Beyond Outsourcing: Building High-Performing Teams with Virtual Assistants

Welcome to the Agent Leader Podcast. This is the podcast for insurance agency leaders to learn, to grow, to raise the bar, to challenge your thinking, and ultimately become your best version possible. My name is Brent Kelly. I am your host. And today I have a very special guest. I've got Valerie Boden, who is coming live from The great state of Pennsylvania, right, Valerie, in Pittsburgh.

Right.

And I was able to connect with Valerie through another speaker, another podcast guest that I had on a while back, Marcus Ogden. So if you haven't listened to that podcast, we're both fans of Marcus. So way to go, Marcus. But Valerie has an incredible story. And as we connected, I thought, this is something that I'm really interested about. I'm curious about. I want to have conversations. And I know that the agency leaders listening will be fascinated and we'll learn some cool stuff from Valerie today. So Valerie, here's how I'm gonna open this up. I'll let you kind of share your story, but what is it that you do? How did you get involved in it? And what else does this mean for the audience as far as your path, your role, the things that you do day to day?

Yeah, well, thanks Brent for having me here. Super excited. I am the founder of a company called Cradle, and so we provide offshore teams and we work with a lot of insurance agencies and, and leaders. And the way I got into it is very unique. When I was 25, I decided to do a backpacking trip across Africa by myself. So I had a tent and a backpack and I started in South Africa and I spent 7 months and 9 days crossing 13 African borders until I got to Egypt. Had an amazing time, super safe. And then I ended up living in Ethiopia for 8 years after that. And when I finally came back to the US, ended up in Pittsburgh. And then started this company.

Yeah. And I, I wanna again, learn kind of more about obviously the things that you do, but I'll just kind of kick things off because I think for our audience, probably a lot of different organizations across the world, the country for sure, with VAs, it can be a hot topic or a cold topic. In fact, I was writing down like VAs, ooh, I've heard that term. Wow. Or whoa. Or, Yeah. I don't know. So in your perspective, again, with the VA, what do you see? Um, you know, obviously from your perspective, but why VAs? Why not VAs?

Right.

Tell me all the VA story, Valerie.

Yeah. I mean, I think most people, like, like you said, they either have a VA that they're like, I can't live without this person anymore, or they have PTSD, a horror story, or just like words like flaky, kind of like common mind. Right. And I, it's unfair to the virtual assistants because now that I'm in this industry, I learned that a lot of companies who hire virtual assistants don't pay well. You know, just as an example, when I lived in Ethiopia, I worked for another outsourcing company that handled Fortune 500 companies and they would pay 50 cents an hour, you know, which was just not enough. And, and so you get these VAs who are not getting paid a lot. They're not trained well, they're not treated well. Sometimes the agencies don't pay them on time. And they're working so many other jobs and then they show up to work with you and you're like, you're like, you're not, you're this, like, you're not doing well. Right. But if you know the backstory, you realize that they're really not set up for success. And so then if you can work with a reputable company where they're paying them really well, they have really high requirements and standards and they're helping manage them, they're working with you. Then like, that's when you get that, please never leave me. You are like the rockstar I've always dreamed of working with. And it can be such a win-win if you do it correctly.

Yeah. So, you know, sharing some things of why it doesn't work, right? I guess, uh, you know, there's, there's a lot of different advantages and I know for, you know, our audience, primarily insurance agency leaders and agencies, but I think it spreads across different industries. What advantages, I know this seems like a basic question, but like what advantages have you seen that VAs provide organizations, not just the insurance business, which of course is what we talk to, but just in general, what advantages are there? Having VAs?

Oh, it's huge. If I, if I even look at my own story, when I first started Cradle, super, super small back in the day, I hired my first VA and I tripled my revenue in 3 months. So I went from $6,000 a month to $18,000 a month from like January to March. And it was so clearly because now I'm not doing everything myself.

Mm-hmm.

