Episode breakdown
Barbara Turley is an investor, entrepreneur, and Founder & CEO of The Virtual Hub – a business she started by accident that exploded in the space of 12 months to become one of the leading companies that recruits, trains, and manages support assistants for businesses who need to free up time and energy so they can go to the next level. With a strong focus on customized training and ongoing career development, Barbara ensures that her team is trained in cutting-edge programs (like Hubspot, Ontraport, etc.) to best meet their clients’ unique needs in digital marketing, social media, personal assistant services, and administrative support. Barbara is also a mom (to her gorgeous daughter Ruby), wife to her best friend Eti and an adventure lover with a passion for horses, skiing, tennis, and spending time in nature.
- Barbara’s journey to now
- Why people fail with support assistants
- Why an A player is not always the right person
- What motivates Barbara Turley
- The weaknesses of Barbara Turley which she turned into strengths
- Barbara Turley’s advice for her audience
“I'm not really interested in being in a race with other people, I don't really care what anybody else is doing, but I like to be at the coalface of whatever I'm doing"
In this episode
00:38 Barbara Turley’s Career Journey
Barbara shares her early fascination with finance, starting as a junior trader in Dublin, her move to Sydney for lifestyle reasons, and a long career in investment banking. She discusses leaving corporate life to travel, facing the 2008 financial crisis, and eventually transitioning into entrepreneurship through opportunities that arose unexpectedly.
06:48 Founding The Virtual Hub
Barbara explains how, while working as a business coach, she discovered a recurring issue: small business owners were too busy with operational tasks to focus on strategy. By informally sourcing support assistants from the Philippines to help clients, she realized the potential for a business and launched The Virtual Hub, which organically grew from that need.
08:34 Challenges in Delegation and Business Scaling
The conversation focuses on common mistakes businesses make with outsourcing, especially misunderstanding what virtual assistants are best suited for. Barbara highlights the importance of structured delegation, systems, and processes, revealing that solving one business problem often exposes the next, which became a foundational principle in scaling her company.
12:33 Building Effective Offshore Teams
Barbara and Roman discuss the value of treating support assistants like integral team members, not disposable contractors. They stress creating respectful, trusting relationships and environments where remote workers are valued, which enhances productivity and loyalty.
15:11 Motivations and Personal Drivers
Barbara reflects on her internal drive to succeed, attributing it to a mix of self-competition and a desire for excellence. She acknowledges deeper emotional factors and discusses how the pandemic increased her sense of responsibility to support her team in the Philippines, positioning entrepreneurs as the next ‘frontliners’ for economic recovery.
19:18 Future of Remote Work Post-COVID
They explore how the pandemic has shifted perceptions around remote work. Barbara shares her journey of moving from a remote to office-based model due to scaling challenges, and now faces decisions about what the future should look like after successfully managing a sudden return to remote operations.
23:06 Turning Weakness into Strength
Barbara admits that her deep trust and loyalty were once weaknesses, leading to difficulties in setting boundaries and being taken advantage of. Over time, she converted this into a strength by building systems and transparent reporting structures that maintain integrity without compromising her values.
27:25 Professional and Personal Advice
Barbara advises business owners to prioritize a well-executed offshore team strategy for scalability and operational efficiency. Personally, she emphasizes listening to intuition, balancing the masculine energy of systems with the feminine energy of gut feeling, which she credits for guiding pivotal decisions throughout her career.
30:09 Closing and Resources
Barbara directs listeners to a special resource page for the podcast audience, offering free guides and courses about working with support assistants and scaling businesses effectively.
