When you’re part of a company’s leadership, it’s only natural that you care about the organisation. You want to make sure that deadlines and commitments are being met, and – more importantly – customers are left satisfied.

But this can mean demanding a lot from your workers. If you aren’t careful, you might end up asking for too much wherein the pressure becomes counterproductive and your employees feel burned out.

Of course, there’s also the possibility that it’s not you or their workload that’s the problem. Perhaps your virtual assistant is just bad at managing their time. Or they find it difficult to juggle learning a new tool, taking on urgent insertion tasks or attending training sessions.

Maybe they can’t say no to your demands but don’t know how to go about meeting them, so both of you end up feeling frustrated at the lack of results.

So how do you address such situations? First of all, you need to know the difference between your remote worker being overworked versus having poor time management skills.

Signs of Overwork

They have unusual working hours

Take a look at how many hours your remote worker logs in each day. The time of day isn’t a major concern but the amount is.

You can keep track through time-tracking apps like Time Doctor or Worksnaps. They can be asked to clock in and out, even for breaks, so you’d have an idea as to whether they’re doing too many or too few hours. The former can lead to the building up a lot of stress, while the latter can signify that they don’t want to face what’s on their plate and would rather procrastinate.

They lack a cooperative spirit

Consider their mannerism; how they’re dealing with management and the rest of the team. Find out if they regularly communicate with coworkers, contribute ideas, demonstrate a willingness to collaborate with others and provide updates on what they’re working on.

If you’ve noticed that their attitude has changed and they’re no longer completing tasks on time, they could be stressed to the max.

They show a decrease in quality

An overworked employee is no longer able to produce quality material because they’re overloaded with things to do. They may be stretched to their breaking point that they can’t serve your clients as well as they used to.

It might also be your VA’s way of indirectly resisting company conditions. Examine if your mission statement places a high demand on your workers and causes them to over-promise with customers.

Signs of Bad Time Management

They are always in a rush

Check if your VA is constantly rushing from one assignment to another. If they are, they may be leaving everything to the last minute as they fail to see the bigger picture.

They may lack the organisation skills to see how much they have left to do and they keep forgetting half the things that they’ve agreed to work on until someone reminds them of the deadlines.

They try to do everything themselves

Regardless if they are a full-time or part-time worker, there are always tasks that can be delegated, outsourced or automated. Your VA are often worried that the team cannot manage without them or they feel that they must constantly prove their worth.

They fail to make use of the resources that are at their disposal, including other members of the team.

They are impatient

Your VA fails to allow sufficient time between tasks or have excessively procrastinated that they’re under extreme pressure to meet deadlines.

They accuse technology or other people for the delay but in truth, they’re at fault. They set poorly defined goals for themselves without checking if there is something more important to attend to.

What Can Be Done?

Now that you have an idea as to whether your employee is overworked or a poor time manager, you can take the following tips to address either issue:

Tip 1: Talk it out with your remote worker.

Understand what’s causing them to feel burned out or not have enough time for work. Reassure them and help them see which tasks take higher priority and what they must focus on.

Tip 2: Minimise anything that might distract them.

While you have no say regarding their physical working conditions, you can try to minimise what you can online. It might be group conversations on Skype, notifications on Teamwork or their work arrangements.

Tip 3: Learn to estimate and plan.

Know how long things actually take from planning to performing to delivery. Then, teach your employee how to budget their time according to these estimates to ease the pressure.

How We Can Help

Remote Workmate is an offshore staffing provider who can connect you with qualified VA who know how to manage their time and avoid being overworked. Naturally, we screen every candidate according to your requirements. Then, we’ll endorse the best applicant we can find to you.