual assistant agency or a trusted colleague. If you work through an agency, ask the leadership team to extend the olive branch to the client and set up a group meeting. If you have a third party present, it can help reset the business relationship. If you are able to confide in a colleague, they may have resources for you to explore or communication pointers for your next meeting with the client.
Make a Plan and Stick To It
Once you are back in communication, it’s time to plan. To keep that trusted relationship going, it’s best to create a to-do list where you can collaborate, make notes, and provide feedback, i.e., Google Docs, Asana, or Trello.
Set due dates for each task, assign action items, and then check in with each other as the deadline approaches. Again, as we get closer to the end of the year, some things can easily slip through the cracks. If both the VA and client maintain that communication, even if a task has to be pushed back on the timeline, at least you are both in agreement.
By this point, you will already be on the right track to mutual trust, as the client will know what is happening and when, and the VA will be empowered to get things done with more leeway.
Under-Promise and Over-Deliver
Once you’re back in the driver’s seat in the client-VA partnership, you can really direct the workflow to where it needs to go. To get ahead of the game, you could try the common customer service strategy, “under-promise and over-deliver,” coined by business author and speaker Tom Peters in 1987.
For example, let’s say you are a virtual assistant, and you tell the client that you will sort through their emails from the last business day. To over-deliver, you decide to organize or clean out their entire inbox and update the client with the good news the next morning.
This theory of expectation management can really amp things up for your business relationship. It is a communication tactic that leads to a good surprise for the client or VA. Therefore, if done consistently, these positive outcomes can build that trust back up better than before.
Communication as a Core Value
Communication is one of Trusty Oak’s core values and a touchstone of our business operations: “Communicate with Transparency. We value frequent, clear, and open communication.”
This is an essential value to keep in mind when working with a client, a virtual assistant, or any professional relationship. It helps you maintain that bridge of trust so you can continue to achieve your goals as a business owner and end the year on a high note.
Learn more about how your company could benefit from the resource of VAs by visiting our “How it works” page!
In January 2019, Lauren began working with Trusty Oak as a virtual assistant. She loves helping her clients build their social media brands, and she also assists with project management, email marketing, and blogging. Lauren also worked as the Trusty Oak Social Media Manager from March 2020 to March 2021.
In her spare time, Lauren writes her own music, plays her flute for her partner’s studio sessions as well as for other independent musicians and producers, and she performs at venues in New York City.