I participated this past week in the Problogger Killer Title contest and I wanted to share some of my favorite titles and blog posts discovered in checking out all of the competitors. There were some wonderful entries and the winner (chosen randomly) was Mjuboy with a truly killer title, Sacrificing Goats and Eating Brains and a post featuring some lovely photos.

Here are some of my favorite contestants:

• Beggar or A List Celebrity from Net Writing
• Are Premium Themes & Plugins Legal from Tech Based Marketing
• The 16 next-gen gadgets by Mediamentalist
• Why Sex Isn’t Enough from Loring Parks
• Are You A Loser on The Internet by Navi
• Journey to the Pit of Hell by Dave Lafferty
• Twitter and Plurk Get Pinged by Jen
• Do Not Click Here by Richard Ball
• Shut Up and Kiss Me by Dawn

It was so fun to participate in the contest and I think I’ll spend more time this weekend surfing the submissions!
<hr /><address>Laurie Mapp, Owner</address> <address><a href=”http://halosecretarialservices.com”>Halo Secretarial Services</a></address> <address>Contact us for more information on virtual legal assistance!
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Check out my guest post about virtual assistance this week over at Grant Griffiths’ Home Office Lawyer. Grant was kind enough to ask for a guest post from me - I just love his work! Grant also has a couple of other sites you may want to check out G2 Web Media and Home Office Warrior.

Have a wonderful long weekend everyone! I’m going to enjoy it - we’re having a birthday party for our just turned four year old and getting ready to send the biggest boy to grade one!

Not too long ago I wrote this post on the financial cost of hiring a virtual assistant. In today’s post I’ll address a different kind of cost - the cost of time spent unnecessarily.

How much time did you spend on email this week? How many emails are sitting in your inbox? Have you struggled with formatting your documents in a time crunch or have you missed sending invoice reminders because you are too busy to get to them? Do you have a regular assistant but she too is overwhelmed with tasks?

Most of us feel like we could use more time in our days, but we rarely realize how much can be delegated if we find someone reliable, dedicated and trustworthy to take on some of the burden. The right virtual assistant will help you streamline the running of your business or your law practice and you will have more time in your day finally!

I read a great article today from Law Practice Today where one lawyer documented her first use of a virtual legal assistant and how quickly it lead to an ongoing partnership with a VA, as she realized the potential benefits were significant. One thing you might note in this article is that the lawyer needed assistance on an urgent basis - something a virtual assistant can often easily step in and provide. Virtual assistants each set their own working hours, but many of us are open to assisting after regular office hours, on weekends and on a rush basis.

I challenge those of you who think you don’t “need” a virtual assistant, but who are running a business, to document over the next few days how much time is spent on tasks that could be delegated - whether that is your email, document proofing and formatting, calling a client to schedule a meeting or doing a draft of court documents from your client meeting notes. Realize that if you gave clear instructions to a qualified virtual assistant that you could save all that time and put it to wonderful use - or you could just enjoy some free time!

I was supposed to go back to my office job this fall, after maternity leave with my third child. People asked me why I didn’t want to go back, after learning that I had no plans to return. It was hard to truly explain to them why options like flex time or part-time didn’t really help me enough to make it worth returning. I should send them this great post from Chuck Newton - I Don’t Want No Freakin Flex Time- it might help a little more!!

Flex time, part-time, job-share - these “options” sound great in theory sometimes. But a 6 hour day instead of 8, with a two hour commute total is still a long day away from my family. And it still requires full-time childcare, even though now I’d be on a part-time salary! Plus I would give up some of my benefits, get treated differently by my bosses and co-workers and miss out on choice assignments that require a full-time employee.

Working from home as a virtual legal assistant was definitely a better option! I can fit the work into my schedule and just the elimination of the commute buys me so much time in the day. If you are thinking about working part-time or flexible hours at your job, so that you can have more time for you in the day, consider working for yourself as another option -it’s got a lot to offer!

Here are some pics I took with my new digital camera of my “two” home offices.

These first two pictures are from my basement office. It’s relatively organized and I love my two desks, one for thinking, bill paying, large projects and the usual computer desk with scanner, printer etc.

Really though, I do the majority of my work from my laptop in my living room. It’s easier to control the rest of my life from there (aka the three boys, lunches, dinner, letting the dog out!) Plus I personally find it nice and comfy to settle down with my laptop onto the sofa. The baby plays on the floor near my feet (or sleeps in the sling while I work!)

Soon my oldest is back to school and I’m going to set up a better routine for the rest of us so I can get my work done around naptimes, some home lessons for the preschooler etc. I really will use my basement office I think -especially since the toyroom is right next door, and in winter that does get used!

I love working from home!