Now I can focus on my zone of genius, which I, like, I love the sales, I love the marketing. I do not like the admin and the ops and like the bookkeeping. Like that was not my thing. So it definitely It helps you focus on what you do well. And again, like you can't do everything yourself, so you really do need that team to grow. And when you get that support, you can grow your business and you can also treat your customers better because now you can actually focus on them because you have more time.

Yeah. One of my favorite books the last few years, pretty well-known author and speaker and entrepreneur Dan Martell wrote Buy Back Your Time. And so I just think of those things and. Uh, I like, you used the term zones of genius. Is that right? Or zones of—

Yeah. Zones of genius.

Yeah. It's, uh, there's so many different phrases around that, right? I mean, I mean, doing what you do best, right? At the highest level. Um, we're big fans here at Sitkins of Dan Sullivan. He talks about unique ability.

Mm-hmm.

And you know, that kind of concept as well. And I actually tell Valerie, a lot of our agency leaders when I'm doing coaching calls or conversations, I said, my goal for you this year is to become a quitter. And they kind of sit there like, I'm like, well, let me explain what I mean is you're doing a lot of things that aren't serving you well right now.

Yeah.

And you need to let go. And one thing that you stated that I want to go a little bit deeper in is about, you know, obviously doing what you do best, but building relationships. You know, one of the things that I see a lot of people get caught into is that, yeah, it's a relationship business. I want there to be higher level relationships, but they get caught in doing all the mundane things. So how have you seen in your scope of VAs allowing people, leaders to have higher quality relationships?

Oh, it's, it's such a game changer for that because you have a VA who's now handling maybe your inbox, maybe those admin tasks. And so all of a sudden, instead of taking 1 to 2 days to respond to your client, you can respond instantly. You can hop on the, the phone and talk to them because everything else is still getting taken care of while you're on those calls. And we've also seen VAs do things like maybe they'll reach out to the, like on the CRM. And so they're calling people and they might say like, hey, you know, I just wanted to reach out. Brent hasn't spoken to you in a while. He just wanted to make sure you're doing well. If you wanna schedule a call with him, let me know. And the VA is like booking more meetings and doing more touchpoints, or at least reminding someone like you to like, hey, it's been 3 months, you haven't talked to so-and-so. Got it. Like send this email or they're sending the email on your behalf. So there's a lot of ways where you can really structure it to really improve your relationships, which is what you need to do.

Term I always tell leaders, especially sales professionals, is build these guardrails, right? They have a lot of good intentions. I wanna reach out, I'm gonna do this. And all of a sudden it's like, is it really the end of May or whenever the, the time is? I can't believe I haven't done that. So to keep you, you know, keep you on target for the things that you need to do.

Yeah.

What things have you seen? 'Cause you talked about, you know, to me, and again, I'm, I'm a novice at this admittedly, Valerie, to a degree. Uh, although we've used some VAs in the past, I've got some experience, but what have you seen where like organizations have really optimized them at the highest level? 'Cause I know there's a lot of horror stories, right? Of like, this didn't work well, but like, how do you get them up to speed and teach and train? And like, I don't know, like just in general terms, like how do you get people installed into your processes or your ways of doing business? What does that look like?

Yeah, there's a few things that you should do to make sure it's successful. And first is just having a really clear job description. I've seen so many clients bring their VAs into like total chaos, or they realize like, hey, this is much more of a technical VA role. And the person's like, well, I'm more of like the, like, I wanna be on the phones talking to people kind of role, right? Or you get like the nerdy VA who's amazing for the technical roles, but they're like, please do not put me on the phone. Like, I am not calling people to touch base with their CRM. And so you have to know what kind of VA you want. First of all, going into it. And then second, I, I do think you should set up several interviews and meet different VAs. You should never work with an agency and just be handed someone because you wanna really click with the person and resonate and you know your business better than anybody else. So you know the kind of personality that works. And then after that, you do need to do, like, there needs to be like a 90-day ramp-up period. And I think what people do is they think, hey, on day 2, you've been a VA before, so like, I'm not seeing the results. Right? And so I would say spend 1 to 2 weeks training, do some daily meetings, like touch base with them, make sure they have clear working hours and be like, at the end of this month, I want you to be able to do this. By the end of the second month, you're doing this. And by the end of the 3 months, like you're handling all of this on your own and really show them what they have to do. And people skip these steps and that's when there becomes issues.

