Episode breakdown
Barbara Turley is an investor, entrepreneur, and the 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 in the digital marketing and social media space for businesses who need to free up time and energy.
- The story of how Barbara “accidentally” started her business
- Why it’s vital in business to find a problem that people will pay you to solve
- The importance of mastering sales
- Why you need to know how to create internal leverage within your business
- The benefits of having a 10-15 minute daily ‘huddle’ with your team
- How a business is really a set of systems — not a set of people
- How a lot of entrepreneurs are great at having big picture ideas, but not at leading a team
- Why your mindset is your most important asset
- Why you need to be able to sell before you can scale
- Why you need to stop expecting marketing to work
Our mindset is the most powerful thing you can control when everything else is chaos.
In this episode
00:00 - Introduction to Barbara Turley
Barbara Turley is introduced as the founder and CEO of The Virtual Hub, a company that grew rapidly within its first year, specializing in recruiting, training, and managing support assistants for digital marketing and social media.
02:15 - Barbara’s Business Journey
Barbara recounts her unexpected path from a career in investment banking and asset management to launching The Virtual Hub. Initially offering business coaching, she discovered a recurring client problem—lack of time for strategy due to operational overload—and began informally sourcing support assistants from the Philippines. Demand quickly outpaced her coaching work, leading to the creation of her company.
06:30 - Evolving Services and Niching Down
She explains how the business evolved from basic administrative support to highly skilled digital marketing assistance. By continually solving secondary problems—such as poor delegation skills among clients—she developed training programs and eventually specialized in areas where she could control quality through in-house training.
12:10 - Critical Skills for Business Owners
Barbara emphasizes that while sales is paramount in the startup phase, the key to scaling lies in mastering systems, processes, and effective delegation without abdicating responsibility.
14:10 - Systems She Would Implement Sooner
Reflecting on early operations, she notes the importance of structured reporting, daily huddles, and project management tools like Asana. Implementing short daily meetings significantly improved communication and problem-solving.
16:44 - Lessons from Mentors
Two pivotal lessons shaped her approach: “Systems run your business, people run your systems” from Michael Gerber’s E-Myth, and an Arabic proverb, “The dogs may be barking, but the caravan still passes,” which helped her maintain focus amid challenges.
19:40 - The Daily Huddle Strategy
She describes the daily huddle as a game-changing practice for team alignment, stressing that the business owner must consistently attend to signal its importance.
22:08 - Delegation vs. Abdication
Barbara distinguishes between proper delegation, which includes oversight and accountability, and abdication, where leaders disengage entirely. She advises entrepreneurs to either develop leadership skills or appoint someone to manage the team effectively.
24:32 - Mission and Dual Client Base
Her mission is twofold: to help business owners achieve cost-effective scalability and to create high-quality career opportunities for talented Filipinos.
25:57 - Strategies for New Entrepreneurs
She advises maintaining a resilient mindset, focusing on sales before overinvesting in branding or product development, and transitioning from working in the business to working on it once product-market fit is achieved.
28:45 - Marketing Realities
Barbara warns against unrealistic expectations in marketing, advocating for continuous testing and measurement rather than relying on a single campaign to deliver breakthrough results.
30:40 - Closing and Contact Information
She invites listeners to connect via TheVirtualHub.com for outsourcing consultations or through LinkedIn for other discussions, and the host closes by encouraging immediate application of her insights.
