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Can Longer Days Make Your Days Shorter?
by Lisa Diggs
Imagine in this day and age having the primary limitation of your business be a lack of workers! That’s been a surprisingly true scenario for entrepreneur, Chad Lawie.
He and his friend Brian Gladu founded Longer Days, a virtual assistance company originally based in Charleston, South Carolina. Lawie landed there as part of a sailing excursion with his wife back in 2007. Upon returning to Michigan in 2009 he opened the current headquarters in Muskegon.
For those not familiar with virtual assistance, it is becoming an increasingly common trend, made possible chiefly by modern technology. Organizations save money on internal staffing by hiring a professional service to provide remote administrative and other specialized support virtually. It may be via an individual assistant, or through a company like Longer Days.
One of the things that makes Lawie’s company different from many other virtual providers, is that while they may be virtual in one sense (not working in their clients’ offices), they are not completely virtual. In fact, the entire team works together in either their Muskegon or Charleston location.
Having no remote employees adds an extra level of security for clients, about the how and when the work is being done. Plus all information is stored centrally.
A variety of pricing packages are available beginning at a ten hour commitment. That way, clients can just get help during a particularly busy period, or buy a package that includes more than one hundred hours for an ongoing project or overall administrative support. The larger the time commitment, the lower the hourly rate is.
When Longer Days adds a new client, they go through a brief process of determining communication preferences, types of projects, software compatibility, and even executing a nondisclosure agreement. From that point, clients are assigned a virtual assistant as their main point of contact, though it is possible some of the work may be completed by other members of the team if their skills and knowledge would benefit the project.
Those projects can run the gamut from data entry to customer service to building websites to editing podcasts, and even ghost writing articles. According to Lawie the array is at times even more expansive like finding a specific Italian-made vacuum for a client, getting it through customs, and out to a yacht.
“I love the random aspect of it,” he says. “Every one of our clients who come through the door needs something or wants something different. I love the variety.”
Sometimes it’s the variety that leads to amazing experiences and growth opportunities. When asked to do projects they have not tackled before, Longer Days is willing to take on the responsibility for learning. Lawie, who admits to not having a college degree himself, seems ideally suited to that aspect of the business saying, “To me this is my dream job, I really enjoy learning how to do things on behalf of a client.”
When asked to look five years down the line at the future of the company, Lawie finds himself a bit stumped, primarily because he sees more clients than available workers in his immediate future. He can visualze a couple of possible scenarios. “One scenario is we stay in the office where we are now and take on about ten more people. The other is we move out, get a bigger office, and position ourselves as one of the largest virtual assistant companies.”
Longer Days currently employs twenty people companywide, nine of which are in Michigan, with room for more.
Finding those extra team members has proven to be surprisingly challenging, even in this economy. The jobs are entry level, paying approximately $9-$11 an hour, and can be a great springboard for a launching a career in a variety of industries.
Most of the projects require a decent level of computer proficiency and comfort with the internet. Though, any age is welcome, these positions commonly attract younger applicants who are looking to gain broad business experience.
Lawie describes the ideal candidate as “Someone who has just graduated from college and is looking for real world experience to build up their resume,” though he is quick to point out that candidates do not need to possess a degree. “I learned from experience. Most of the skills required to do our job are skills that anyone born after 1980 has from just living life at this point.”
If you’re interested in pursuing employment with, or contracting the services of, Longer Days, visit their website: www.LongerDays.com.
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