Who Needs a Personal Assistant?
The Top Misconceptions about Hiring a PA (And the Truth about those Misconceptions)
Our personal assistants aren’t what you’re thinking. The Middle does personal assistants differently. We only place part-time positions, our clients are regular people, and we don’t have any set plans or minimums- all at an accessible cost.
MISCONCEPTION #1Only Celebrities & CEOs Need a Personal Assistant
Admit it, you hear “personal assistant” and you think of an eager 20-something clinging to their phone trailing a high profile individual, available at their beck and call 24/7. It’s an easy assumption make when no one has made personal assistants quite so accessible- until now. Clearing the misconception that only celebrities and CEOs are busy enough/high profile enough/in need enough for a personal assistant is The Middle’s mission.
Who needs a personal assistant then? We believe personal assistants are for any busy person: parents, consultants, creators, artists, founders…basically, if you’re to-do list keeps getting longer and the free time in your day keeps getting shorter, you could benefit from working with a part-time personal assistant. Working with a personal assistant for even a few hours a week can make an impactful difference on your bandwidth- which is why we specifically place part-time personal assistant positions (that’s anywhere from 5-20 hours per week.) Continuing to do it all alone leads to burnout, shrinking personal time, and missed opportunities with your friends and family.
Imagine your task list checked off, your projects under control, your home decluttered and your life streamlined. That’s what working with a personal assistant is like. But working with a personal assistant from The Middle isn’t the intimidating employee onboarding you may be thinking of. Since work is on a part-time basis, our engagements are flexible, and with direct communication to your personal assistant- no paywalls or additional fees- it’s like working with a trusted friend.
MISCONCEPTION #2A Personal Assistant Is Just an Errand Runner
A personal assistant for private individuals is commonly delegated errands, but personal assistants are capable of so much more. Yes, often an errand is as simple as picking something up at the store, but what if the product is out of stock? Only available in a different size or color? We look for personal assistants who can do more than a no-questions-asked pickup, and have the foresight to ask those “What If?” questions first. So not only is your errand completed, but it’s done without needing your input halfway through.
What does a personal assistant do beyond errands? They can handle household organization, life admin like scheduling doctors appointments and managing registrations, and even business support. Our personal assistants are skilled administrators: they can streamline your daily life and household needs with simple SOPs, coordinate appointments and schedule meetings (making sure everything lands neatly on your calendar), or handle vendors and contractors for home projects.
Limiting your PA to running errands means limiting your own potential if you continue to try to do it all yourself.
MISCONCEPTION #3Too Expensive For Small Teams and Individuals
It’s an automatic assumption that personal assistants are too expensive for small teams and individuals unless they are celebrities or ultra high net worth. No one really stops to break down the math.
So let’s do that. A personal assistant for private individuals might work 5 hours per week tackling errands, scheduling appointments, and keeping your household running smoothly behind the scenes. At $30/hr, you would pay them $150/week- essentially, a dinner for 2 out in the city.
If you're a small business owner or founder, you may work with your executive personal assistant for 10 hrs/wk. They schedule your meetings, keep deadlines on track, handle registrations, and manage all of the small administration needs that are inevitable in any business. At $30/hr, you would pay them $300/week. By comparison, a salaried full-time executive assistant (who you as a small business owner don’t need full time hours from) would cost you approximately $1346/week ($70,000/year).
You don’t need to handle it all yourself. Instead of letting your to-do list run your life, free up your mental bandwidth by working with a part-time personal assistant. Our clients, especially those with demanding jobs whose personal lives fall behind all too easily, have praised the relief they feel now that they can pass of daily to-dos to their personal assistant.
My whole business changed when I hired my assistant. There is no reason I should be spending my days scheduling and tracking interviews when the big picture direction of The Middle had been neglected. My assistant finally freed up my time so that I could tackle the projects I’d been putting off for years- like The Middle’s Instagram and TikTok!
MISCONCEPTION #4You Must Be Fully Organized First
If you were fully organized…would you need to hire a personal assistant? Maybe so, but that’s also what they are for! You don’t need to be fully organized, you just need to know what you can delegate. I totally get it, when I hired my assistant, I didn’t think I had all my ducks in a row to bring someone on (and I’m an insanely organized person). But I was overwhelmed and had let it get too far- and just the act of hiring an assistant forced me to get organized piece by piece.
A personal assistant can build systems to manage your home and work. They triage your inbox- they’re the type of people who like organizing and color coding and giving everything a place. They keep notes on vendors, birthdays, airline preferences, and other personal details so they can be more efficient with each routine task. They will help you put structures in place that help make life run smoothly.