The rat race - aka the “real” world - is not all it’s cracked up to be. Commuting, meetings, contributing for yet another group gift - working in an office takes a lot out of us all. If you are thinking about getting out and starting a home-based or virtual business I highly recommend you check out The Rat Race Rebellion or the blog of the same name. The authors of the site/blog are the wonderful individuals who wrote the book The Two-Second Commute, a book I absolutely enjoyed and was critical in helping me decide to start my own virtual legal assistance business from my home.

Having said that, you’ll understand how pleased I was when my google alert this weekend turned up a notice that of a hit on my name from The Rat Race Rebellion Blog - on a post about how virtual paralegals are a great option but need more media attention to get lawyers to realize the value. Guess that interview with the CT Law Tribune was a great idea!!

Did that title catch your attention? I sure hope so, because it’s the inspiration for this post, which I’m writing to submit to the Killer Title project over at Problogger. You can check out the contest results on Friday and also check back at my blog on Friday, as I’ll be taking Darren up on his suggestion to post a list of my favorite titles/posts from the competition.

I might have been inspired by the contest, but the content of this post is simply inspired by my passion for my work. I LOVE being a virtual assistant. I love the feeling I get when I know my clients’ businesses are growing. I love showing my clients how easy it is to work with a virtual assistant and I love learning from them about their businesses, their lives and their passions! I also love working in my pj’s!!!

I used to enjoy my job in the “real” world, I was a legal assistant and paralegal for over 10 years. I worked in a couple of different places, made friends and worked hard. I went home at the end of the day and usually didn’t think much more about work after that (until the next morning anyway!) I would never have told you I was passionate about my job then though. I was just putting in my time until the next vacation, the next summer picnic, the next baby and maternity leave.

This past year I started my own virtual assistant business, offering virtual assistance to business owners and lawyers from my home office in Alberta. The work isn’t that different from what I did before. I need more clients to be profitable and I work an awful lot of hours! Still the feeling I get from being my own boss, from interacting with other virtual assistants, bloggers and twitterers (my home office water cooler!) is absolutely amazing. I’m using this newfound passion to develop my business and to help my clients improve their businesses! So if your business needs an injection of passion look me up!

If you want to see a good example of how a business can be really mobile and paperless watch this video from over at 21quinces. I love the tablet pc (like this one I’m guessing) that the realtor in the video uses. I think I might have to put one on my wish list!

Technology seems to improve by leaps and bounds every year - and even a regular laptop nowadays can make it so much easier to work from anywhere you want. I usually run my virtual assistant business right from home, but I know that I can take my computer with me if I’m traveling and still get everything done. My faxes come straight to my computer, most of my clients contact me by email or call my cell phone, and just in case I need something from my desktop computer I have SugarSync set up on all my computers which gives me access to all of my files from pretty much anywhere.

I recommend that all solo or small businesses try to be set up to be as mobile as possible. You may not stray far, but it’s nice to know you can if the opportunity comes up to take a trip or you just feel office-bound somedays and want to head to a local coffee shop to work!

I’m going to try and not work too much this weekend, we’re taking the kiddos to a waterpark and I need to finish getting organized for back to school (Sept 2!!) There’s always time for a little linksurfing and twittering though!!
Here are some links to peruse if you get a chance this weekend - and have a wonderful one!

From MasterMaq - where do we want free Wifi in Edmonton

Ooooh - just found this Alberta Blogs blog and I want to join - will be sending them an email!!

Good reminder from Gavin Craig at Minneapolis Business Lit blog

From Erin Blaskie - discussion of the VA Industry

Great post on capped fees from Law 21

Loved this one from Duct Tape Marketing on Social Media

Over at Build a Solo Practice, LLC is a great inspirational post about becoming an entrepreneur

Virtual Law Practice shares that virtual law offices are really catching on across several states now - yay!

Fluent Simplicity shares a great story about the power of Twitter

This video post from Freelance Parent over at Sparkplugging is a MUST watch

Create a Thriving Business has a wonderful post about how you MUST be online in to truly grow your business

Hope you enjoy some of these links and take care!

I am a strong believer in continuing education. Maybe it’s because I love to read and I really enjoyed school. Maybe it’s because I believe in improving myself. Or maybe it’s just because I’m so independent I like to do everything myself!

One of the things I’m learning about right now is WordPress. I had help setting up my VA site and blog, which are both WordPress based. I want to have some idea how to manage it myself though, so I learned how to use ftp and setup my own plugins and learned to manage my own editing and make small changes to the design. Now, to further my WP skills, I’m setting up a personal blog. It’s actually easier than I had expected, although I still think it was well worth the money to have someone set up my VA blog, especially when it comes to putting the logo into place and such.

I’m not planning on offering WP help to my clients or anything, but I do want to know enough to be able to update my own site and make suggestions to clients about possible changes to their blogs. WordPress is a great platform for this and I highly recommend it!