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Outsourcing Success: Building a High-Performing Team Beyond Borders | LAYC 105
Episode 1052nd March 2024 • Seasoned Women Serious Business • Isabel Alexander
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In this episode, Tobe Brockner, founder of Katuva, shares valuable insights on building a successful virtual team for entrepreneurs. Topics covered include:

1. Managing Differences: Tobe discusses how Katuva addresses timezone, cultural, and currency differences, emphasizing the importance of minimizing fees and optimizing payment platforms.

2. Cultural Nuances: Insights into cultural aspects, including the significance of birthdays, the 13th month, and the strong religious influence in the Philippines.

3. Living Wages: Tobe sheds light on the misconception about VA wages, highlighting how Katuva ensures VAs receive a substantial living wage, significantly impacting their quality of life.

4. Infrastructure Challenges: Tobe explains how Katuva helps VAs overcome challenges like typhoons, power outages, and internet connectivity in the Philippines, showcasing the resilience of the team.

5. Strategic Outsourcing:The episode explores how entrepreneurs can leverage VAs to handle tasks they shouldn't be doing themselves, allowing them to focus on strategic initiatives and business growth.

6. Flexibility and Support: Tobe emphasizes the flexibility of VAs in handling emergencies, providing a valuable resource for businesses during unexpected events like sick leave or family emergencies.

7. Transitioning Tasks: Tobe shares examples of tasks successfully transitioned to VAs, illustrating the efficiency and support they can provide in critical areas like website migration.

8. Creating Time Freedom: The discussion concludes with Tobe expressing the joy of helping entrepreneurs free up time and live more intentionally, highlighting the positive impact of successful outsourcing.

https://learn.katuva.com/300-tasks-ebook?am_id=isabel425

https://learn.katuva.com/exploratory-call?am_id=isabel243

Transcripts

Speaker:

Welcome to the Lift As You Climb podcast, where it's all about the

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journey and the joy of discovering who you are now, deciding who you want

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to become, and embracing your genuine identity, influence, and impact.

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In each episode, we'll explore how life's experiences have prepared us for what

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we choose to do next and how to create our Encore, write our own script, and

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star in the next stage of our lives.

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I'm your host, your Encore strategist, and transformation catalyst, Isabel Alexander.

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Hello, here we are.

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The 5th in the series of 5 interviews with Tobe Brockner, the founder

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of Katuva we have covered a lot.

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We've talked about the transformative power of having a virtual assistant on

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your success team and building ladders.

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with them.

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Today, we're going to dive into a couple of very fascinating specifics

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on working successfully with a virtual assistant, and that's managing

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cultural and currency differences.

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On a previous episode, we talked about managing time differences.

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So if you haven't listened to the first 4 episodes, check them out.

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Make sure you put a pin in that to go back and do and share it, of course, with

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all your friends, because there's a lot of stuff that we covered here to make

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your experience, whether it's a first time or a retry, much more successful.

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I also want to just take a moment to reflect on the overall.

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impact that the series has had for me and for others in my audience, just

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reflecting on how much freedom and fun and financial certainty and fulfillment

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can come from a successfully organized relationship and building your virtual

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team with a company like Katuva who's got a system, got a process.

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has hired, retained the right people, and facilitates a lot of the day to

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day stuff that you don't have to do.

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They can do that.

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Stay tuned, as I like to say, buckle up, we're going on an exciting

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ride, and I look forward to talking to you at the end of this episode.

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See you soon.

Isabel:

And we're learning more and by example from you how to even expand that,

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because why wouldn't I as an entrepreneur, as a business owner, and as a woman with

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a whole lot of epic living left to do, Why wouldn't I want to create more time

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for myself to do things that are fun, and new, and exciting, and expansive?

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And the only way I can do that is by having a success team and I just, I love

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this opportunity to have diverse skill sets come and diverse perspectives, which

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is a segue into one of the other questions that I was going to ask you and that is,

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so what are some of the things that you've learned along the journey in building

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Katuva about managing, we've talked about managing timezone differences,

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but what about cultural differences and currency differences and payments?

Tobe:

Yeah, like many countries in the world, the U.

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S.

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dollar still carries a bit of cache.

Tobe:

I pay all of our VAs in U.

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S.

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dollars.

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We use PayPal.

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We're looking at moving over to a platform called Wise.

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I'm looking at the fees and the differences and what those are costing

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us because as we get, and this is another thing, I'm trying to think in the future.