When you interview personal assistant candidates, it’s helpful to evaluate organizational skills to see which fit best with your lifestyle. While we’re confident all of our candidates are organized both physically and digitally (or they wouldn’t be PAs!), it’s important to make sure their skill set aligns with your needs. Are you in desperate need of an inbox cleanup, a Google Drive folder system, or calendar management? You might want a candidate with stronger admin experience or executive assistant experience. Are you consistently running out of stock of certain household staples, or have a closet that hasn’t been organized in decades? You might want a candidate with a background working in a home environment or who expresses a particular joy in organizing spaces.
MISCONCEPTION #5One PA Can Do Everything
Personal assistants are certainly multifaceted and can handle a variety of tasks, but expecting a Jack of All Trades and Master of All too is an unrealistic expectation.
Personal assistants are versatile but each have their own strengths. The PA who’s a pro at graphic design might not be the same PA who excels at travel planning. The PA who loves dogs and can offer pet care might not be the same PA who has years of project management experience. Identifying the ‘need-to-haves’ and the ‘nice-to-haves’ for your role helps us match you with appropriate candidates. We need to know if it’s a requirement that your PA has graphic design experience, or simply a bonus (for example.)
This applies not just to individual skills, but also to the general scope of work. Seasoned executive assistants might not be the best fit to support a family in a household/family assistant position, and an experienced house manager might not be the right fit for a founder looking for support growing their business. This is where our matching comes in- we know our candidates’ strengths and match them with our clients’ needs accordingly.
Expecting one PA to excel in all areas will set your PA up for failure, and you up for disappointment. It’s best to be transparent and descriptive about your needs in our Client Questionnaire and learn about specific skill sets that are most applicable to your role during interviews. Ask your candidates to share stories of prior experience that is relevant to your requirements.
MISCONCEPTION #6Remote PAs Can’t Handle Sensitive Work
It’s hard to develop trust when the person supporting you is across the world, across a third party platform, or in another state. That’s why we focus on direct relationships between our PAs and clients. You’ll enjoy direct communication with your hired personal assistant so you can develop a 1:1 working relationship. Our PAs are always based in your city so you can meet with your PA in real life and make a real human connection, even if the work is remote.
If you are working remotely with you PA, you can always require NDAs, work with software that offers security for sensitive information, or set up a new email address for your PA so they do not require access to yours.
Granting access to certain information does allow your PA to take tasks that may require personal information off your plate- like booking airline tickets, or paying bills, but you should only share sensitive information as you feel comfortable. Some clients prefer to start work predominantly in person so they can build trust, and then transition to remote work once established. Others prefer to speak with references (we do conduct reference checks for all candidates), and some may simply need time. What you share with your personal assistant is entirely up to you, when you want, and how you want.
MISCONCEPTION #7It’s Faster to Do It Myself
You’re right, it is faster to do it yourself- if you had to explain a routine task to a new person every time it needed to be done. We place part-time personal assistants in ongoing positions, which means you’ll work with the same PA for everything you need done. These aren’t temp or contract gigs where you’ll have to swap in a new person every few months or each time you need support. Because of that, your PA will learn your routines and preferences and be able to act as a second you.
Personal assistants should create their own SOPs for your life- a guide they can reference for any and all tasks so they don’t need to repeatedly ask you for details. Over time, your PA will start to own tasks that were once routine for you. I saw this firsthand with my own assistant. I used to schedule every interview, and now that is her responsibility. In the beginning, she naturally had questions and I needed to show her how it was done, but after an initial (short) period of oversight, she’s now a pro- and sometimes I have to ask her how things are done!
If you don’t learn to delegate, you’ll never really enjoy the benefits of working with a personal assistant. Start small, and then keep going- keep passing tasks off that really are not worth your time. Small lifts to consistently pass off tasks will result in greater freedom in your mind and in your time so you can focus on the things that really matter- bigger picture projects, your family, or yourself.
MISCONCEPTION #8Good PAs Don’t Need Onboarding or Structure
Every client is different. You could start working with a personal assistant who has 10 years of experience, but their prior client liked things done completely differently from how you would like them to be done. When two individuals start working together, there will always be a learning curve, but good PAs will learn fast and adapt.
However, a good PA can’t be a good PA if no tasks are ever given to them. You can’t expect your PA to show up on Day One and know where things are in your home, or how you handle business. Onboarding a personal assistant isn’t a scary corporate training program, but it does mean you’ll need to introduce them to your life, share your preferences, and let them know when you need them.
We recommend having a weekly standing meeting with your PA, at least in the beginning. This way there is a set time for you to pass off a core to-do list and go over priorities for the week. Can be 15 minutes! But having that face time anchors the work and allows both you and your PAs to have a touch base for any questions that may have come up or that they may have moving forward.
As with most aspects of working with a PA, over time they’ll learn your preferences and will be able to run with little direction- keeping your life running smoothly and handling the daily road bumps along the way.
