As a fellow business owner, I’m sure you’ll appreciate this one.

I was feeling indulgent the other day and couldn’t help popping into my favorite ice cream store as I was driving by.

Okay, maybe I wasn’t driving by, but I was in the neighborhood.

There were no other customers, just four employees and here’s the thing – they were all standing around chatting. In other words, not working.

My business antennae started freaking out. I mean, I almost lost my appetite (not quite).

I don’t really blame the employees – this was clearly a management issue.

I guess there was no manager on duty, or maybe I just walked in when they were taking a short break. Who knows?

They were all sweet and polite and I got my ice cream treat and went on my way.

But it got me thinking about one of the questions new clients ask most often – how do I make sure my virtual employees are using their time productively?

It’s a legitimate question and deserves a thoughtful answer. Fortunately, over the years, we’ve given this quite a bit of thought at Hiresmart Virtual Employees.

There are a couple parts to this question, the way I see it. First and most basic, there’s the minimum effort principle and it’s pretty simple.

There’s a minimum amount of effort that all employees have to give in order to keep their jobs. They have to show up, meet deadlines, and perform given tasks adequately.

No one will keep an employee around who doesn’t meet these basic requirements.

The trickier part of the question is how to create a system where employees are challenged so they’re working at a high level, not only accomplishing their tasks, but learning, growing and becoming more efficient.

With a system like this in place, employees become more valuable and more productive. They put themselves in position to advance and your business in a position to succeed.

Now I can’t teach you a management system in the space of an email. Hundreds of entire books have been written on the subject.

But, at Hiresmart Virtual Employees , we do spend lots of time coaching our clients on how to build this type of management system.

So, I’ll give you a few pointers:

• If you do nothing else, make sure to have your virtual employee fill out a Close of Business (COB) report. This gives you hard data on pace and efficiency and allows you to analyze employee work results
• Check in frequently with your virtual employees to provide guidance, feedback, adjust workloads and help them address any challenges they’re facing
• Set clear measurable job requirements and goals. Clear and measurable is the key. When you’re giving a performance review, you want to have specific data to discuss, not just your opinion of how they’re doing

Making sure our clients get the best work from their virtual employees is something we take very seriously at HireSmart Virtual Employees. It’s an essential part of our repeat business.

Maybe that’s been the sticking point keeping you from hiring a virtual employee? If that’s the case you should click here and set up a free consultation.

We’ll be happy to address your concerns and match you up with one of our hard working, experienced virtual employees.