Yeah. I, uh, without naming any names at all, but you know, sometimes you'll hear it's just like, yeah, we're good. We decided someone said we should get a VA, so we got a VA and like, well, what did you What, what was the role? Well, we just like, you know, wanna bring 'em in to do stuff. And it's like, well, uh, what kind of stuff? Lots of stuff. It's like, I wanted to fix all of our problems.

And yeah. Mm-hmm. And you, you'll have people who are like, I really want someone who can like spar with me and lead this and design my systems. And it's like, that's actually not the role of the VA. The VA is very much of like an executor, right? So you, I think in today's world you have to know like, what does your virtual assistant do? What does AI do? And like, what does either your internal team do? Your internal team should be coming up with like the structure, the system, like the leadership of where you're going and making sure things are going well. And then the AI is doing like all the, like, you know, the things that you don't really need a person to be doing. And then the VA is doing like the high, the high-level execution of things that the AI is not doing. And people get confused on who does what, and then that also causes more issues.

Yeah. So maybe you can help me go deeper, 'cause you brought up something I was gonna ask you anyway, 'cause obviously in the world of AI and where it's going,, right? I mean, I, I have personally, I have an executive assistant and I use AI a lot and they have different things, right? I probably could use a VA too. Who knows? We'll talk. But, but like, how do you, I mean, maybe you sort of answered that, but like, how does the VA and the AI world fit together today? What does that look like? Or where's it going?

Yeah, it's, it, for us, it's been the most empowering thing because now you have virtual assistants who can better perform their task and know the nuances of your business and your industry that they couldn't before. So as an example, we have a lawyer in Texas who's like 44, right? And his VA is running his LinkedIn for him and getting appointments. And how else could she— like, she's like 21 in, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. So how else would this 21-year-old girl be able to talk like him? Well, it's because of ChatGPT and like the ability to like mimic his presence now. So I would always give your, like a seat to your VA on your TouchMT or Claude or whatever you're using, and it will help them write better, know your nuances better, do some of the admin tasks that like clear up their time so they can even do more things for you.

Yeah, that's, yeah, super, super, uh, interesting cuz I just keep thinking like, you know, obviously AI, if you do it right, it gets to know you pretty well, but allows your VA to get to know you really well too, right?

Yeah.

And the company and all those things. And I was thinking even from a VA perspective, they can do higher level work because of that. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so really, really interesting. All right. So I'm curious too. So now is all your work in Africa then, all the VAs?

Okay. Yeah. I mean, my, we do have like a strong social impact component to what we're doing. And because I lived on the continent for a decade, I just became so in love with this like job creation idea. And so we only hire in Africa. Even my internal team is all originally from the continent. So I'm just saying like, that's how I know it works for you because everyone in my company is also in Africa. And in 3.5 years, we all have almost 200 people and 70% are women. And I think people have to know that you've probably never heard of hiring from Africa cuz no one has. Everyone thinks of like Philippines or, you know, India. But the thing is, there's like a huge ROI from hiring from Africa just in terms of the fact it's such a large continent and there's been so much of a focus on education. So now you have millions and millions of college-educated grads who speak perfect English, perfect American accents, and they're so motivated. And there's a massive lack of jobs on the continent, and the cost of living's still low, so you can pay them super well. Like, they can like 7x their salary when they start with you, and you're still paying below minimum wage. And they're so hungry to do well, they're so smart, and it's, it's just such a win-win on both sides. So I would definitely say like, look at like an emerging location like Ethiopia, Kenya, Zimbabwe. Like, there's some great VAs there that will just grow with your business.

That's, yeah, I mean, before I talked to you, uh, when we first connected, I was like, I didn't know that existed.

