Rachel Ngom: Hey, Barbara, welcome to the show.

Barbara Turley: Hey Rachel, thanks for having me. It’s great to be here.

Rachel Ngom: I’m so excited to have you on. So why don’t we start off? Just tell us a little bit about yourself.

Barbara Turley: Sure, so where do I start? Well, I live in Sydney, Australia, but I’m originally from Ireland. So some people wouldn’t pick that up from my accent. But I’ve lived in Sydney now for about 17 years. Yeah, forged a career, business, life, got married. I have a daughter who’s two and a half, so she keeps me on my toes. And I have a business in the Philippines that’s about five years old. So if you can imagine, I have a toddler business and a toddler. A real toddler. Gives you some insight.

Rachel Ngom: Tell us about your business.

Barbara Turley: Sure, so the Virtual Hub is a business that recruits, trains, and manages virtual assistants in the Philippines, mainly in the digital marketing and social media space. And we specifically train in those areas. So at the moment, we have just ticked over 100 employees right now on the ground in the Philippines. So it’s going good. Yeah, we’ve got offices set up over there. And we’ve got a great team on the ground over there. So yeah, I’m making it sound like it was so easy, but as I smile through it.

It’s a good day. It’s good today.

Rachel Ngom: So how does that work? Were you there physically in the Philippines for a while, setting it up? How did you actually, how did you do that?

Barbara Turley: Yeah, look, people who’ve heard me speak before might have heard me talk about my accidental business because I didn’t intend at all to do this. I actually had a background in investment banking. I spent most of my career in the investment banks here in Sydney. I was on the trading floors, so nothing to do with the Philippines or HR management or outsourcing, or anything like that. But I left corporate about seven years ago, and I started doing some business coaching. Like lots of corporates, we start doing consulting and stuff when we leave. And I noticed that all the businesses I was coaching all had the same problem. It didn’t matter whether they were brick and mortar, online, offline, whether they were a financial advisor or a yoga teacher or a tennis coach or anything, they were all trying to do everything themselves. And the smaller businesses, yeah, they’re in that trap of they can’t grow because there’s too much to do, but they haven’t grown enough to hire people. So there’s this horrible sort of deep crevice that you end up in.

And I had gotten a VA myself in the Philippines, so I just got a few of her friends to start working for some clients. And before I knew it, I was just getting way more demand for that than I was for business coaching. So I thought, I wonder, is there a business in this? And here we are five years later.

Rachel Ngom: Okay, I love that, kind of like accidental business.

Barbara Turley: Totally, totally by accident. We had no name or anything. It was just like, people are asking for this. I think I might try a bit more of this. And then it morphed over the years into what it is today. It’s a much more developed platform today.

Rachel Ngom: Yeah. Okay. So what you were saying really speaks into the problem I see so many entrepreneurs having of they need to outsource because they’re trying to do everything themselves, but in their head, they think they can’t afford to outsource. So how, how are you helping solve that problem for them?

Barbara Turley: Yeah, so a couple of things here. It is a valid concern, right? So when you’re starting out, I mean, it’s so difficult because there is so much to do, right? And I think what I would say to people these days is that I see too many people in the beginning get caught up with their branding, all their story, and all that stuff, which is obviously important, but it’s far better off in the beginning stages for you to just go straight after sales. You’ve got to find something that people will literally fall over themselves to pay you to do now, like not in the future, because I’ve gone through this too. Like, you’ve got to solve a pain point that exists for your client or your customer today.

Now, I know we all hear this, but we still get caught up in this. I need a website, I need, need, I need. And yes, you do, but when you’re not making any money, you’re going to spend all your time doing that stuff, and you will struggle to even get a VA because you need to have cash flow. So, look, our business, we sort of specialize more in businesses that are a little bit more established now because we do a minimum of 20 hours. But you can, 20 hours a week, sorry. But you can go online and find a VA for a few hours a week to help you out. And it is worth just dipping your toe to get a few things off your plate in the early days.