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We are the size we are right now, and the fees hurt, but they don't cripple.

Tobe:

When we get bigger, two, three, four, five years from now, the fees

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that we're paying on transferring money are going to be substantial,

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purchasing a home substantial.

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And so, I'm trying to head that off and figure out, how do we minimize

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the amount of fees that we're paying?

Tobe:

I actually had one of my VA's, Mylene, had her do the initial preliminary

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research on different payment platforms to see what those fees are going to be.

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And we can make a decision on that later.

Tobe:

But U.

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S.

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dollars, we generally pay there.

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In the Philippines, that's the Filipino peso.

Tobe:

You can pay them that way in pesos as well.

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The exchange rate that they get it through PayPal or something is generally

Tobe:

worse than what they get at their bank.

Tobe:

So we send them dollars and they convert them to pesos there.

Tobe:

A lot of people talk about the amount you're paying and it works even though

Tobe:

we don't charge per hour It works out to be about 8 an hour and we generally pay

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our VA's a little bit more than market average as a general rule Comparing

Tobe:

to other VA agencies and other people that are paying rates, we pay a little

Tobe:

bit more, but a lot of people are like how's that even a living wage?

Tobe:

And the difference in living wage in the U.

Tobe:

S.

Tobe:

versus the Philippines is drastic.

Tobe:

The amount of money they make here with Katuva is equivalent to making,

Tobe:

60, 65, 000 a year in the Philippines.

Tobe:

And so the lifestyle is much better.

Tobe:

Gellie messaged me the other day, I said, have a good

Tobe:

weekend, you have any big plans?

Tobe:

And she's oh, I'm getting a massage.

Tobe:

And I said, how much does a massage cost in the Philippines, just out of curiosity.

Tobe:

And she said, 500 pesos.

Tobe:

Doesn't mean anything to me, so I converted it on Google.

Tobe:

It was 8.

Tobe:

56 for an hour of massage.

Tobe:

The difference in pricing and everything over there is just so much

Tobe:

different, and so they're getting a very good, solid living wage.

Tobe:

That was one of the more surprising cultural things.

Tobe:

I was also surprised by how important they take birthdays.

Tobe:

Generally, they'll ask for the day off for their birthday,

Tobe:

which was surprising to me.

Tobe:

I'm 46 now and I'm, stopped caring about birthdays when I was 17.

Tobe:

So that they ask for that day off and celebrate it.

Tobe:

It's surprising and humorous to me, but that's a cultural

Tobe:

thing over there as well.

Tobe:

They're very religious may not be the right word, although there's a very

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religious undertone to their thinking and behavior and moral compass.

Tobe:

Large portion of the country is Catholic, so there's that piece of it.

Tobe:

Other cultural things were like the 13th month that you

Tobe:

just experienced in December.

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That's actually one of the things that's a big differentiator between Katuva and

Tobe:

somebody trying to hire them as well.

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Not only do we know what the 13th month is, but we honor it.

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We attract them from the other people who don't even know what it is.

Tobe:

Just for your listeners, the kind of thumbnail version of that

Tobe:

is you pay the equivalent of a month's salary in early December.

Tobe:

It's not necessarily a bonus, it's more of a part of their compensation package.

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They use that money to budget for the next year.

Tobe:

They'll make large purchases, if they need to get appliances fixed or purchase things

Tobe:

to send their kids to school, buy school clothes, they use that money for that.

Tobe:

So they build that into their budget and it's important to them and so

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we try to make sure they get that.

Tobe:

We make that optional for clients, but we only had one client opt

Tobe:

out this year, which made me sad that he opted out, but it made me

Tobe:

happy that all the other clients that we had said, yeah, absolutely.

Tobe:

That was good.

Tobe:

There's still a third world country.

Tobe:

The Philippines is made up of something like 7, 800 islands; an archipelago.

Tobe:

There's still typhoons, and there are still hurricanes, and there

Tobe:

are still power outages, and we try to mitigate that as best we can.

Tobe:

Most of the VAs have generators, backup, power backups.

Tobe:

They have multiple data cards where if their one internet service provider

Tobe:

goes down, they have another one.

Tobe:

The government's actually invested quite a bit in the infrastructure for the

Tobe:

power grid, but also for the internet.

Tobe:

One of my internal VAs, her name is Faith, she lives literally

Tobe:

in the middle of nowhere.