Nobody knows. Yeah, I think, I think like the narrative of the continent, I think in the US it's still kind of, um, there's a lot of stereotypes and like the media hasn't been super helpful, but yeah, I mean, it's, it's such a great place to hire from. And even with my own business, like in 3 years, like as also a mom who's super busy and I'm not working 80-hour weeks, you know, like I'm very much working like the daycare schedule, but we hit 7 figures pretty fast. Um, we continue to have 90+ retention rates, right? And like, again, that's all my team who's also based in Africa. So, and that's like us as an unfunded bootstrapped company. So imagine like a larger company who has more funding and more resources than I even did, and you plug in with these awesome teams and it's just amazing, like what they can do for you.

Yeah. Well, and I know, you know, again, I'm not, I don't study this a lot or whatever, but I mean, pay enough attention to the business world where I hear a lot of like investors and high-level people like, invest in Africa, right? Africa is coming. So like, I've heard whispers of that, but now what you're saying, I'm like, oh my gosh. And it's college educated and the amount of growth and potential there. Now, I don't, again, I don't, you answer how you want, like I'm not here to bash or minimize other parts of the world that use VAs, but you mentioned like typically it's Philippines or India. So maybe you answer part of that with the education, but what makes, you know, the African VA different?

Yeah. Yeah. I, that's a great question cuz it, like, there's nothing wrong with hiring from the Philippines or, or Latin America or anywhere like that. I would say that for decades those countries have been doing outsources, outsourcing, and it's getting a little bit oversaturated. And so if you look at like the country of the Philippines, it's, it's still small, right? And they're having to go to more and more rural parts to get enough talent. And sometimes that suffers in terms of like the accent and the skillset. And so again, like when you hire from somewhere in Africa, like you get these college-educated people where there are Fortune 500 companies hiring them and giving them experience, but those companies are paying them 50 cents an hour. So then you come along, you pay them well, you work them into your company, um, and they'll continue to grow with you. And just as an example, like we have a client who does financing, is like an accounting company, and he started with like one VA in Uganda, and then 3 years later, this woman is now his operations manager. And he is actually giving her equity in his company 'cause it's employee-owned and he wanted to open that to her as well because she's just done such a great job and been so integral. So you start with a VA and like if you can build that relationship with them, they can keep doing more and more things and really run a part of your business like in a few years from now.

Really interesting. You know, something I, I share with Valerie before we officially started recording, and now I'll, I'll share it to the group, but I, I've mentioned this in the podcast before, but And this will tie in, I think, to VAs, and I want to get your opinion on this. But, you know, we ran some studies last year and we called the Sitkins Principle Analysis, and we were looking at 4 tiers of client business and the revenue. And we find the top 25% of clients and agencies represent 88% of revenue. And then the next tier was 8%, which just stopping there means the top half of clients that we work with have 96% of the revenue tied into 50% of clients. And the bottom 50% 4%. Yet the amount of allocated workforce and time and energy and issues is not proportionate to that at all. And so they run into capacity issues, sales and service capacity issues. So Valerie, I would not expect you nor ask you to know all the, you know, the insurance ins and outs of things, but I don't think that's probably crazy unusual across many industries of that imbalance.

Right.

So knowing that you've got this top tier that produces so much revenue, and I'll let you time to think about this, how could VAs help navigate, maybe foster processes, systems, tasks, and then what things could they maybe take away from some of workforces on the lower end?