Rachel Ngom: For sure. That’s exactly what I did. So, I mean, when I started my company, I didn’t have a ton of money to outsource or anything like that.

[nobody does]

Nobody does. But I was like, nobody does. If I want this to be a legitimate business, I have to figure this out, and I have to have someone to help me with these little tech things that just drive you crazy, and you spend so much time doing it, and it could take someone else literally like a minute, and they’re like, done.

So I hired someone in the Philippines for like 6.50 an hour, 10 hours a week. And just having that little bit freed up so much energy, so I could focus on what I’m really good at in my zone of genius and creating content and serving people. So I agree 100% with what you’re doing.

Barbara Turley: Good! Because yeah, because it is hard. And I think people, look, there’s a few things with outsourcing that can be difficult for people because a lot of people have been burnt. It is, it’s not as easy as people think. People think it’s just, I’ll go and get a VA for five bucks an hour and everything will be great. It’s not necessarily that way all the time, but it is worth trying to hustle and find, maybe try a few. It’s worth it. It’s worth it to make this work, put it that way. It’s really worth it to make it work.

Rachel Ngom: It is. I hosted an event, and one of my VIP clients came, and she was really struggling with outsourcing because she wanted to do it all herself and be in that control. And I’m like, boo, you can have control or you can have growth, but you can’t have both. Like, you have to figure out a way to let go a little bit and empower somebody else to take over. Otherwise, you’re going to stay here, and you’re not going to go anywhere.

Barbara Turley: You know what as well? Business is messy. We all want, particularly women, we all want everything to be perfect and our website to look amazing. Of course, we want all those things. But the reality is, what I learned from this business, when I first started this, nobody asked me what my web address was. Nobody cared. They were just like, “Can you get me one of those VAs?” You know, that was the thing. They didn’t care that I had no brand, no name, nothing.

And that grew over time afterwards, but it was a really good lesson for me because I had done all the things I’m talking about in a business prior to that, where I’d done the website, spent a lot of money, and all this sort of stuff. And today I’m just like, the most successful businesses just go out and sell something and then figure it out later and build as you go. And people will forget the crappy brand you had in the beginning anyway. It’ll be rubbish in the beginning.

Rachel Ngom: Okay. So everyone listening, write that down, just sell something and then figure it out as you go. Cause that literally is what successful entrepreneurs do. You don’t have all of the answers all of the time. It’s just taking best the action is something I talk about all the time. You have to, if you want to.

Barbara Turley: Messy action, yes. I mean, if I was to look at the website I have today when I was starting out, I probably wouldn’t do it because I’d be like, look at them, they’ve got all this content. And yeah, of course we have that, but I’ve been hustling hard for five years at this thing. In the beginning, like I said, we had nothing, and then I had a landing page for about six months because we were so busy trying to fulfill client needs that nobody cared about the website.

Rachel Ngom: So what were some of the first things that you did, the first people that you hired to really get this off the ground?

Barbara Turley: Look, the first thing you definitely need is a, well, it depends on what you’re doing, but I always think a good generalist VA is always good. Someone who can kind of cross different areas because in any small business, you’ve got emails to be answered, you’ve got bookings to go on, you might have social media. So you want someone that can maybe do Canva, maybe be a bit creative, but they don’t necessarily need to be a graphic designer. Someone who can handle putting a blog up on WordPress. So a few techie skills.

Good generalist, all-rounder online VA is a good place to start. And then as you grow and as you get better with that VA, you’ll discover that VA has a natural strength somewhere, and you may hire a second one and move that VA up into that more specialist role, or leave them in general and hire a graphic designer later, as you grow. So that’s generally what I recommend doing.

Rachel Ngom: Cool. That’s kind of what I did in my company. I hired a general VA and then kind of promoted her. She’s more like project manager. And then we hired someone, she was doing everything. And then we hired someone to do customer service, and we hired someone to do social media and bookkeeping, and all those other things. But that’s exactly how we started. How did you start your company? What were some of the first things that you did to get it off the ground?

