If you have employees, a big part of your job is motivating them to work. You might use the carrot and the stick approach (in which you dangle the carrot over their heads to tempt them to move forward)… or you just use the stick approach (in which you beat them senselessly until the do the work)!

Okay, so you don’t literally use a carrot and stick to tempt or the "beat-them-with-the-stick approach" for harsher motivation, but you do need to motivate them and plenty of motivation falls into those categories.

Let’s look at two jobs I held during high school as great illustrations of these two types of motivations in action:

The first job was at a gas station. The owner would berate his employees by cursing at them and asking, "are you stupid?". He made us beg for our paycheck. He took money away whenever he felt that we weren’t working the way we should be. I realize now he broke several labor laws (although at the time I didn’t know any better and just accepted it).

The second job I had was at a small franchise fast food restaurant. (Smaller than McDonalds). The owner encouraged us to have fun and didn’t mind if we sat down on the job as long as everything got done. He rewarded us a with performance bonuses. He held a contest (which I won: I got to see Robert Plant and Jimmy Page in concert!). He encouraged employees to connect after hours.

The difference is like night and day. And if I knew then what I know now, I’d have left that first job in a heartbeat. It’s not a surprise that the gas station owner churned through employees while the restaurant owner had loyal employees.

And my two part-time high school experiences illustrate (perhaps hyperbolically) the real world. We have those bosses that tempt us to succeed and we have those bosses that seem to beat us mercilessly if we fail.

You might have employees now or you might be thinking about hiring some soon. Regardless, now is the perfect time for you to think about employee motivation and develop personal policies and best practices to create a great working environment:

* Your employees earned their pay. Don’t make them work extra hard to get that money.
* Your employees don’t always feel bought into the company so they don’t always work as hard as they could. But if you pay them for performance, they could be more likely to feel "bought in" and thus will work harder for you.
* Your employees spend at least one-third of their days at your workplace. So make sure that it is a place that is enjoyable to be at, that feels like a community. Care about your employees. You don’t have to get really personal to still show them that they are important to you.

Brought to by you by: Contemporary VA - Run your business instead of running in circles.

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People.  Yes, it’s pretty much that simple.

Starting and managing a small business, or any business, doesn’t have to be rocket science.  It’s simply a matter of creating a team, with each person contributing their knowledge and expertise which will combine with everyone else’s to be your vehicle to success.

And a team doesn’t have to break your budget.  A team can be as small as two people or as large as ten or a hundred people. Dealing with many small business owners, and large business owners, that’s the one thing I hear again and again -  "I couldn’t do it all myself".  Technically, there are those few that may be able to do it all themselves, but for the larger part of the business population, they brought in someone to either handle the tasks they simply didn’t need to be bogged down with because it hindered their ability to focus on the bigger tasks at hand in growing the business; or, to handle the things that they simply didn’t have the expertise in.

No matter what your business, what point you are at in your business, how much you do or don’t know, or how much or how little help you need – you simply need "people".  (Reminds me of that commercial "I’ve got people!")

You might need someone to bounce ideas off of – this can alone can make such a tremendous difference.  You might need someone to hand off your administrative tasks to.  You might need someone to do your marketing for you.  You might need someone to handle your books.  Maybe you need someone to handle customer support, do research, or any number of other tasks running a business requires. 

Can you really do all of these things yourself, efficiently and effectively?  I suppose it’s possible, again, for a few but surely they don’t sleep or their business takes ten times as long to take even the smallest step forward.

Many very successful businesses started with just two to a few people getting it off the ground, each contributing in their area of knoweldge.  These days, with the ability for many people to contribute to a business from their own home or office, many businesses are starting out with the owner and one Virtual Assistant. 

Costs are cut because there is no overhead, no paid breaks and lunches, no benefits or any of the extra benefits an "employee" would drain out of your pocket.  You pay for the work they actually do and that’s it. 

Even multi-million dollar businesses are using VAs these days. A VA can do all of the tasks above and anything else you need done, from writing to assisting with your website and so much more.  You can have them do as little or as much work as you need or can afford. 

The benefits of a VA to any size business are immeasurable. You can get started with a VA for any task you need and you can easily stay within your budget by working with your VA to determine what they can accomplish for you within your budget.  Maybe they work two hours per week for you; maybe they work 40 hours a week for you – it’s TOTALLY up to you.

All you need is "people".

Karen J. for Contemporary VA

Small business owners tend to be know-it-alls and do-it-alls, because most of the time, that’s a necessity. In order to truly be successful with your small business, you generally need to micromanage every facet and aspect of your business, or else success will elude you. After a while, though, running a small business, or perhaps even a medium business, doing everything can get rather tiresome.

When this happens, one of the best things that you can do for yourself is to get help. Oftentimes the best help can come in the form of a virtual assistant (VA). A virtual assistant can be known by many different names, including an online personal Assistant, virtual secretary, virtual administrative assistant, or virtual office assistant. They are all essentially the same.

A virtual assistant is better for small business than a traditional assistant in many respects. One of the best benefits is that, usually, you can hire a virtual assistant on a contract basis, which means they will work on a specific project for a specific length of time, and you can go back to them for various projects. Additionally, you can contract them to work on specific tasks constantly. More often than not, getting help this way, from a virtual assistant, is much more cost-effective than hiring a traditional administrative assistant to work with you day to day or even part-time at your business location.

What does the "virtual" mean in virtual assistant? A virtual assistant works remotely, and primarily on the Internet. For example, your primary communication method with your virtual assistant will likely be email, however, most virtual assistants are flexible in meeting your needs, and if you need to speak to them by telephone, that is likely not a problem. A virtual assistant can complete the same tasks as an administrative assistant, they simply complete it remotely and submit it to you virtually through email, though many virtual assistants will also submit projects via fax, and even telephone if you just want a quick update.

Since virtual assistants work in their own space, and frequently in a completely different state than the businesses for which they work, you do not need to worry about providing space, a computer, office supplies, and anything else that you would need for a traditional assistant. This is yet another benefit to your business bank account.

One of the most renowned virtual assistant firms is Contemporary VA. Not only does Contemporary VA offer virtual assistance, they also offer bookkeeping assistance. In fact, they even offer easy, do-it-yourself small business bookkeeping software.

Remember, we will consistently bring you the most recent, must-have information, so come back frequently. After all, we’re your Best Business Experts. You don’t want to miss what’s coming next.

Your Best Business Expert,

Lisa on behalf of Contemporary VA

www.contemporaryva.com