Entrepreneurs often want to get tips and advice on how to build a virtual team. Questions high on the agenda are how to interview people to check out their skillsets, speed of working (when they are paid hourly), reliability and so on. Something that is often missing, though, is the question about the personality factor.

To have a successful team you need to be very precise on what sort of personality you have, what kind of person is good to support you best and how many team members you have with different personalities. Personality typing involves psychological classifications of different types of individuals.

This is done to help people for self development, to see how they fit into a team, what their best learning style is, to determine what approach in life they usually take and what jobs are actually right for them. I  know stereotyping or “pigeonholing” people is not PC or “in”, but it can be a powerful tool for understanding people.

This also applies to relationship troubles where people of different personalities come together who may not understand why the other half is behaving in the way they do and sometimes get upset and angry by the other person’s actions. Personality-typing can help these people to understand the other person better, not to see actions as a personal affront, but to see how the other person actually views the world.

The impatient Driver/Director type personality

It’s great to be able to see the world with the eyes of your partner because then you are more understanding and maybe can bridge the gaps and find ways to communicate with each other without blame and fights. It is also beneficial for individuals to determine what sort of job would be great for them and see in which area they would find most fulfillment and use their strengths rather than their weaknesses.

I still remember that my dad wanted me to become an IT professional and study computer science with a lot of mathematical content in the courses, while I was actually  better at learning languages, writing and the arts. It was a big disappointment for my parents and they felt I was just being difficult. I genuinely didn’t really grasp maths at school, trying hard, but never really “getting” it. My elder brother did get maths, he was exceptional at it and became a computer specialist.

He was quite a quiet person, didn’t like the limelight and worked well by himself. He was detailed and the thought of making a speech terrified him. In contrary, I always volunteered when speaking up or even giving speeches or announcements to large groups and never got nervous at all. I just acted naturally and found it enjoyable.  I loved being around people and working with them, brainstorming with them and working in a team environment. My brother didn’t.

Coincidence? No. Personality typing helps us understand why my brother wasn’t good at public speaking and I wasn’t good at maths or working in a lab examining specimens.

For me learning about personality typing was a big relief. Finally I understood why I wasn’t patient when it came to endless data checking, working alone in a closed room until a solution was found or fiddling with number doing accounting. When I found out what type I was it meant for me, that actually I was a person with a lot of value to give to society, but not in the way my parents wanted me to do. I was good and bad at some things, but exceptional at others.

I remember in the past, mostly at school, people/teachers always advised to overcome your weaknesses, work on your mistakes and get to become good at what you dislike. Strangely, though, many top achievers rather nurture their talents and discard their weaknesses. They don’t even try to overcome their weaknesses, they just ask other people to deal with the areas they are not good at.

The 4 personality types

An example is Richard Branson, who is an excellent and charismatic visionary who loves big picture thinking. He is a person who comes up with amazing ideas and lets other people implement and finance his ventures. He isn’t working on becoming a detailed implementor or financial whizz who sits for hours in his office analyzing figures and checking balances, he rather utilizes his biggest strength of big picture thinking and innovating, and asks the people who are good at what he’s not, to do what they do best.

A person like him would become impatient at longwinded reviews and “boring” data collection, whereas other people love data collection and checking things and would never want to invent anything new as it’s way too scary for them.

Giving people the tasks they do best gives them the  biggest satisfaction and they also offer the fruits of their labour and strength to society.

The same sort of thinking is necessary when you are an entrepreneur and want to build a team of supporters around you. You first need to determine who and what type you are, what you are good at, what kind of person brings out the best in you (when you work with them) and what kind of person is the right for the tasks you want them to do. This sounds complicated, but is not as complicated as it sounds right now.

Click here to read more about the 4 types or here. Once you familiarize yourself with the different types you will recognize them, regardless of what the author calls them. A, B, C, D or Driver, Expressive, Amiable and Analytical or Powerful, Playful, Peaceloving and Problemsolving. Once you familiarize yourself with the types, you know exactly which one is meant by its description.