Barbara Turley: Well, like I said, so I left corporate, and my first foray into my own business was, I still have this platform actually. I started a platform called energizewealth.com. It’s still there. I leave it there as kind of like my labor of love. I did the whole content thing. I did Product Launch Formula. I launched an online program. So I did all the bells and whistles.

God, it was hard. I mean, it was hard yards, right? So I did have a VA working with me there. And I was doing some consulting to private clients as well. So that was kind of my cash cow at the time. And that was where I discovered this virtual assistant thing. And I guess, look, my background being in banking and trading in particular, I was used to making very fast decisions. So overnight, I was like, we’re closing that, we’re opening this. Like I was like, forget that, we’re doing this instead because I could see that there was a business in that. I was like, people are clamoring over themselves for this thing. I’m going to sell this and not that.

Rachel Ngom: Let me hold on. Let me stop you for a second and highlight what you just said. Successful entrepreneurs take, they make fast decisions, and that’s exactly what you did. Okay. Keep going. Sorry.

Barbara Turley: Yeah, no, it’s a really important point. And I’m glad you paused there because people have asked me in the past, like, how do you get to the point where you were able to do that? And I’ve always said that it is a skill you can hone. You’re not necessarily born with it. But I had 10 years on a trading floor where you’re making fast decisions every second. So for me, it was very much second nature. And that was probably a reason why I was quite successful.

And even at this game, I’ve been very successful at going, that’s not working, we’re doing this. And I just forget about it. Don’t get wedded to the vision or, you know, I hear people go, “But that’s not my vision.” I go, don’t worry about that. Your vision will come back into play, but you may need to pivot over here a little bit and see what’s over there, and dig under things. And I think people get stuck with what they wanted to do. You know what I mean? So yeah, that fast decision-making, pivoting fast, is really important to do.

Rachel Ngom: Definitely. So when you’re setting stuff up in the Philippines, you had a few friends that were there. What were some of those steps that you took to actually set up the office? Like, who did you hire? What systems did you put in place? Like, what did that look like?

Barbara Turley: Yeah, so look, one of the first systems that I took on board, and I still use today, and the whole company has run off this amazing system called Asana.com, which is free.

Rachel Ngom: We use it.

Barbara Turley: Yeah, I started with this free Asana. I was on the free Asana until a year ago. I only upgraded to premium a year ago, even though we had so many people, but it just became apparent we needed that. The reason Asana is so great, particularly when you’re running teams, particularly offshore teams or VAs, people try and communicate tasks via email. And that is just a disaster. Like, I won’t even get into why, but just listen to me. Don’t do it. Put something on Asana, and it helps you to organize your thoughts and organize your task lists and then to have communication flow per task with your VA.

It’s a very simple tool. I’d recommend anyone do it. So I started off doing that, and then as I was helping VAs into businesses for clients, I noticed that clients didn’t know how to do this, and I was like, I thought everyone knew how to do this. So I quickly kind of pivoted actually from just recruiting VAs into helping clients to understand how to delegate more effectively. And I built a small training program purely showing them how to use Asana and LastPass and those kinds of little tools. So the business developed slowly by me getting feedback from clients and then later from the actual VAs that became employees, of their experience of clients and the clients’ experience of the VAs. I know the company today very much focuses on success between the two.

But that’s taken a long time to build, and it’s just incremental. Again, like I said, this is not working. Let’s do this instead. And just being very nimble. So Asana definitely, and creating your task lists. So, for example, your recurring task lists, what are all the tasks that keep the engine of your business moving on a daily, weekly basis? Those are different from project tasks. So you’ve got your recurring tasks and your project tasks.

And those are the ones you start to delegate slowly. So I’m hoping that’s kind of answering the question for you, but there’s so much more to it today, but that’s a great place to start.

