{"id":69297,"date":"2021-12-01T14:23:49","date_gmt":"2021-12-01T12:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/?p=69297"},"modified":"2026-01-29T17:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T15:56:11","slug":"its-fluid-and-painfully-humbling-entrepreneur-shares-her-view-on-the-journey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/its-fluid-and-painfully-humbling-entrepreneur-shares-her-view-on-the-journey\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s fluid and painfully humbling.\u201d Entrepreneur shares her view on the journey"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\u201cIt\u2019s fluid and painfully humbling.\u201d Entrepreneur shares her view on the journey\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\tZia Taylor<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cWhen you\u2019re a small business owner, you\u2019ll have hundreds of tasks to fulfil before the day is done. From bookkeeping to social media management, there\u2019ll be a lot on your daily plate. However, with a virtual personal assistant (VPA) by your side, you won\u2019t have to worry about all that. We\u2019ve got you covered.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her company may be Nameless, but hers is one you\u2019ll be hearing often. Lerato Litheko is the founder and owner of virtual PA company Nameless VPA\u2019s<\/a>, an online service of great people making use of good technology to ease the admin burden of their clients.<\/p>\n

Lerato is a firm believer in convenience, which is why she started a company that caters solely to making life easier. Need your children collected from school? There\u2019s a VPA for that. Flights booked? VPA. Meetings scheduled and minutes taken? You guessed it \u2013 VPA.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s all about efficiency and accessibility. Time is an expensive currency. Everyone who knows that is either willing to sell their time to others or to pay someone for theirs,\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

she says. \u201cVPAs will home in on tasks that usually kill your time as an entrepreneur, helping you focus on your company\u2019s growth. Essentially, VPAs are time savers, and time is an important commodity in business.\u201d<\/p>\n

The list of possibilities for VPAs is endless \u2013 if you can outsource it, Nameless VPA\u2019s can do it. \u201cFor example, if a VA is a good writer, you can hire them for content writing and digital marketing. You could also hire an experienced virtual administrative assistant or executive assistant to handle data entry, reminder services, and appointment scheduling,\u201d says Lerato.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s in a name?<\/h2>\n

Having started as a VPA in 2008, Lerato knows the ropes \u2013 and the perils \u2013 of the entrepreneurship journey.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is very fluid and painfully humbling,\u201d she says, \u201cMost of the time, you don\u2019t know what you\u2019re doing, but you know you have to do it perfectly. It takes a certain level of stubbornness (or foolishness!) to keep doing that over and over again, whether successfully or with failure. It\u2019s one thing to be able to provide a service that solves a problem. It\u2019s an entirely different ball game to run a business that provides a service that solves a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the life of an entrepreneur is not an easy one to start, there is light at the end of the tunnel, although no room for complacency. \u201cIt\u2019s tough and painful as you go through each step, but there comes a point where it starts to make sense. You have to keep pushing till you get to this point. And once you\u2019re there, you very thoroughly and confidently pay attention to each step moving forward,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Lerato shares that the secret lies in being flexible, constantly unlearning to learn, and having the ability to \u2018pivot well\u2019 so that you can change direction if need be. She also notes that being an entrepreneur is a holistic endeavour. \u201cYou have to pay close attention to the people you admire and respect, not just in the business space but in your personal space too, because, as an entrepreneur, every part of who you are is involved in the process.\u201d<\/p>\n

The all-encompassing nature of entrepreneurship does come with its challenges, and Lerato has seen her share of them. \u201cTo be honest, the day you decide to fully embody being an entrepreneur, you\u2019re signing the contract with yourself to always take on challenges,\u201d she says. \u201cThey never stop. Once you\u2019ve solved one problem, another one creeps up. You just get better at your capacity to solve them. Every new challenge is more difficult. Every problem you solve prepares you for the next problem. It\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adaptation: The name of the game<\/h2>\n

Lerato believes that a standard skill of entrepreneurs is the ability to keep evolving. \u201cThis skill is vital because we don\u2019t live in what could, should, or didn\u2019t happen. We deal with the current facts and explore within those possibilities,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

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\u201cEntrepreneurs are the medium through which the economy and communities are going to be rebuilt.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Being an entrepreneur means being open to learning from your and others\u2019 mistakes and building bigger and better businesses based on that knowledge.<\/p>\n

So, what can you learn from Lerato?<\/p>\n

On when you should make the entrepreneurial jump:<\/strong> \u201cTry something new out of interest and curiosity and also based on your understanding of your skillset. If you\u2019ve enjoyed it for two or three years and are good at it, turn it into a money-making platform. Some will work out. Some won\u2019t. Some are meant to make money. Some are meant to stay in the hobby lane. You have to give yourself the space to figure out which is which.\u201d<\/p>\n

On what you should be reading:<\/strong> \u201cI try not to be fixated on business books. In my experience, every business has its own complex issues, which you only learn as they arise, so nothing can prepare you for it. I do, however, read books on self-growth because I need to be in check to keep everything else in check.\u201d<\/p>\n

On small business finances:<\/strong> \u201cIt\u2019s hard as a small business because you\u2019re running everything out of pocket. You\u2019ll lose money learning lessons. Once or twice a year, relook at your running costs. You\u2019ll keep having a better idea of what your company needs to run and what is just decor.\u201d<\/p>\n

On what you need to grow to get where you want to go:<\/strong> \u201cPeople skills. And this is from both aspects: when dealing with clients and when dealing with your team. Your team and your clients are an extension of your business, so you need to extend yourself to them. It goes a long way.\u201d<\/p>\n

And what she knows best? \u201cThat I don\u2019t know anything at all.\u201d<\/p>\n\n<\/div>\n

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7 ways to take control of your business<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Want to know how you can take control of your business? Read this guide for top tips to help you master your business admin.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDownload your free guide<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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Get a roundup of our best business advice in your inbox every month.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSubscribe<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhen you\u2019re a small business owner, you\u2019ll have hundreds of tasks to fulfil before the day is done. From bookkeeping to social media management, there\u2019ll be a lot on your daily plate. However, with a virtual personal assistant (VPA) by your side, you won\u2019t have to worry about all that. We\u2019ve got you covered.\u201d Her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1295,"featured_media":69298,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sage_video":false,"post_featured_image_hide":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[34,30,47],"tags":[350,166,186],"business_type":[2],"lilypad":[],"context":[],"industry":[],"persona":[16],"imagine_tag":[53,85,86],"coauthors":[447],"class_list":["post-69297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-process","category-daily-money","category-editors-picks","tag-business-continuity","tag-business-management","tag-entrepreneurship","business_type-small-business"],"sage_meta":{"region":"en-za","author_name":"Zia Taylor","featured_image":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2021\/12\/Lerato-e1638361104909.jpg","imagine_tags":{"53":"Business management","85":"Small business","86":"Start up business"}},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"Sage Advice South Africa","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/1295"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/69298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"business_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/business_type?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"lilypad","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/lilypad?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"context","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/context?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"persona","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/persona?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"imagine_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/imagine_tag?post=69297"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-za\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=69297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}