Tobe:

Think of the most rural place you could think of in the

Tobe:

Philippines, that's where she lives.

Tobe:

It's called Lingundan.

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It's about four hours north of Davao City.

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She's in Southern Philippines.

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Davao's a big, very advanced city.

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It's one of the largest cities in the Philippines, but she is

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four hours removed, and it might as well be four million miles.

Tobe:

It is just remote.

Tobe:

The idea that Faith has a reliable power source, internet, speaks English,

Tobe:

is Mind boggling that, this person who would otherwise literally be picking

Tobe:

up rice out of fields for a job, making a dollar a day or two dollars a day

Tobe:

or whatever it is, can be a virtual assistant for a company in the United

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States and making a wage that is far surpassed what she could make anywhere

Tobe:

else is just unbelievable to me, still.

Tobe:

I'm still in awe!

Tobe:

Like Warren Buffett, I tap dance to work every day.

Tobe:

That's how I feel.

Isabel:

I share your enthusiasm and your rhythm!

Isabel:

I think this is something that perhaps people are curious about.

Isabel:

I'm a pretty well traveled person.

Isabel:

I had an international business and I still do.

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In fact, it's a different business now.

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I sold the chemical company.

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So, I'm more fluent, shall we say, in different cultural practices

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and standards, but I know there are many people who are not as familiar

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with foreign markets and foreign cultures, and one of the questions

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has been how's their English?

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It makes me a little bit sad that people don't have a more global

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perspective but fair enough.

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The answer to anybody wondering that, who's listening, Impeccable.

Isabel:

These are very educated people with a very strong desire to have a good job,

Isabel:

to provide for their family, and to really be a valuable member of your team.

Isabel:

It's it's been wonderful to have that affirmation of, okay, wow, in

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fact, my grammar could use a little brushing up from time to time.

Isabel:

And because there is also that I think at least in my experience, the

Isabel:

prevailing desire to do really well.

Isabel:

They use tools and resources like Grammarly, etc.

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to vet, to check things

Isabel:

chatGPT.

Isabel:

. ChatGPT, absolutely.

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And anybody who says AI is going to replace employees, give me a break,

Isabel:

but what it can do is argument.

Isabel:

I have an internal joke with Cherry that ChatGPT is just another member

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of The Encore Catalyst success team.

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And we call her Chatty Cathy.

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It helps to support us to, get us started with some ideas, but then we make it

Isabel:

our own and really give our voice to it.

Isabel:

And the other thing I'm glad that you mentioned, because faith is a

Isabel:

big part of it, celebrating family is a tremendous part of the culture.

Isabel:

And I like being able to make that happen as the employer that I can

Isabel:

recognize anniversaries and birthdays.

Isabel:

And in fact, my VA was evacuated about two weeks ago during

Isabel:

some heavy rain in her area.

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So we just flexed our work schedule and that was fine too.

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What was more important to me was that she was safe, and that,

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she had a home to go back to

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All right, I feel that there is a lot more that we can talk about and expand

Isabel:

other people's perceptions of working with a VA and open up the creative thinking

Isabel:

around what could a VA do to help me have more time, more freedom, create

Isabel:

more financial certainty in my business.

Isabel:

I'm really thrilled, Tobe, that you've given us so much time, and

Isabel:

there's probably going to have to be a future series of interviews

Isabel:

once we get some feedback,

Isabel:

but for today, I have one more set of questions that I would like to ask you,

Isabel:

and this is particularly about people who have established businesses, as many of

Isabel:

my clients do, and have the conventional idea of staff or employees and utilize

Isabel:

contractors on a more local basis.

Isabel:

Are, what are the ways that they potentially might also take

Isabel:

advantage of a VA supporting them?

Tobe:

Yeah.

Tobe:

There's really two things that we ask clients to look at when

Tobe:

they're deciding on whether or not they need to hire a new VA.

Tobe:

One are the things that you're already doing that you

Tobe:

shouldn't probably be doing.

Tobe:

You probably shouldn't be doing it yourself.

Tobe:

You should be outsourcing that.

Tobe:

Editing this podcast would fall under that category.

Tobe:

You shouldn't be editing this podcast.

Tobe:

That should be something that you outsource.

Tobe:

You may have somebody internally, locally, that can do that.

Tobe:

Most likely, if you do have someone internally, they are already full.

Tobe:

Their bandwidth is stretched thin.

Tobe:

A lot of times, I used to fear, when we were going into a business

Tobe:

and they had a staff already, are we going to upset these people?

