If you’re one of the many companies that are hiring Filipino remote workers, you might be wondering if it’s possible to cut ties with them and when is a good time to do so. You are likely curious about what are considered reasonable grounds for firing a virtual assistant as well.
Your reason might be that they have failed to deliver their work or that their skills are not meeting your expectations. Either way, some people believe everyone deserves a second chance, even a disappointing VA. Others think that it’s best to get rid of toxic workers as early as possible.
When should you fire a virtual assistant?
You don’t want to hire a Filipino VA one after another but you don’t want to allow issues to go on longer than they should. As much as you might want to stand by your decision to hire remote staff in the Philippines, you want to avoid getting railroaded by them too.
Here’s how to determine if you’re at a good midway point:
Check existing processes
There are actually a lot of boxes to tick when you decide to fire someone. In some cases, it’s not entirely their fault that they aren’t performing well. It might be that you don’t even have a system in place but you assigned them a long task list with limited information, for instance.
There are instances when you do have an established process but there are plenty of holes in it. When you delegate it to someone and it returns to you with mistakes, you feel the need to blame them. The truth may be that you have a good worker but a problematic setup.
Check your expectations
Here’s another instance where it might be that you are the problem and not them. You need to ask yourself, when you chose to outsource jobs to the Philippines, did you make it clear what you are expecting from them and how often that should be?
Perhaps you expect them to send you a detailed report about project progress before 10AM on Mondays. The issue may be that you said you want a report at the start of the week with no specific time, so they send in their reports after lunch or before clocking out.
Check the work progress
If you’ve determined that the problem isn’t on your end, the next thing to check is the amount of work getting done. There might be items that aren’t found on your cloud storage but you’re being billed for. There may be things that were due last month but remain unfinished until today.
When they’re still undergoing training and getting used to the pacing of your team, it’s understandable if they fall behind during the first few months. A natural disaster or personal problem may be affecting their productivity too. Outside of that, there’s no valid reason for them to lack results.
Check the work quality
A new hire VA in the Philippines deserves to receive constructive feedback on their work. When you’ve been through several rounds of performance evaluations yet nothing has changed, it might not be a good idea for you to continue working with them.
There are instances when the tasks assigned to them play against their weaknesses. Hence, you want to understand what they’re good or bad at then assign projects accordingly. If you know they’re skilled at something yet they produce subpar results, that’s a huge red flag.
Check their transparency
Let’s say you’re using a time tracking tool like Time Doctor so it’s easy for you to know what your new hire Filipino virtual assistant was doing over the course of their day. In the event that you are giving them a flexible schedule paired with a spreadsheet, you want to check if there’s anything irregular.
For example, there’s a certain task that they normally accomplish within 30 minutes but they’re logging it as an hour lately. You’ll definitely question what’s causing them to lag behind or if they’re being dishonest with their records. It’s worrisome if they’re spending company time on a job they’re doing on the side.
Check response times
Maybe you’ve provided all of the instructions, given all of the necessary training, and the new hire virtual assistant in the Philippines disappears off the face of the planet. This happens often with workers who are working remotely for the first time so they get overwhelmed by the tasks.
It’s a good idea to get their contact information outside of online channels early on. This allows you to contact them through phone when they aren’t replying to your chats or emails anymore. It might be that they’re more comfortable with contacting you through text and are adjusting to your platform.
Check their attitude
When you hire a Filipino freelancer and they react poorly or harshly to any feedback you provide, its a sign that you don’t want to work with them for the long-term. The reason you’re adding people to your team is to free up your time and not add stress to yourself, after all.
It’s a different matter when they’re a bit slow to learn your tools and tasks. Some people find it easier to learn when they’re working hands-on than when they’re hearing concepts. If they’re willing to learn and they have a knack for it, give them time to get better.
Where should you find a better VA?
Now that you know when to part ways with a VA, you may be planning to say goodbye to one or two people in your team. That means you’ll have to replace them with someone better and that alone is a lot of work. You want to hire a freelancer in the Philippines who won’t disappoint you this time.
We at Remote Workmate have a pool of top talents in the Philippines for you to choose from. Each of our candidates are carefully screened according to stringent standards and replacements can be arranged in the worst case scenario.
Click the button below when you’re ready to outsource jobs to Filipinos today.