Copyblogger, an amazing blog for entrepreneurs who want to find out more about copywriting on the net and Internet marketing, also has a take on the personality-types on here. Don’t forget to sign up for the blog updates, they are really good!

I bet by now you have fun playing with the personality types and start thinking what types your family members and friends are. It’s really useful to know and don’t forget to type your clients because it will save you from misunderstandings and troubles. When you clients feel understood and supported appropriately you will gain the benefits!

After you have found your own type that feels right to you,  look at your business and what the role in your business is that you like most. I understand you may call yourself CEO (chief executive officer) or head coach or consultant, but which tasks or services dp you like and use most. Be honest. If there are things you just find a drag, admit it and be ok with it. It’s not a problem, it’s a good thing because now you know you can find a support person or assistant who is good at what you are not good at.

If you are a person who is very artistic, full of big picture ideas, but doesn’t like to sit down and put it all on paper or research it, then you need someone with these complimentary skills. Find an assistant who loves to sit down and check things, researches in books and online, is a bit introverted and has a strong attention to detail. This person is probably the opposite of you and you may find her/him a bit boring, but don’t look for a carbon copy of yourself even if you click with someone like you on the phone.

Be careful: if you are excited about interviewing someone and you feel they are so much like you and consequently so much fun to chat to, you should take note. You may just be talking to a perso who has the same personality style as you, which is not a problem when this person is a client, but might cause you headaches when this person has to work for you, because she or he is not complimentary to your own strengths.  If you hire this person you hire a mini me. This person will possibly be have the same strengths and weaknesses as you. Do you need someone like you or do you need someone who loves what you hate to do? Chances are you need someone who is rather complimentary to you.

Also think about the tasks you want your virtual assistant/VA to do for you. If you look for a website coder, chances are the best choice for the job is a detailed person, usually quiet, introverted, patient and works best when you tell them exactly and precisely what you want from it. Don’t expect her or him to give you lots of creative flair or any surprises. Don’t think this person wants to come up with the ideas and you can do something else, you need to take a lead with this type of person and enjoy that they will do exactly what you tell them to do. How good is that?

If you hire a graphic designer, chances are this person is artistic and creative. He or she may not like it when you are too strict and narrow minded with your ideas. They will want to create a logo or graphic and show it to you as a kind of surprise, full of pride and easily offended when you don’t like their draft. Be careful not to upset them with blunt criticism, give them some positive feedback and tell them the mood you want to create rather than the exact image that you have in your head. These type of people often think in pictures, so describe your wishes in pictures, too. And be open, they may actually come up with a fantastic new approach that is better than yours!

If you hire a customer service person, this person is probably bubbly, friendly and likes to make friends. He or she is outgoing, fun and easygoing. They often create a good feeling within you you after talking with them. They are patient and thrive in the helping industries. If you get a VA who applies for a customer service role in your company, such as first point of contact or complaints department, this is the right one to choose. If the person you hire has a cold voice, an abrasive personality, is either shy or introverted, stay away! She or he won’t be warmer or friendlier with your clients either.

These are examples of classical personality traits people should ideally display show if they are in the right job.  Many times, though, a quirky creative artist may apply for your bookkeeping tasks because he/she can’t find another job right now or doesn’t know yet what they really are good at, because you would probably end up with a mess in your Quickbooks. Ideally your bookkeeper is a detailed person, not a creative person, with a lot of attention to detail. You get the gist?

The Analytical Type

Similarly, when you look for an infusionsoft or shoppingcart specialist you need to write down the qualities you think  a person needs to have to be successful in this role. This would be similar to the bookkeeper and the web coder: attention to detail, patience, focuse, doesn’t get impatient when testing autoresponders or links for hours, etc. Don’t make the mistake and hire someone who is impatient and gets sloppy after a few hours, simply because their personality doesn’t match the job description.