Well, I, I've seen this with even our own company and it was like astonishing to see like when we audited, like you're right, it was like almost like the 80/20 rule and you're like, oh my goodness. And the smaller companies, they do need a lot more support and handholding. And so what we've done is we give them, uh, more of like our junior account managers, right? And so what that means for you is maybe your, you or your US-based team are handling like the clients who are bringing in the most amount of money and then the smaller tier clients, right? Your VAs could help manage them a lot more, taking on more of their admin work, the communication work. And so that way maybe you're overseeing, but it's mainly being managed a little bit more by this VA. And it doesn't have to just be a VA. Like our clients also hire cold callers from us, account managers, project managers. So it doesn't have to just strictly be that VA role. It might be something different for you, like a client success manager who's handling more of it, or client onboarding specialist, whatever it is. But yeah, I would have that offshore team handling more of those lower income clients and your US-based team hiring more of the— handling like the enterprise clients or the more expensive ones that you're making revenue from.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, it's, you know, again, part of this and, you know, there's exceptions to this, but for a lot of agencies we talk to and work with, I mean, they've got very top-tier, high-level thinking people, relationship people, communication people, and they're constantly interrupted or sidetracked or doing things that quite frankly, I'm like, you don't really need to be doing that. Well, I have to. Someone has to. I'm like, yeah, someone does. Probably not you.

It's, it's like, if you look at like the IT profession, for example, a lot of tier 1 problems are handled offshore and then the tier 2, level 2 problems are handled internally. So, your admin team should handle like that level 1 issues because, you know, they don't need, like some of those things are just so easy to train on and it just comes with an email template and you don't need your high-paying staff to cover that. And then if your issue is bigger or more sensitive, that's when it gets flagged to like the next level where your team kind of looks into it.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like, you know, this, again, this happens all over, but I would tell one of our insurance producers, like, you just got interrupted 4 times in a week by this $1,000 client, which again, not saying it's a bad person, but like you're reacting, you're trying to solve problems, you're fixing things, and you got this $100,000 client that would love strategic thinking and some relationship things. And quite frankly, you're not getting to it. It's 100 to 1.

Right.

Oh yeah, that's a good point. But it's like, well, someone's got to do it. I'm like, I know. So I think you, uh, you hit that really well.

Yeah.

Question I'm gonna ask too, we, we talk a lot, I mean, the, the buzzword for years and it'll continue to be is culture. Um, we talk about culture as the language and behaviors that are normal in an organization or an agency. So how do you see in your world having VAs across the, you know, across the ocean, mm-hmm, integrate into culture? Like, what does that look like? How does that work? How do, how do organizations win in that area?

Yeah, no, you definitely want someone to fit within your organization culture. And then also if you're in the US, like you want them to fit into like the American culture in some way, right? So that's why one, again, you should always be interviewing people. And I think what you'd be surprised about is for good or bad, how Americanized some of the youth are around the world because they're all on TikTok, they're all on Instagram, they're all watching shows. Like I never watched Friends until I went to Ethiopia and that's all they watch is Friends. Like, you know, so they, they are watching the same true crime documentaries as you. They listen to the same podcasts. Like, it's just amazing. So they are, again, maybe too Americanized, like in a way that might be bad for their own local culture. But so they do fit in. And when you are interviewing them, again, you want to make sure that you're hiring the right person. So if you have more of a startup vibe, you do want that person who loves like that startup culture. If you're a larger company and you have much more corporate and bureaucracy, you want someone who likes that. Structured position, but again, it also goes with the onboarding. I think some people keep the virtual assistant very siloed and it's just very like, they're not really integrated. So I would say the first couple weeks, like introduce them to your team, have them meet different people, have them shadow you. Um, my VAs will usually do like, they're with me in Zoom like 40 hours a week. Like we're just like hanging out the whole week virtually, right? And it really helps them get integrated. And then I would definitely do like a daily huddle if possible, especially for the first few months until you establish that relationship. But our best clients are doing daily huddles sometimes because they're doing more like cold calling roles where they might do a morning check-in and then sometimes even like a lunch check-in, but that might not be as necessary, but more check-ins and then involving them in company meetings. Some of them also put like, our clients will put them on their website, they will put them on social media, uh, some of them will send us t-shirts. Like that are like company branded. So that way when they join a meeting with a client, it still says like their company name on there. So there's a lot of ways, but I think getting, taking the time to get to know them is also huge. And I think people just skip that step because they wait till they're too busy. They have no time to train this person. That VA walks in, they don't know how to integrate them. And so yeah, it's, it's definitely, I think, more of an integration issue sometimes on the client side than the VA side.