Rachel Ngom: Asana is amazing, and that’s definitely a great place to start. What are some of the things you see entrepreneurs needing to delegate and get off of their plate first?

Barbara Turley: Social media is a massive one. It’s like a sock. Social media is great, but some people are very precious about their social media profiles, and I know why, because they’re influencers and stuff like that, and it is important to have your presence right and your brand and all that on social media. But it’s also important to remember that sometimes having a presence is better than just getting frozen and doing nothing. Yeah.

And we spend ages tinkering with Canva and figuring out what fonts we like and all this stuff when really a VA can do a lot of that promotion of your content. So if you are producing video or podcasts or any of that sort of stuff, a VA can quickly turn that into social media posts. Just get it out there, just get it spread. Otherwise, you’re going to spend all day with that. That’s a big one for me anyway.

Rachel Ngom: Definitely. I mean, we have someone doing social media on our team, and it’s crazy to think I used to do all of that myself. And just looking at everything that she’s doing, I’m like, dear God. Like, yeah, it’s awesome to have that freedom.

Barbara Turley: I think as well you’ve got to get comfortable with things not being perfect, like we said before. So if it’s 80% good, you can tweak it yourself, spend a few minutes tweaking something. It’s better than doing it all yourself. And if you’ve got very little money to pay an agency or pay like a big social media strategist, well, isn’t it okay if you spend an hour a week tweaking something rather than creating the whole thing? So that’s what VAs are great for.

Rachel Ngom: Yes. What do you think, what do you see as being the number one mistake that entrepreneurs are making when they’re hiring somebody?

Barbara Turley: Oh, there’s a few, yeah. So the biggest one is somebody going, “My God, I’m in chaos, I’m overwhelmed, I can’t cope, I need a VA.” And I’m like, no, no, no. Before you get a VA, you need to try to get some structure into what you want to delegate. Because people think getting a VA is the answer, but that’s just throwing a body at the problem.

The problem actually is that you don’t have any systems or processes and any structure to what you’re actually doing. And before you get a VA, the reason people waste money, time, and energy and get frustrated with VAs is because they don’t do the pre-work. And the pre-work is probably more important than the hiring work.

Rachel Ngom: So what would that pre-work be?

Barbara Turley: Like I said about your recurring task list. So, for example, there’s three key steps actually that I always tell everyone. It doesn’t have to be difficult. Set up something like Asana, and then go through every business, regardless of how small it is, right? Has departments, you know, you’ve got your invoicing, you’ve got your bookings, you’ve got your website, social media marketing, whatever all the different little departments that there is. And then you’ve got to list down within each little department what are the recurring tasks that have to happen on a daily, weekly, monthly basis continuously to keep this thing going. List them all down, and then you need, how are those things done in your business the way you like them to be done? You have to have sort of a process.

Now, some VAs can help you to build that process, but again, it’s your business, so you have your own flavor you want to put on it. So it’s good to at least have that much done before you hire a VA.

And then you’ve got to onboard that person and communicate with that person effectively so that you get the results that you’re looking for and you can work together. So it’s these three things of tech tools, proper task lists and process mapping, and proper communication and meeting rhythm. Like, don’t just throw a task list and come back in a month and be like, “So how’d you go?” And people do that, right? They do. So yeah, those are the early-stage tips.

Rachel Ngom: How would you properly onboard somebody?

Barbara Turley: The first step with onboarding somebody, even if they’re just with you for a few hours, it’s really, really, really important for them to understand what it is you’re trying to achieve. Even if they’ve got nothing to do with what you’re trying to achieve, they’re only doing a few tasks for you. The reason you want to do that, it’s like a psychological thing. When people see the bigger picture, they understand why the small things matter and why there’s attention to detail that really matters to you.

The second thing I always think is good to share is your style. So, for example, are you the type of person that’s available all day and you would prefer to deal with problems that your VA or questions your VA might have ongoingly? I’m sort of like that because the nature of the work that I do, I’m around. I don’t deal with clients or anything like that, so I’m there. But other people that might be coaches, for example, they might be on coaching calls all day. The last thing they want is a VA pinging them on Skype every 10 minutes with a new question.