Create job descriptions for the tasks you need done and come up with the personality that fits the description. When you write an ad, mention these traits so that everybody who applies knows what you are looking for. This will make your job of hiring easier  and you may get more applicants with the right attitude, skillset and personality type.

Constantly maintaining online reputations is one of the reasons why Online Reputation Management exists. In real sense, Online Reputation Management (ORM) was created to help business owners and professionals deal with bad press.

Even a large company or a small one could not get rid of the receiving end of negative publicity. Remember that the internet never fails to forget. Everything we do online leaves a digital mark that will never go away. This gives a reason why Online Reputation Management serves as a necessity in the field of business today.

See the advantages of Online Reputation Management for companies:

• It improves customer satisfaction by gaining insights from consumers about what is good and bad about their product or services. This increases perceptions of brand/ product by creating opportunities to listen to and engage consumers.
• It helps on gaining insights about their competitors and their customers’ perceptions about their products and services. This helps in the understanding of the relationship between user generated content and traditional forms of online media, e.g. news, print, etc.
• It maintains shareholder value by mitigating risk by having ears close to the ground where opinions about a business are being formed and propagated.
• They’re likely to be engaged in more effective Public Relations by understanding who the real influencers are.
• ORM takes a role in providing early warning systems for reactive and defensive PR.
• This may also help in reducing marketing dollars by learning how to reach out to customers more cheaply.
• May reduce internal costs by employing services which save time and effort, as well as money.
• ORM helps to identify gaps for products and services which can be developed for profitable niche markets.
• It gains insight into online networks and keywords and key phrases found in user-generated content, which can help to bolster natural search results about the person, product, or business.

Tips for maximizing the efficiency of your online reputation management endeavors:

1. Set up your social networking sites with your own name.

In other words, you need to create an interlinked “web” of these powerful social networks – that all point to you. This is profoundly important because it establishes your presence in the major search engines like Google. Using aliases, pen names or otherwise will not help establish your branding effectiveness.

2. Try to get the same username set up for all of your social media engagement profiles.

3. When you add any type of content to your social networking sites, keep your online reputation management plan in mind. You should add relevant materials.

Seeing the advantages of Online Management training, I can say that it’s a mistake for companies to launch an online reputation management campaign after the damage of bad press has already spread which is a mistake. Everyone must take a preventative approach to protect  business.

This great post was contributed by Eleanor Marks Prior, WordPress Whiz and Social Media maven.

With great pride I would like to announce that I have received my certification to become an “official” online business manager. The training took place from March to August under the watchful eyes of Tina Forsyth and Andrea J. Lee, two very well know entitites in the world of multiple streams of income for online businesses.

If you are interested what the certification entails, check out the website: http://www.certifiedobm.com. The training was very thorough and brought all my virtual assistant skills and my management knowledge together in one sophisticated model that will support my clients’ businesses successfully in their growth and active maintenance periods.

Tina, herself a very successful online business manager and mentor of new and existing online business managers (OBMs)  is the first to officially talk about the “OBM” role. People have worked unofficially in the role of an OBM before, but Tina has defined, finalized and announced the term of the OBM for everybody to see in her book: “How to become an online business manager”. 

Most people I’ve talked to read this book with a strong interest as it offers ambitious virtual assistants a fresh career opportunity with more responsibility and added value. It is also a good read for business owners who want to know what this hype about online business management is all about. Business owners nowadays more and more realise that they need to let go of some tasks in their business to grow. There is simply no other way to achieve growth.

If you look in the offline world, the brick and mortar businesses never really function with one owner by him/herself for long! They either get their spouse, their children, family members and eventually outside help into the business to grow. It’s still a bit the “do it yourself” mentality online, though. The more you grow the more you realise how burned out you get if you don’t delegate. Your business is not simply a business. Most entrepreneurs and coaches start their online business based on their passion and life purpose (and that’s probably why it’s so hard to let go and delegate!), but to succeed and share your message with the world, you need to look outside and gracously receive help from other talented human beings who love your business (almost ) as much as you do. Yes, this is possible.

