STRESS AS A HIDDEN VARIABLE

by Jill Glist, Lambent CEO

I have understood our business model as exchanging money for time: you pay for someone do things that you don’t have time for. This leaves room for what only you can do (your job, exercising), that you want to do (travel planning, shopping, taking a class), or leisure (spending time with your family, meditating, going to a museum). Sometimes your assistant saves you money, that is disproportionate to how long it takes – when they help you organize your tax organizer on time, find promo codes related to online purchases, process medical bill reimbursements, or apply a way they save money in their life to yours.  Time for money. This is perfectly clear for our hourly assistants – you pay by the hour, or in some cases, the minute.

For the time=money equation, the hidden variable is stress. Stress is always exchanged between a client and assistant, with the understanding that the stress should flow mostly from client to assistant. An assistant who stresses his client out is failing. Learning what is stressful for each other unfolds over time, and liking the other person is not enough. Nor is being competent.

Because putting the client’s needs before their own is written into the job description, assistants face resistance when they try to address their experiences, both to themselves and to the client. When they bring up problems, they are often ignored because of the unbalanced nature of the supported/supporting roles. Clients are more willing to listen when their assistant quits, which is too late.

“Difficult” clients have an unrealistic understanding of how much stress they can reasonably share. To retain staff, they need to pay a higher salary to keep the time-money-stress balance.