Yeah. So, what you're saying, Valerie, are they're real people with thoughts and emotions and experiences and all those things that blend in, right? I mean, it's like—

Yeah. It's like the common sense, like you would never hire someone in the US and just be like, "You better start," and like not include them in any meetings and expect them to feel integrated. And just sometimes we forget that you have to do the same thing with offshore people, maybe even a few more touchpoints, but as long as you treat them the same as like your internal team members, like you should do really well.

Yeah, I just had a meeting this week with an agent or an agency was talking about this and they're in, you know, one state scattered across multiple locations and they're like, yeah, you know, it's actually really hard. Like we just realized we're not doing a good job of getting people involved in the culture. Like they're in an office 40 miles away and they're just kind of out there on their own thing. And I'm like, about being intentional. And obviously we live in a remote world and, you know, most of us are doing some form of Zoom or Teams or whatever. But it's just like, yeah, like this idea that they're just gonna be hanging out in your office and you just touch base once in a while may not be the case. Like you actually have to be proactive and intentional.

100%. Yeah, because even if they have VA experience before they come to you, the way you do things is so differently and the way you handle your clients is differently. So like you have to spend time getting to know each other so that they really like understand you. I think sometimes people also make the mistake of like, I'm just gonna send them Loom videos. So, they might know how to do things, but then if they get an issue that's not exactly in that Loom video, they still have to come back to you. But if they know how you think and how you do your reasoning, then they will need you less over time in a positive way.

Yeah. Yeah. We, uh, that's a great point cuz we talk too about, you know, culture and process and the process is the thing that you do and the culture is really the why, why you do it. And, you know, oftentimes like, well, here's this new thing we're gonna do. And that's fine, but like, why? And how does it integrate?

Yeah.

What does it mean? And what's the outcome? Like, people have these questions.

Yeah.

Yeah, maybe they'll do it, but if you don't know why, uh, and really understand that, like, it becomes very difficult.

Hun— yeah, 100%.

Yeah.

Just as like one more practical example, we had a client named Josh and he hired 3 of our team members and he spent an hour a day with them for 6 weeks straight, which is like a massive investment for a founder.

Yeah.

And within 6 weeks, they were cold callers, but within 6 weeks they had closed, I think, $100,000 of new revenue for him. But he had spent an hour a day with them, right? So if you're hiring VAs, yeah, that first 6 weeks, like it's a time suck. Like you have to teach them. But one thing that I would do is like, as you're teaching them, record everything. You can have them take that, put it into ChatGPT to make like SOPs out of it. So that way, again, if something were to happen and somebody gets sick and they have to quit, you're not really restarting the whole process again with a new person cuz you already have to have like all of that training recorded in there for like the next team. Or sometimes they might go to the higher level positions and then you're hiring someone to like backfill their work and then you already have that done. So it gets easier over time, but the first time, yeah, it is, it's an investment.

Yeah. It's, I was gonna say, you said the word, it's an actual investment and you can get a great return, but it's an investment.

Yeah.

You gotta pour stuff into it. And I'm thinking too, like back to AI or whatever tool you're using with it, but like to be able to, to narrate and get to know you and to be able to kind of share that SOP or whatever it is of like, this is how we do it. It makes So much easier.

Yeah. Yeah. I know it's huge. The other, like, last thing is I would also recommend, um, if you're working with an agency, I mean, we have account managers who meet with a client every week, and hopefully if you're working with a good agency, they offer something similar. And the clients we have who do those meetings have the best results because if there are issues, you have one other person making sure that things are like smoothed out. And the people who skip those meetings are the ones that like It just, things kind of go awry where they're like, well, I wasn't happy about this. And we're like, well, we had no idea. If we would've known, like we could've fixed it so easily. Like that's like a simple, quick fix, you know? So I would always say like the benefit of having a VA is that they're more affordable and you should have someone in the agency who helps manage them a little bit so that like it makes it easier for you if you've never done this process before. So definitely like hop on those account management meetings cuz they're there to support you.

