Much like any other professional entering a particular industry, there is criteria to meet. You’ll find that the majority of Virtual Assistant organisations require VAs to have a minimum 5 years’ experience in admin/secretarial or similar backgrounds.

Wikipedia is written by anyone who wants to contribute to it – if you do the research I think you’ll find the definition relating to VAs has been changed many, many times at Wikipedia, depending on who wants to contribute to it. It really cannot be taken as the definitive authority on the industry.

The industry itself has been defined as an industry since around 1996 and the first certification programs began to surface a few years later. Today there are many coaching and training programs relating to the industry which is proof itself that VAs need training. Too many people think they can just set up with a computer and internet connection and voila! they’re a VA. There are also a number of organisations that have set up to create a pool of VAs (as you’ve discovered) but again, the definition of a VA is that they are independent contractors (not employees) providing administrative and other services via remote or virtual means.

For example, in my opinion a VA can absolutely be a college graduate… or even a high school graduate. I’m not aware of an industry wide definitions or requirements for someone to call themselves a “virtual assistant”. If I need transcription work done I bet there are plenty of high school grads that would do an excellent job. Are these not virtual assistants?

From Wikipedia: “A Virtual Assistant (or simply VA), is an independent contractor providing administrative, technical, or sometimes creative assistance to clients”

The International Virtual Assistants Association has almost the exact same description: “A Virtual Assistant (VA) is an independent entrepreneur providing administrative, creative and/or technical services.”

So, based on the above I can absolutely call my geographically differentiated independent contractor a Virtual Assistant.

Regarding time: oDesk (where I found this provider) is an hourly based system where you actually “hire” providers for a specific number of hours per week. I had “hired” my virtual assistant for 20 hours a week but wasn’t able to fulfill that time with projects which is why I received the email above.

VAs are NOT college graduates either – they are experienced former PAs and other office workers who have brought their skills back home to work, using today’s technologies. For my own particular clients I provide these services: wordprocessing, formatting of documentation, Powerpoint presentations, data entry and maintenance of database programs, manage/maintain websites and shopping carts, as well as online databases, prepare and send out ezines and broadcast emails, organise bookings for events and much more.

Tell me where/how a college graduate could possibly know how to do these things without the required experience and background?

Excellent points and suggestions! A daily journal of activities is a great idea. An additional thought would be to break out my “Jack of all trades” tasks into groups: Admin Assistant, Programmer, Graphic Designer, etc. With these groups I could approach the appropriate people with the appropriate tasks.

Yes, I hope my VA is cheating on me and getting work from other buyers. We’ve come to the understanding that she’ll continue to work on my email management and additional projects as they arise.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: just the exercise of going through the VA process has been very educational and is providing a foundation for the time when I’ll be ready to fully leverage multiple Virtual Assistants!