Author, speaker, and coach Julie C. Henry shares how her BELAY Virtual Assistant Sarah Rivera stepped into her business and life with the energy and expertise she needed to grow.
About The Client
Julie C. Henry is an author, speaker, and coach who is passionate about using the fundamental principles in nature to help others lead the way they were born to lead.
Her book Wisdom from the Wild: The Nine Unbreakable Laws of Leadership from the Animal Kingdom examines these principles and their application in today’s business landscape.
In addition to her professional roles, she is a devoted mother of two who draws strength and resilience from her journey through grief as a widow.
The Challenge
“I've been in business for myself since 2008 – and that's important because when you're building your business, you have to try out different things. At the time I was married, but my husband then got sick with cancer, which is also relevant because my kids were only three and five years old.
“So my journey was taking care of my husband, who was battling cancer, taking care of our house that was getting taken into eminent domain, building a business, raising the kids, and then he died in 2018 — and, at that point, life shifted.”
With 2020 right around the corner and all of the challenges COVID brought, Julie’s business suffered, but she spent the time finishing her book Wisdom from the Wild.
Next, it was time to rebuild.
“It was very simple,” Julie said, “I knew if I was ever going to scale to have the impact that I wanted to have and knew I could have, I needed somebody to come in and do the operational things and handle the details.”
“[O]nce my book was published and the world started to come back — whatever way it was coming back — my kids were older. I was at a really interesting point where I was deciding, What do I financially invest in next? Who do I partner with?”
And that’s exactly what Julie found with BELAY — a partner.
The Solution
Julie and her BELAY Virtual Assistant Sarah hit it off right away.
“I'm very blessed that this was the right fit from the beginning,” said Julie, “I’m a relational person, and she’s relational, too. There’s nothing transactional in my business; it’s all people. Had my relationship with Sarah become transactional, I would not have continued because that's not what I need.”
“I call her my keynote concierge. Because the reality is, if I'm in Pittsburgh — which I was last week — I can't always answer requests, but when someone needs something like a headshot or access to Google Drive, or X, Y, Z, she can help them. So, that's really important to me to have her have a direct relationship with the clients, too.
“She's helped me functionally, but the other way she's helped me is that she's got my back. I travel all the time for work. I've still got two teenagers at home, and I've literally been able to call or text her, ‘I'm so hungry, I need some food.’ Or, ‘I need Advil.’ Or, ‘One of the kids needs money in their lunch account.’
“And she thinks of things, too. That's really important to me as a parent and as a business owner as well.”
Not only did Sarah allow Julie to be more present during her travels knowing that the day-to-day details of home and work are taken care of, but thanks to Sarah’s support, Julie uncovered new strengths of her own.
“She's helped me unleash my creativity in a new way because I don't have to think about the details anymore. I still have to focus on them sometimes – and she knows how much I hate that – but I can get into it and say, ‘Oh, yeah, I really want it to look like this,’ and she's such a cheerleader.
“She gets just as excited as I am. She'll share things on LinkedIn that I've posted, and I'm excited that she's excited about connecting with people, too.”
“She's also totally different creatively than me, which is great,” said Julie, “She has a different aesthetic. She put together some stickers that represent key points from my book, so I give them out at book tables now, and she completely designed them.
“She had a great time. She designed them in Canva, and people love them. They love them. I would have never done that. Never. I wouldn't have even thought about it, and I couldn't have even done it if I had, but she just churned them out.”
The Right Hire. Right Now.
When Julie reflected on her decision to partner with BELAY, she credited that choice to the research she did before making the choice.
“I wasn't coming from a place of desperation, and that's really important because that meant I could make a proactive decision and create my business future the way I wanted to versus, Oh my gosh, I'm drowning. I didn't want to get to that point.
“I've hired people all my life. I mean, I had a team of 45 people working for me when I was in corporate America. It's not like I can't hire people or vet them or hold them accountable; that's not the issue.
“I didn't want to spend the time doing it.
“[So I decided] if I can just go through BELAY — who has already vetted people but who is also interested in who I am in the [matching process] — that saved me two big steps.
“It would've taken a while for me to find the people that meet my standards, and I could tell after conversations and research with BELAY that they had a similar standard of excellence that I do — operationally and relationally…
“And I knew there was a backup plan if it wasn't working and I had to make some changes.”
The backup plan Julie is referring to is the BELAY Guarantee, which ensures that if a client’s first personalized match isn’t the right hire for them, BELAY will provide a new match at no additional cost saving clients the time, stress, and hassle of hiring again.
BELAY is all about matching clients with the right hire for their specific needs. For Julie, that was not only someone who could handle client communication, travel accommodations, and creative execution but also someone who could give her the peace of mind that only comes with an invested partner.
“I’m responsible in my life all the time, and now it's nice to have somebody who also feels responsible.”
If you are interested in the support and freedom Sarah has offered Julie, visit our website to learn more about BELAY Virtual Assistants.