But establishing that together actually is really important because how would the VA know what your style is or what’s going to annoy you if you don’t tell them? And you can become frustrated because your VA’s got a different style to you, and you guys haven’t sorted this out beforehand. So I see a lot of relationships break down, and that’s not even anything to do with the work.

So those things first, and then after that, you’ve got to take them through your task list, what you actually want them to do, their role, each of the tasks, and preferably you need a process or a bit of training on each task that you want done. And you’ve got to allow them time to then go through your training or to train by doing. It could be just doing and getting feedback, but don’t expect, like on day three, some people after a week, they’re like, “It’s just not working. This isn’t working for me.” And I go, well, you haven’t really given it any energy or time. So it’s really important to do those things. That’s the beginnings of onboarding.

Rachel Ngom: Yeah, very, very important. Can you talk about culturally, how we could work with somebody that’s in the Philippines? Because it is a different culture, and there are differences, obviously. So what are some things we should be aware of?

Barbara Turley: Yep, so the number one thing is that culturally, it is quite a yes culture. Especially in the beginning of a relationship, you will not have a candid relationship with most people in the Philippines. You will not see the real overwhelm. You won’t really know how they really feel. You won’t know if they understand the words you use, the jargon you use. They’ll just say yes. And they’ll go away and run away and try and figure it out for themselves, which is an amazing trait to have.

But it leads to confusion, mistakes, frustration, all of these things. So you’ve got to kind of accept that in the beginning and then work with your VA from day one to ensure that they understand that their voice matters to you, that you want to hear their opinion. Now, even if you say it, it’s not going to happen on day one, but you’ve got to kind of infiltrate your relationship with that and give them permission to speak, permission to say if they’re afraid to say to you, “I don’t know how to do that,” because you might fire them.

There’s just understanding the psyche of them, that they’re afraid to say no because they might get fired. There’s a lot of unemployment there. There’s a lot of problems like that. Just understanding that dynamic and working on that relationship is very important in the beginning.

The other thing is, like I said, allow people permission to try and fail. And again, it takes time, allowing people the space, time, et cetera, to learn your style, your business. And if they make a mistake, to go, “Yeah, I could see where you were going there with that. That’s great that you were doing that, but why don’t we try it this way?” And just be a bit, you’ve got to work on that relationship a little bit.

Rachel Ngom: Sure. I think that’s definitely something to be aware of, and I know for me, when I first started working with my VA in the Philippines, I was like, why did he say he could do it if he doesn’t know how? And then obviously, I live in another country and I’ve worked with other cultures, and I was like, okay, there’s something going on here that I just don’t know yet. And after working with him for almost like seven years now or something crazy, we met each other, and it’s worth taking that time to figure each other out for sure.

Barbara Turley: Yeah, yeah, and I think it’s just accepting that that’s the culture too. And you can also talk openly about it, but they’re not that open in the beginning. So it just is going to take you time.

Rachel Ngom: So one of the things that you’ve said is systematize, delegate, evolve, and refine continuously. Can you explain what you mean by that?

Barbara Turley: So I lost you there for one second, but I think you said you’re talking about refine, evolve. Yeah, yeah, you’ve got to continuously systemize. So what I mean by that, we talked about creating your recurring task list and your processes attached to those tasks. What you’ll find as you grow, as your VA grows, as your business grows, as things change, as dynamics in your clients and the market change, your processes will need to evolve. They’re sort of living, breathing things, and they’re not set and forget. And you’ll find that over time, they’ll get tired and you’ll have to revisit them. So it’s recognizing that your processes need to move with you.

So you need to systemize up, delegate them out, but then get feedback from your VA around how that process is going. You’ve got to figure out how are you going to look at reporting around, is this working? Because sometimes it works for a while and then it doesn’t work anymore, especially with social media.

