This year marks my 9th year in business. 9 years is a long time, and in that time I’ve had a ball. As well as working with some amazing customers, I’ve been fortunate to have a lot of really enjoyable tasks.
Here are 9 things that I’ve really enjoyed, some just because they’re my type of work, others because they’re so random and unexpected:
1. Created and edited a heap of spreadsheets
This probably sounds silly, but playing with data is one of my favorite things to do! I enjoy doing everything whether it’s splitting out date; joining up data; data entry; creating tables; creating charts; pivot tables; checking data and creating formulas to find specific information. I love it all!
2. Formatted documents
Like the note above, it probably seems a bit strange, but I love document formatting. In the past 9 years I’ve often helped clients with branding their documents, spreadsheets, powerpoints and emails. While it can be time consuming and fiddly, the results are amazing when you’ve got a document that looks good and gives the best impression of a clients business.
3. Furnished a rental property for an overseas client
This was a task that I first thought might be a scam, but it turned out to be one of the most fun things I’ve ever done. I was given the dimensions of the rooms that needed to be furnished, details of what type and style of furnishings were required, and I got to go wild.
4. Produced newsletters
In MailChimp, Aweber, Campaign Monitor, Infusionsoft, Salesforce and Constant Contact. Newsletters are a frequent request from clients. I love them because they’re a great way of getting to know more about my clients businesses.
5. Searched for someone’s relatives
A client asked me to try to find relatives from the UK. Starting with a bit of geneology research to track down exactly who I was looking for. Then to see who else was researching those family trees and finally to see if I could make contact with any of them. This job is still in progress, so I can’t tell you how it worked out.
6. Transcribed interviews for a private investigator
One of my early clients was a private investigator who got me to transcribe recorded interviews. Often they were a little disturbing as they were often for insurance claims due to injury, but occasionally they were a little amusing when an interviewee was a natural storyteller.
7. Typed up peoples life stories
These were two of my favorite jobs, a love story & a life story. The love story was from an elderly gentelman whose wife had recently passed. So he wrote the story of how they met, their courtship and the early years of their marriage. He wanted to present his kids with a bound document so they could know their history, particularly when he wasn’t particularly comfortable discussing it.
The life story was a local lady who had written the life story of both her and her husband from their respective childhoods until they met. She wanted to be able give it to her children for future reference. For me, it was a great way to learn about the history of the local area, and greater Brisbane.
8. Updated (and/or created) websites
Websites are one of my favorite things to play with, I mean, work on. 😊 I’ve worked on websites using WordPress.com, wordpress.org, Wix, Weebly and HTML coding. These days I mostly work on WordPress sites, but occasionally get one of the others which is always fun.
I’m amazed at the changes from the first website I worked on when I had to learn HTML code, and get our IT department to give me some code to paste in where I needed forms. Up to now where there’s a plugin or widget that will do pretty much anything you want.
9. Worked with 75 clients in the past 9 years
That’s right, I’ve just checked my records and in the past 9 years I’ve worked with 75 clients. As you can see from the chart below, I really don’t have a niche! For me, that’s one of my favorite things about being a Virtual Assistant – I get to learn about so many different industries. And I get to do so many interesting things.