Tobe:

Are they going to feel threatened?

Tobe:

They welcome us.

Tobe:

They're like, Oh my gosh, thank you so much!

Tobe:

I have all this other crap I'm doing.

Tobe:

I don't need to do, I don't want to do, I don't have time to do.

Tobe:

We just placed two VAs in an engineering company, analyzing data for some process

Tobe:

that I don't even know what it is.

Tobe:

These VAs did though.

Tobe:

This particular client, her boss is actually our client.

Tobe:

He's the business owner, but she initiated the whole thing because she

Tobe:

was like, they want me to do this.

Tobe:

There's no way I have time.

Tobe:

I need help.

Tobe:

And so we hired her two VAs and she loves us.

Tobe:

So that's one, number one: things you're already doing that you probably shouldn't

Tobe:

be doing and you can't necessarily offload to a current staff member.

Tobe:

So you could offload that to a VA.

Tobe:

Number two; this falls into the Stephen Covey quadrant.

Tobe:

Most of the things that we work on when we said we work in the business,

Tobe:

that's the urgent, not important, or the urgent, important things.

Tobe:

Those are the things that we spend a lot of our time on.

Tobe:

Things that are on fire, customer service, selling, all those types of things.

Tobe:

But where the real magic sort of happens is in the not urgent, but important.

Tobe:

It's the more strategic things.

Tobe:

So these are the things that you could be doing that you're not

Tobe:

doing that would move the needle.

Tobe:

And those could be like putting together strategic initiatives, putting together

Tobe:

new marketing campaigns developing out your sales process, building out

Tobe:

those automations for follow up, all of those things that you need to do

Tobe:

that you never quite have time or the bandwidth or the resources to get to.

Tobe:

Those are two great areas to start in.

Isabel:

You inspired me also to, to think about the opportunity to leverage

Isabel:

filling a sick leave position or an emergency leave, like God forbid that

Isabel:

one of your staff is in a accident or, suddenly has an extended illness.

Isabel:

or a maternity leave where, the position responsibilities don't go

Isabel:

away while you're birthing that baby.

Isabel:

So I think having a VA to come in as a placeholder.

Isabel:

And the company can continue on until such time as, maybe the individual

Isabel:

comes back or you have time to recruit and hire another full time person.

Isabel:

And it's not just the staff member, it could be you.

Isabel:

Something could happen to you or you fall ill or you have something happen.

Isabel:

We have a client who had someone in her family very close to her pass

Isabel:

away, and it was a very hard time, very dark period in her life, and she

Isabel:

came back to me later when it settled down and was like, my VA saved my life.

Isabel:

She saved my business.

Isabel:

I would have gone out of business had my VA not been there to pick up slack

Isabel:

because I was just not in a place, where I could even think straight, much less

Isabel:

do the things that needed to be done and she was so great about coming in and

Isabel:

being proactive and, following up with clients and staying in touch with people.

Isabel:

The staff is one thing, but we're not bulletproof either as much as we.

Isabel:

Pretend we are and things could happen to us as well that, a VA can come

Isabel:

in and take the reins, if need be.

Isabel:

Thank you for reminding because in fact, that's one of my specialties.

Isabel:

I work with my clients to help them take themselves out of being the

Isabel:

primary asset in the company, and fire themselves from the hands on daily

Isabel:

management so they can promote themselves upstairs to be the chief investor.

Isabel:

So you're right.

Isabel:

We shouldn't be indispensable.

Isabel:

We should be looking for every opportunity to have somebody else, become us and

Isabel:

fulfilling all of that and executing our vision for how the company will be.

Isabel:

I also was thinking, as in my case, there's the one time, the specialty tasks.

Isabel:

As in my case, where I need to transition from a platform, not to be named.

Isabel:

My website and my programs, my online resources were with a company that

Isabel:

I just wasn't gelling with but I continued my subscription with them

Isabel:

for years and it was really, truly more of a hate than a love relationship.

Isabel:

One of the first tasks that Cherry did when you introduced her to me and she

Isabel:

joined my team, was to take all of that very valuable information, my assets, and

Isabel:

move them over to GoHighLevel, so that there was no interruption in my business.

Isabel:

My clients didn't know she did that all behind the scenes and

Isabel:

one night, we turned the switch.

Isabel:

And we were there.

Isabel:

So that is something else that I thank you and I know other clients thank you for.

