Personal Assistant Services: For those looking for a Personal Assistant & Qualified Candidates looking for Personal Assistant Jobs
Personal assistant services are generally carried out by professionals who are highly organized and highly resourceful. Personal assistant job responsibilities require the applicant to provide support for a family or an individual, but these responsibilities may vary greatly depending on the specific needs at the time. On this page, you’ll find helpful information about why you may want to hire a personal assistant, important personal assistant qualities, and how to hire a personal assistant to meet your needs and the needs of your family.
Why You May Need a Personal Assistant
There are many reasons why people hire a personal assistant for work and or home. Busy professionals often hire personal assistants to help keep track of meetings and deadlines in the office or while traveling for business. These are commonly referred to as corporate personal assistants.
However, many people also hire home personal assistants to help organize and coordinate household responsibilities. In this way, a personal assistant may help you with travel planning, pet care, errands, and phone calls to schedule important appointments. Other common household needs that a personal assistant can handle include booking hotels, doing dietary research, formatting family photographs, event planning, dinner reservations, and making household payments.
One of the best reasons to hire a personal assistant is to reduce stress in your life. These household professionals can handle life’s little burdens and hassles so that they don’t weigh you down or overwhelm you. A personal assistant can help you can better control over your life, take on tedious and time-consuming tasks that you don’t have time for, and help you prioritize the things that are most important to you. You’ll quickly find yourself being more efficient, productive, calm, and happy after delegating certain tasks to a personal assistant who knows your needs and preferences well.
Common Personal Assistant Job Responsibilities
Individuals who are looking for a personal assistant should consider candidates who maintain the highest level of professionalism at all times. This is important because your personal assistant will often be speaking or action on behalf of you to get tasks done. These individuals should also be able to handle a wide range of responsibilities. The list of responsibilities that personal assistant services usually include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Calendar management; anticipate calendar risk and plan contingencies with multiple options
- Travel arrangements, including flights, hotels, ground transportation, guest travel, etc.
- Organization of events/engagements
- Reservations
- Running errands
- Clerical duties (answer phones, data entry, filing)
- Various projects as requested
- Keeping Principal on-task and on-schedule with multiple task lists
- Negotiating with service providers for Principal (hotels, car service, etc.)
- Work with internal team (executives, accountant, lawyer, etc.) on Principal’s behalf
- Pro-actively anticipation of Principal’s needs
- Supporting Principal with other duties as required
Important Skills for Candidates that are Looking for Personal Assistance Jobs
Suitable candidates for personal assistant jobs must be able to fulfill a number of responsibilities on the fly. Your priorities may change day to day, so it’s important for your personal assistant to be flexible and able to accommodate changing requests with little advance notice. To succeed in this line of work, personal assistants should generally possess the following skills and abilities:
- Successfully handle complex travel and logistical arrangements with minimal notice
- Be highly organized and able to manage multiple projects simultaneously while prioritizing critical tasks
- Be self-motivated and possess a positive “can-do” attitude
- Anticipate issues before they happen and plan option-based contingencies
- Remain hard working, highly efficient and extremely detail oriented while maintaining accuracy
- Strong computer skills including PC and Mac
- Strong technology skills including smart phone, iPad, tablet etc.
- Superior oral and written communication skills
- Strong problem-solving skills
- Know when/how to be assertive to get things done
- Quickly respond to requests and be completely dependable on follow-through
- Demonstrate the ability to handle sensitive, confidential information
- Possess versatile professionalism with a high standard of integrity, and be able to maintain professionalism and composure in a highly stressful environment
- Willingness to undertake travel
Qualities All Great Personal Assistants Have
Household Staffing International has worked with so many wonderful personal assistant candidates over the years, so we’ve noticed certain patterns and shared characteristics. Successful personal assistants have great interpersonal skills, active listening skills, and make a priority of being accurate and detail-oriented. They are extremely reliable, have good intuition, know how to practice discretion when needed, and take a proactive approach to their jobs. Before you hire a personal assistant, it’s important to assess the candidate’s honesty, loyalty, and work style to ensure that it meshes well with your own.
Many of the candidates we’ve worked with to place in homes have broad and well-rounded life experiences that make them well-suited to the job. Personal assistants come from all backgrounds and bring a wealth of worldly knowledge with them to help keep you organized and on track with your personal goals. These household professionals will become your “right hand man” or “right hand woman” who will get to know you in ways that many other people in your life never will.
How a Personal Assistant Can Cater to Your Needs
For personal and family tasks, personal assistants need to understand what your strengths and weaknesses are and where they can best step in to help. Some personal assistants take directions well but need a lot of hand-holding to know what to do and when to do it. This may be all that you require of a personal assistant, especially if you don’t want to delegate too much responsibility, at least in the beginning.
However, more experienced personal assistants can handle many tasks at once and take independent initiative, just as long as you establish the appropriate processes and protocols to follow first. These household staff members are more autonomous and can help you leverage your time better than ever before.
How to Hire a Personal Assistant of Your Own
At Household Staffing International, our favorite personal assistant is Mrs. Moneypenny. She possesses many of the characteristics and skills of a qualified personal assistant and sets an example for others in this profession to follow.
Agencies like Household Staffing International can help families and individuals who are looking for personal assistance to clearly define their needs and find a candidate that matches their expectations. We have been helping establish successful household employer-employee relationships since 1974 and understand what it takes to find a good fit.
If you’re looking to satisfy a need for personal assistant services, consider filling out an application. We also welcome you to call us at 212-683-7722 to tell us in detail about your current needs and what you could use household help with the most.
Meanwhile, if you think that you have what it takes to become a great personal assistant, take the first step and complete an application for employment. We would love to help you find an amazing household employment setting to put your impressive set of skills to work.