CEO gains balance, plus time to focus on high value activities

Client profile

Riipen is a work-based learning platform for educators, learners, and employers. They’re enabling transformative opportunities for companies to collaborate with post-secondary students on real-time, real-world challenges that are embedded directly into coursework.

The opportunity

Founder and CEO Dana Stephenson’s time was divided between raising investment, securing partnerships, travelling and presenting at conferences. As a servant-leader, Dana pushed himself to be all things to his team, working harder and longer hours to make sure he was available to respond to his team’s needs. When his team revealed that his inability to get back to them fast enough was actually slowing their entire company down, he knew something had to change.

Objectives

• Enable Riipen’s CEO to focus his time on higher value activities while feeling confident the rest of the work was getting done
• Support company growth momentum

The solution

Virtual Gurus matched Dana with Cher, one of our highly-skilled virtual assistants. Shortly after they started working together, Dana realized how many more things his VA could assist with. Her strengths in communication and organization immediately helped Dana to declutter his work life. 

Although they started with a smaller hourly package, Dana doubled it within a short time upon realizing the value his VA was providing. From triaging his calendar and inbox to communicating internally and externally and managing Dana’s personal social media presence, his became an invaluable asset not only to Dana but to the entire Riipen team.

The impact

Signing up with Virtual Gurus has enabled Riipen’s CEO to delegate more and focus on higher value activities, while also making himself more accessible to his team when they need his guidance. With the support of his VA, Dana is getting significantly more accomplished while also achieving something more akin to a work-life balance. He’s also more available to support the rest of the Riipen team — they can now get what they need when they need it, faster and more regularly, which allows them all to accomplish more.