Evolve and refine. Like when I look at the processes I have now compared to what I had four years ago and where I want to go with our processes, I go, wow. It’s like as I’ve grown as an entrepreneur, my processes and my delegation and my strategies have grown too. And it’s being committed to that every day means that you will build a saleable, highly valuable asset and not just a job.

That’s essentially what you have to do. I mean, look, the whole thing of running a business, right? So people get caught up in the vision and what they want to do. At the end of the day, building a company involves what I just said. It’s systemizing, delegating, refining, doing it again, finding the market, all that sort of thing.

That’s what it is to build a company, not necessarily to be a naturopath or to be a yoga teacher. That’s part of it, but the building of a business is a skill all by itself.

Barbara Turley: Which we all learned the hard way. Like, man, this is hard.

Rachel Ngom: Yeah, for sure. How have you built such a big business, and how do you build a big business without being in the business all the time? Because you’ve been able to take time off and have some of that freedom.

Barbara Turley: Yes, so an unflinching commitment to process. Like everything I’m talking about, I feel like I’m a broken record, but it’s like process up everything and delegate that effectively. Now, that sounds like you’re going to be a micromanager, but actually it’s not. It’s just active management. You’re creating a structure where people can be flexible within the structure.

So you say to your people you’re delegating to, here’s the process. I want you to come back to me and let me know how that process is going and where you see holes and where they suggest changes to processes themselves. So that’s number one.

And then basically you’ve got to get to a point where really ask yourself, if I’m going to build this company or a business, what part of it do I really need to be doing? Actually, none of it. I need to be the one who’s the conductor of the orchestra. Yeah. And in order to do that, you need to keep delegating all the time and letting go, letting go, letting go, but having strong reporting structures, strong processes, and strong team communication daily so that you know what’s going on within the business.

And then you’re just looking at metrics and reporting and dashboards and building the next part of it. So I’ve been very good at that, but I had a background, I guess, as I said, in that investment banking arena. So I always was committed to that, yeah, and to my own freedom. Freedom is my highest value.

Rachel Ngom: I’m with you.

Barbara Turley: I just knew I wanted to be a mom. I know there’s things I want to do with my life. And I do believe that you can build an amazing company that changes lives and has mission and vision and everything without having to destroy yourself and do everything yourself.

Rachel Ngom: How do you balance between being a mom and being a driven entrepreneur?

Barbara Turley: Yeah, that’s hard. There are days when I’m being a full-time mom, and I think I almost feel that sense of guilt of not loving it as much as I should. I prefer to be at a conference these days. I do love it, but it’s hard, right? Two and a half years, as you know.

Rachel Ngom: Yeah, especially when it’s hard, yes.

Barbara Turley: It’s so demanding, and I think, I look at Facebook and see friends of mine off at amazing TED conferences, TEDx things, and there I am at home trying to make pasta and have cheese puffs all over the floor. So it is a hard balance.

And I think how I’ve done it is I’ve split my time, and I work three days a week, and I have my daughter two days. She’s in daycare three days, and I have her the other two days. But then I still manage to get a bit of work in here and there on those days, and I’ve got a great team. It is hard, though. Yeah, it’s hard to balance it.

Rachel Ngom: It’s definitely not, especially when you are a driven person, and sometimes it does feel easier to work than it is to clean up messes and wipe butts, you know.

Barbara Turley: I’ve got a friend who’s a full-time mom. She gave up work completely, and I said to her recently, “What you do is harder than what I do.” I don’t know how you run that company. And her mom. I’m like, no, no, no. I think what you do is harder because you’ve got it full-time. It’s full on, right? Yeah. So hats off to all the women out there doing it. It’s tough. It is.

Rachel Ngom: What’s the best book that you’ve read?