Well, Valerie, I wanna, Again, you can make this about you. All right. That's why I do the podcast, or you don't have to, but you certainly can. But like, you know, an agency leader listening right now, and they're probably ourselves are going, hmm, I've thought about it. We've considered it. You know, I understand what it is to a degree, but I don't really know how it works with me. Like, where would someone get started? Like, if I'm a listener and I'm going, huh, that's interesting. I haven't thought about that before. Maybe we should consider this. Like, what do I do next?

First of all, audit your time. Like, even if it's a Google Sheet and for 1 to 2 weeks you're writing down what you do every 15 minutes, because that's eye-opening in kind of like the worst way. Like, you realize where your time is going, and then you could— that kind of becomes like the job description for what you're looking for. I would also read that book, like, that we mentioned, like, Buy Back Your Time. I tell everybody to read it. It's so helpful. And it also, like, like, what can they do and how do you start them off slowly, then expand, right? So I'd read that book and then once you have a job description and a start date, that's when I would actually start trying to find candidates to interview. And you should feel really comfortable with the person. Like usually I feel like when we do an interview, the client's like, I love number 2. You know what I mean? Like it's, you should click with them because you, you know, you wanna like them too. You're gonna spend a lot of time with them. Yeah. And that, that's kind of how I'd go about kind of starting it.

That's great. Well, I wanna get, first of all, I wanna give you some kudos here. I'm gonna get to that. And I have a question I ask every guest. It's not really work related, but it's about your experience and background. But before I get to that, I wanna make sure that people can connect with you. So people that are listening, and we'll put it in the show notes and all that, but like, what's the best way again? People are, hey, I wanna know more about this VA. Valerie sounds pretty smart. She's got her stuff together. I agree. She's doing really well. They can help us. How do people connect with you?

Yeah, well, you can always go to our website, which is cradle.com. It's spelled a little bit weird, so it's C-R-D-L-E. It's like cradle without the A. And you can just kind of like, there's a really cool video on our story and what what we're doing and you can always like schedule a call with us there. Or if you're like, I'm not quite there, like follow me on LinkedIn and I post tips like every week on like how to onboard, how to manage, like questions to ask in an interview, like just things like that that are, that are helpful and like free tips.

Yeah. Wonderful. Well, I'll make sure we get, you know, again, people reach out to us, connect with you, 'cause I love, I love what you're doing and kind of matching that like purpose and passion into the actual process. And getting results. And so one thing too, and this is, is on your LinkedIn page, which I'm looking at now, found it says NBC's top 30 global women.

Mm-hmm.

First of all, tell me about that. And then I'm gonna lead into the question that, uh, I love to ask every guest. So tell me about the top 30 global women. That's pretty awesome.

It was, it was really cool cuz I think there's, uh, like the first female president, I think of Namibia is also on there. So I was like, I can't believe I'm on a list with like a president. Like that is, it was really cool. But I would say that there, One of the reasons why I got that honestly is like I've spent a lot of time on LinkedIn. So for the past 3 years, I have posted 3 to 4 times a week, added almost 100 people every week, spent 20 minutes a day commenting. So like I really worked LinkedIn and today I think at least 7% of our clients come directly from my LinkedIn. And now I am pushing my team members to also do this because it's such a great, such a great channel for us. So when people. Say like, oh, did you get almost 30,000 followers from becoming NBC's top women? I was like, no, but NBC I think found me because my LinkedIn was, was popping. So yeah, just a good takeaway. Like if you're not getting clients on LinkedIn, like you're not doing it correctly, 'cause you should.

It sounds like if you put the time and energy and effort and work it strategically, it might work. And, and I'm, I'm into this too.

Yeah, I, I think it work, it works if you work at it and it does take time. Like I, I think it took me 6 months of consistent work before I got the clients and now it's a channel where we get clients, we get candidates, we've been offered grants, which we haven't taken, but it's always nice to like be asked, you know?