When I look at some of my clients’ businesses and the amazing things they help their clients with I know that I’m in the right job. I like helping people and when I help you, I actually help a whole lot of other people because they are able to access you with my assistance. Without your OBM and VAs you don’t grow your online business and these people miss out because you only have so much time to serve clients one-on-one.

Thanks to Tina and Andrea for all your support and help with the online manager certification. You both are an inspiration! Check out my resource page for some excellent programs Andrea and Tina created to help you with your strategies.

Wondering if you should hire an Online Business Manager?

Here are 5 tell-tale signs that it may be time for you to add an OBM to your team.

1. 1. Your business is growing while your own free-time is shrinking.
2. I’m betting you started your business to create more freedom in your life yes? Freedom of time, money and choice. Let me ask you – as your business grows are you actually working more or less time?                                                                                                         

If you are on the ‘working more time’ side of things you certainly aren’t alone… I can’t count how many times i’ve talked to business owners who have shared how they are actually working more hours in their own business than they ever did in their ‘old job’.

However it doesn’t have to be this way… as a business owner you have the ‘freedom of choice’ to be able to make changes in your business, including hiring the right help to get stuff off your plate.      

This is exactly what an Online Business Manager does – their main focus is to free up the business owner so that they can focus their time and energy on the things that only THEY can do in their business.

2. You are having to turn away opportunities because you are so busy!

This is a sad by-product of the first point. Are you so busy that you can’t take advantage of the opportunities that are coming your way? Do you ever find yourself saying “I would love to do X and know it would be a great new revenue stream… but I simply don’t have the time for it right now… ”

Not only can an Online Business Manager help free up your own time to be able to explore these opportunities, they can also work on bringing some of these opportunities to life for you! An Online Business Manager is very focused on implementation, and can help manage the process of creating new revenue streams in your business from concept to launch.

3. You are still doing things the same things you were doing when you started your business.

Remember when you first started your business and had to wear many hats? You were the cook, hostess, waitress and busboy (so to speak, hehe.) Now that your business is growing, are you still doing the same things as you were in the beginning? Are you still updating your own website? Are you still managing your shopping cart? Are you still answering all your customer service emails?

As your business grows your role will (and should!) change. An Online Business Manager can lovingly ‘slap your wrist’ when it comes to you doing some of these things… helping you let go of some of the ‘old’ stuff taking up your time that gets in the way of you growing your business.

4. You have a great team, but find yourself frustrated by them always ‘bugging’ you.

This is actually a very common complaint from business owners – they have a great team of VAs, webmasters and such. And yet they are constantly frustrated by how much their team needs from them. They feel like someone is always tapping them on the shoulder with a question or request. The thing is, your team does need someone to manage them. They need someone who they can turn to with questions, to get what they need to complete their projects quickly and on time.

And if there is not an Online Business Manager on the team who do they turn to? You – the business owner. As a colleague of mine so eloquently shared: “My VAs were doing a fine job – it was ME who was unhappy managing them.” Most business owners really don’t enjoying being managers, and i’m guessing this may be the same for you. An Online Business Manager becomes the key point of contact for your team – all questions, requests and such go to the OBM instead of you.

5. You are stuck at $X revenue and can’t seem to get past that point!

When you find yourself stuck at a certain point in revenue there is usually one thing getting in the way – you! My business partner Andrea Lee calls this the quarter million dollar speedbump (can be more or less than that of course) and a big part of the solution usually requires you removing yourself from the day-to-day of your business.

Start to ask yourself as you go about your day – do I need to be the person to do X? (with X being the many things you spend your time on each day.)

Chances are many things on your to-do list could be passed along to someone else on your team. And an Online Business Manager can help with that process by delegating and managing those tasks on your behalf.

Ready to hire an Online Business Manager?  

Tina Forsyth is the author of Becoming an Online Business Manager: Playing a Bigger Game with Your Clients and Yourself. She writes and consults in advanced online marketing and business systems for business owners and their support teams. www.OnlineBusinessManager.com