Barbara Turley: That’s a good one. I think the most pivotal book I think I’ve ever read was this, which sounds so boring, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. It was a good one, so yeah, I was like, that just makes so much sense. It really, really does. So for me, that was a really pivotal book that I remember. I love business books, so I’m not really a fiction reader.

So the other book, I’m trying to think of the ones that were really pivotal for me. I did read the… It’s called Built to Sell, and it’s a book, it’s The Rockefeller Habits basically, and I sort of just picked it up and read it on a flight once, and I was like, my God, that’s amazing. That is how you build a company to be sold. Even if you never sell it, it’s like the most amazing way to build a company, and it is a lot about what I’m talking about. I’ve taken a lot from those books and put them into this business.

Rachel Ngom: I just added that to my list. I’ll get it. What does it mean to you to make an impact?

Barbara Turley: Yeah, that’s a funny one because I used to think that to make an impact, I had to be the one liaising with people. And this business has taught me a few things about myself, that I’m one of those funny extrovert-introvert people where I’m very social and people always think I’m an extrovert, but I’m actually kind of a closet introvert, really. I need huge amounts of time by myself. Yeah, I go away to recharge. I think a lot of entrepreneurs are actually.

And a few years ago, I made a decision that I felt was going to be very difficult at the time, but it was the best decision I ever made. And I made a decision to not be client-facing anymore in the business. I was having a baby, so that was kind of a bit to do with it, but the business grew a lot better when I pulled away from that because I wasn’t getting distracted by client needs, and I was actually able to build a stronger employee brand in the Philippines, and I was able to give back more to the employees.

And they are the ones then that have brought success for the client. So to make an impact, I almost had to pull away in order to actually make the impact that I really want to make on a grand scale. And I had to start saying no a lot, right? So I think actually to make impact, you actually have to start saying no a lot. And it’s going to challenge you because you’ll feel like, but if I say no, I’m not going to make the impact I want to make. But for me anyway, pulling back has been the way I’ve made the biggest impact and continue to do that. So big, big personal learning from this business, that it’s taught me to do that.

Rachel Ngom: What’s next for you?

Barbara Turley: So next, look, I’m still deep in this business very much. Look, we’re at 100 employees now. Realistically, to make the impact that I do want to make, I’ve got this mission of eradicating overwhelm for small business and simultaneously creating dynamic next-level careers for the smartest Filipinos, right? So in order to do that, I need more volume, right?

So in order to do more volume, I need to really, really nail the Philippines strategy and that side of it because the clients are actually easy to find. It’s more, we actually struggle to find supply of people, good people. So for me, I sort of have this vision of, I want to fit out our own office space with our branding and everything. I want to have this amazing Google of virtual assistants-type office. I don’t know if I’ll ever get there, but I have this kind of idea for idea lab rooms and collaboration rooms and things like that for the people.

I think that’d be really cool, to maybe have like 500 people in something like that. Yeah, I’d like that. And I know that that excites the people that are working for us because they’re doing exciting work with our clients, you know, so it excites our clients too. So yeah, that’s the next stage. And after that, I don’t know, who knows? I might write a book one day.

Rachel Ngom: You should. Yes.

Barbara Turley: Yeah, probably will. I think there’s a book in me. I’ll wait till the day I feel that it’s time to do that.

Rachel Ngom: Where can we connect with you?

Barbara Turley: So the best place to find out more about even me and what we do at the Virtual Hub is if you go to, I’ve got a special link for you guys that have got some special gifts. It’s thevirtualhub.com/shesmakinganimpact. And over there, we’ve got a couple of downloadables. We’ve got a little e-course that you can sign up for, which I’ve basically created myself. It’s about creating a scalable business using cost-effective teams, so that’s pretty cool.

And also, I share a lot of my content and stuff on LinkedIn. That’s mainly where I hang out personally, so you can just look me up, Barbara Turley, on LinkedIn.

Rachel Ngom: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for sharing all of your tips, your advice, your wisdom with us. We really appreciate it.

Barbara Turley: Thanks for having me. It’s been great.