Yeah.

Um, we've had a lot of just great opportunities and even when I apply to go speak at an event, like the fact that I had that many followers on my LinkedIn is always helpful. So yeah, I think it's definitely something to focus on, especially for, for insurance world. Like it just, it does make sense.

Absolutely. Well, it's credibility, it's positioning, it's influence, all those things, uh, they after. So, all right, Valerie, ready for my last question?

Ready.

You don't, you don't know what this is, I don't think. Uh, so here's my question. Obviously, you know, you go into Africa and I mean, it's fascinating, all the stories and what you've created and you're growing this business and you said got to 7 figures. If you ran into the younger version of Valerie, and by the way, Valerie's not very old, she's also very young. But if you ran into the younger version of Valerie today, I know you're at home with your son and whatever, but like you go outside and there's a younger version of Valerie, like, oh my gosh. And that younger version of Valerie looks at you today and says, Valerie, I got 30 seconds. Give me one piece of advice to help me as I move forward in my life and career. What's the one piece of advice you would give to the younger version of yourself?

It's, it's very cheesy, but I would say keep following your heart, your guts. Because when I decided to backpack Africa, as you can imagine, I did not have a lot of support for that. You know, my parents were not really thrilled at that idea. When I was living in Ethiopia, just doing all kinds of random fun things, my friends were out, you know, really working on their resume and getting all these great jobs. And so in many ways I felt behind, but my heart said like, stay here. Like, this is where I feel alive. This is where I feel happy. Like, this is where I should be at the moment. And even when I started Cradle, I was 8 months pregnant with my second child, which again is not a great time to like quit your job and start your own company. But again, I just felt it so much in my gut, like this is what I'm supposed to do. And it's turned out to be amazing, like beyond my wildest beliefs, right? And we keep, keep growing. So I think that's what I would tell myself is just like that confirmation, like keep following like that inner voice and it's it's not gonna, it's not gonna mislead you.

That's awesome. Great advice. No, not cheesy at all. I think it's, it probably needs to be said more and it gets missed, you know?

Yeah.

And time is fleeting. So to go out there and, and live it fully is pretty awesome. So it's great to have that. Well, it's great to have you on the podcast, Valerie. Before we officially depart, anything additional with this audience you'd love to add or share that's on your heart or mind or Something maybe I didn't ask that I should have.

No, I was just, I'm just thinking about one of our clients, Brian, who is, you know, running his own insurance company and he hired a VA from us named Bel Shaddai. And I've just seen how his company's grown, how she has continued to grow in her responsibilities. And so if you're out there and you're like, well, I don't know if like other insurance leaders are having good experiences with VAs, especially in Africa. Like I can just say like Brian is like such a great example of someone who is kind, who trained her, who onboarded her and she's doing fantastic. So yeah, if you have any doubt, there are other insurance leaders hiring VAs and, and getting great results.

That's awesome. Well, thank you, Valerie. Again, it's great to have you on here. I can't wait to continue to see your success continue, because I know just talking with you a couple times here, your passion, your energy, uh, and obviously what you do and the impact you make is incredible. So thanks so much for being on the podcast today.

Thank you so much. I appreciate it. It's been great.

Awesome. And by the way, for all the listeners, if you like this show, I'll do the whole thing that I do every time. Like, subscribe, share it to people. Continue to grow. We want to make an impact to insurance agency leaders across North America and maybe now even into Africa as we move forward. So thanks, Valerie. Appreciate you being on the show.

Thanks.

All right. Take care. Hey there, agent leader. Brent Kelly here. Want to take just a few seconds to remind you that now is the time to create your true best version possible agency. If you go to sitkins.com/bookacall, sitkins.com/bookacall, we'll get to know more about your agency, conduct an agency assessment, and provide your agency with a customized plan to help you avoid some of the pitfalls, frustrations, challenges, and roadblocks to get your agency to true ultimate freedom and become its best version possible. It all starts by going to sitkins.com/bookacall.