Isabel:

Because you have an agency for HighLevel, you provide that

Isabel:

opportunity for us and bonus!

Isabel:

You train our VAs on how to be fluent in that area.

Isabel:

So yay!

Isabel:

Again, the ideas keep coming to me, so there's definitely

Isabel:

an opportunity for the future.

Isabel:

I am so happy to be a client of Katuva, and I haven't mentioned it yet, but

Isabel:

of course, we're going to reward our listeners, our audience, not only with

Isabel:

the richness of what we share today, the wisdom that we're sharing, but I know that

Isabel:

you've got some free resources that they can access and that information will be

Isabel:

provided in each of the episodes, show notes, both on podcast and on YouTube.

Isabel:

Additionally, because I am a raving fan of Katuva, I'm gonna

Isabel:

be offering an affiliate link.

Isabel:

Because I do believe in the company and I'd like to share that with

Isabel:

as many other people as I can.

Tobe:

We're just as thrilled to have you as a client as you are to be a client.

Tobe:

There's nothing that makes me happier than helping entrepreneurs free up their

Tobe:

time and live life more intentionally.

Tobe:

So thank you!

Isabel:

Cheers to you.

Isabel:

Talk to you soon, Tobe.

Isabel:

How was that?

Isabel:

I don't know about you, but I found it so thought provoking and inspiring

Isabel:

and empowering because now we know what to look for in establishing a

Isabel:

successful virtual assistant relationship and building out our team so that

Isabel:

we can do more of the things that.

Isabel:

We do best and more of the things that give us a happy,

Isabel:

fulfilled life and business.

Isabel:

We've talked about the transformation that is possible when you embrace the

Isabel:

idea of having a remote team and set them up for success as well and really

Isabel:

change some of the way you think break out of some old patterns and paradigms

Isabel:

about working hours and the things.

Isabel:

only you can do.

Isabel:

So I'm so very grateful to our guest, Tobe Brockner of Katuva for sharing

Isabel:

his very personal experience, his journey to the successful business now

Isabel:

providing virtual assistance for clients.

Isabel:

from all around the world, and how he's offered to share so many resources

Isabel:

with us, from his book recommendations to great quotes, personal anecdotes,

Isabel:

and stories that, you know, that I think as entrepreneurs, we all

Isabel:

can relate to and are inspiring.

Isabel:

Additionally, his Providing that great PDF, that thought starter

Isabel:

about the 300 plus or more things a virtual assistant could do for you.

Isabel:

Some that you may not even have thought of, for sure, I hadn't.

Isabel:

Also, because I love Lifting and Climbing.

Isabel:

I'm sharing an affiliate link for a very special rate to explore,

Isabel:

investigate working with Katuva.

Isabel:

And after you have a conversation with Tobe, you will know.

Isabel:

If that's what's right for you at this time.

Isabel:

So cheers to you, to building your success teams, creating more freedom in your

Isabel:

life to do what you want to, getting rid of the albatrosses, as Tobe did.

Isabel:

Let us know.

Isabel:

What else?

Isabel:

What other questions came up for you about working with VAs?

Isabel:

Because we'll be here to answer those for you.

Isabel:

Reach out to me, hello@theencorecatalyst.com

Isabel:

or comment in the episodes on YouTube or on your podcast channel, or reach

Isabel:

out to Tobe at Katuva, be sure to follow him on his social media because

Isabel:

they've got some great inspiring content that'll make your day better.

Isabel:

All right, see you soon.

Isabel:

Thank you for spending this time with me.

Isabel:

I hope our conversation added value to your day and expanded your

Isabel:

vision for your legacy and impact.

Isabel:

Please join me in increasing my impact and expanding my reach to even more

Isabel:

people by sharing this episode on social media, with friends, and leaving a review

Isabel:

on Apple iTunes, Spotify, Or channel of choice to catch all the latest from me.

Isabel:

Subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.

Isabel:

Connect with me and others in our community Facebook group, the Lift

Isabel:

As You Climb Movement, where you can engage, be inspired by and grow

Isabel:

with a tribe of like-minded people.

Isabel:

As I evolve as a podcaster and spokeswoman for collaboration and

Isabel:

economic empowerment, your input and feedback are especially important.

Isabel:

To me, I welcome your suggestions and questions to hello@theencorecatalyst.com.

Isabel:

Until we meet again, please remember your success may be the foundation

Isabel:

for someone else's to together we can raise success ladders around the world.

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