If Covid-19 has taught me anything, is that what one knows today may become irrelevant tomorrow, with absolutely no warning!
BC – Before Covid
For almost 8 years I have run a successful corporate events company in South Africa and when the Corona virus hit SA in March , in one morning every single event I had lined up for the rest of the year got cancelled. One minute I had a business and an income and the next minute I didn’t. And even when we moved from one stage to the next allowing more businesses to open, it was as clear as daylight that it would be an extremely long time before I would be able to go back to organising the large scale events that I used to.
I had to do something – I needed an income! Bianca from Wahm Workspace reached out to me and asked me to join her team. She said my event organising skills would be a huge advantage in the Virtual Assistance space. So I joined feeling confident…… then reality hit!
A Whole New World!
It’s like saying to a photographer, “You take great pictures on land, now come take great pictures under water”. It’s not that easy! Whilst the principal of what you do is the same, the environment you now need to work (under water), and equipment (different cameras, scuba diving skills etc) are completely different. And this is exactly how I started to feel. I knew how to organise …. But I had to drastically adapt my skills in order to ‘organise’ in the Virtual online space.
What I began to realise is that to be a successful Virtual Assistant you have got to understand and learn numerous computer software, programmes and APPS. This ‘virtual world’ does not operate like my normal ‘events world’. I started to get so frustrated trying to perform the most ‘basic’ of tasks, because I had to learn all new systems in order to get anything done. And just when I had mastered a programme, there was a better programme that was now available to do the same thing….. so back to learning all over again!
DC – During Covid
But WOW, what a journey the past 5 months have been. When I now master a task for one of my online clients its gives me such a sense of achievement. Old dogs can learn new tricks and become darn good at them!
I’ve now become so open to learning and look forward to discovering new systems and ways of doing things. What I have also learnt, is that with the way our world is heading, it is becoming more and more important to become ‘virtual’ in order to continue to succeed, even during unprecedented times.
Not many professions allow one to be able to work from anywhere in the world while at the same time have clients from every part of the world.
