The 2-Second Commute: Join the Exploding Ranks of Freelance Virtual Assistants - Softcover

Durst, Christine; Haaren, Michael

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1564147924 ISBN 13: 9781564147929

Publisher: Career Press, 2005

Synopsis

Virtual Assistants work from home, providing everything from administrative support to high-end consulting via email, phone and fax. Predicted to be a $130 billion industry by 2008, they don't commute, they set their own hours, and they get to spend time with their kids. Wouldn't you like to be a VA, too?Christine Durst founded the Virtual Assistant industry in 1995 from a basement office in rural Connecticut. Michael Haaren, an ex-Wall Street attorney (who grew up in a log cabin), was one of her clients. Together they launched Staffcentrix, a leading VA training company, and the International Virtual Assistants Association, built the first Portable Career/Virtual Assistant Training Program for the Armed Forces, presented at the United Nations, and transformed the Virtual Assistant movement into a global phenomenon. Drawing on years of experience training and mentoring Virtual Assistants around the world, Chris and Mike take the mystery out of home-based virtual careers, and help you avoid the common pitfalls, too.

In The 2-Second Commute, you'll learn how to:

• Market the skills you already have
• Overcome shyness to get the work you want
• Launch your VA business on a shoestring
• Use the business to strengthen your family
• And much more!

The 2-Second Commute's self-assessment exercises will help you decide whether the VA path is a good fit for you, or if you need to acquire new skills before setting out. Interviews with successful VAs, VA clients, and telework industry experts will help you find good clients and projects ASAP (and avoid bad ones), and leverage your first assignment toward a foundation of consistent cashflow that meets your financial and work-life goals. Along the way, you'll meet people who will support and inspire you to do what you, too, may have often longed to do: bid farewell to the rat race, earn a respectable income, and spend more time with your family.

About this title

About the Author

Christine Durst and Michael Haaren co-founded Staffcentrix (www.staffcentrix.com), a leader in VA training, and the International Virtual Assistants Association (www.ivaa.org), the industry's premier regulatory organization. They appear often in such media as Business Week, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, and publish frequently on virtual career issues. Chris resides with her two children in Woodstock, Connecticut, and Mike resides in Sterling, Virginia.

From the Back Cover

"... a must-read for anyone considering a home-based job."
--Fortune magazine

"Rather than responding to ads and come-ons, however, most of these home-based workers are generating their own opportunities through hard work and self-promotion. For information, check out "The 2-Second Commute," by Christine Durst and Michael Haaren, co-founders of Staffcentrix, a Woodstock, Conn., training concern."
--The Wall Street Journal

"Any who dream of working from home must have The 2-Second Commute as a guidepost to success."
--Midwest Book Review

"If you're interested in becoming a virtual assistant, this is the only book you'll need. Prepare to take notes!"
--Daniel H. Pink, author of A Whole New Mind and Free Agent Nation

"This book should stay open with dog-eared pages on every new VA's desk!" --Prof. Kathy Striebel, lead instructor, Virtual Assistant Certificate Program, MiraCosta Community College, Calif.

"Homeschooling parents have long sought a work-from-home solution, and THE 2-SECOND COMMUTE 'brings home the bacon.'"
--Rebecca Kochenderfer, co-founder and senior editor, Homeschool.com

Edition details

• Publisher: Career Press
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1564147924
• ISBN 13: 9781564147929
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288