{"id":1156,"date":"2016-07-25T15:16:06","date_gmt":"2016-07-25T15:16:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/moretimeforyou.co.za\/?p=1156"},"modified":"2016-07-28T10:12:41","modified_gmt":"2016-07-28T10:12:41","slug":"riding-wave-virtual-concierge-services-time-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/moretimeforyou.co.za\/index.php\/riding-wave-virtual-concierge-services-time-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Riding the wave! By Virtual Concierge Services \u2013 More time for You!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"09_hh_trees_snowc\"Mother Nature has waved her snow wand and seemed to have dusted South Africa in snow!\u00a0 Today Table Mountain looks like Old Van Hunk and the devil have had an enormous pillow fight and the pillows have all burst, covering the mountain in puffs of clouds that look like bruises against the deep blue winter sky.\u00a0 Oh yes, winter is in full swing and we have had some lovely refreshing rain.\u00a0 Rietvlei has filled up and flamingos and pelicans are once again making the most of the wonderful and weird weather.\u00a0 I say weird because I didn\u2019t realise it but really, the winters in the Cape are like riding on a weather roller coaster.\u00a0 You dip down into the cold then rise high into the warm, only to swoop swiftly downwards again.<\/p>\n

We have had days when driving through the wine farms towards Stellenbosch, you see the majestic Hottentot Holland Mountains rugged peaks sprinkled with snow, sparkling and glistening in the sun.\u00a0\u00a0 You think to yourself ah, great, time to wear that snazzy winter jacket and those comfy boots, winter is here.\u00a0 Then of course, the weird part is the temperature doesn\u2019t agree.\u00a0 It starts to rise.\u00a0 It gets higher and higher.\u00a0 The snow melts.\u00a0 The valley\u2019s heat up.\u00a0 The birds start chirping excitedly thinking spring\u2019s here!\u00a0 Only for it to once again drop and dip down towards the naughts\u2026 bringing the chill back into the air and freezing toes.\u00a0 That is weird. For it to be so cold one day and then temperatures rise incredibly high (into their twenties) only for the next day they drop again by at least 10 degrees.\u00a0 It is fun guessing what to wear!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not complaining, I love it here.\u00a0\u00a0 Cape Town is especially lovely in the winter.\u00a0 Farm fields and evergreen trees seem to glow emerald green.\u00a0 However, we do need more rain, the dams are only 40% full, so we continue to cross fingers and hold thumbs and pray to Mother Nature to wave her rain wand here.<\/p>\n

VCS have been busy and time is flying by.\u00a0\u00a0 As most of you know, VCS More Time for YOU is a team of virtual executive assistant experts with a wealth of experience who can provide any professional person or business the virtual assistance they require to build, improve and manage their business operations.\u00a0 Finally, it seems people in South Africa are becoming more aware of how using a virtual assistant is the way forward.<\/p>\n

\"ocean_waves_ventura_california_usa_20120704\"Recently we have been riding a wonderful wave of meetings and have met some brilliant people too.<\/p>\n

VCS Partner, Rachel, met up with two very busy professional women to do an interview about \u201c5 Things I Wish I Could Tell My Younger Self.\u201d\u00a0 Margaret Hirsch and Andrea Hendricks both took time out of their busy lives to give Rachel some enlightening and interesting information for the articles, available in our newsletter.<\/p>\n

The VCS team met up with Carmen Mulder of Lighten Up (www.lightenup.co.za<\/a>).\u00a0 Lighten Up are a professional organising and consulting company.\u00a0 Carmen is inspired by creating order out of chaos and believes that the less clutter you have, the freer you feel.\u00a0 VCS can relate to this.\u00a0 VCS deal with so many busy professionals who just don\u2019t have the time to de-clutter their lives or spend time on those tasks that take up their time.\u00a0 VCS provides a range of professional virtual client services to resolve those tasks that get in the way of your family or career.\u00a0 VCS give you back your most valuable commodity \u2013 TIME.<\/p>\n

The fascinating Melanie Hawkins of Lionesses of Africa (www.lionessesofafrica<\/a>) is someone who we at VCS have recently had the honour of meeting.\u00a0 I say honour in that this motivated professional lady took time out of her incredibly frenetic schedule to meet us in Cape Town, sit with us for a very thought-provoking hour.\u00a0 Lionesses of Africa is a community passionate about Women\u2019s entrepreneurship in Africa and supports the start-up dreams of all women on the continent.\u00a0 This is so exciting as Africa is definitely the place to be for entrepreneurs.\u00a0 In fact, it was Bill Gates who recently tweeted \u201cAfrica\u2019s start up scene points to incredible potential\u2026\u201d and there are so many exhilarating things happening on this continent, it is wonderful to be a part of it.\u00a0 Read the VCS \u201cStart-Up\u201d<\/a><\/span> story on the Lionesses of Africa\u2019s blog page.<\/p>\n

Melanie put us in contact with the very obliging and wise Westleigh Wilkinson (www.open.co.za<\/a>) at Workshop 17, who, together with the now charming and astute Community manager Nicole Chalkley, have been so welcoming and positive towards VCS. They were very interested to hear about VCS and how we help professional people and businesses by providing professional administrative assistance tailor-made to suit their needs.\u00a0 VCS work virtually and clients only pay for the time we spend on their tasks \u2013 saving them time and money!\u00a0 Personally I think Workshop 17, a collaboration of Open, is one of the best kept secrets in Cape Town (www.workshop17.co.za<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Based in The Watershed at 17 Dock Road (opposite the aquarium) in the V&A Waterfront, Workshop 17 is an exciting hub that exists to accelerate innovation and entrepreneurship for a positive social and economic change.\u00a0 It is now the work place of more than 240 entrepreneurs, innovators and professionals and 80 companies.<\/p>\n

Corporates, government and civil society use the space daily for meetings, teachings and events.\u00a0 The public drops in for informal work and meetings in the caf\u00e9.\u00a0 The community buzz is felt every day and it is exhilarating and uplifting!\u00a0 VCS are so excited about working together with Workshop 17 to offer ongoing virtual assistant and support to their members.\u00a0 When you\u2019re there check out our VCS advert showing on the CloudOne.mobi\u2019s digital screens in the caf\u00e9 area.\u00a0 If you\u2019re interested in advertising check them out on\u00a0www.cloudone.mobi<\/a>.<\/p>\n

From Workshop 17 our wave of meetings then rolled to the \u201cMasters and Mentors\u201d event held a couple of weeks ago at Workshop 17 by Standard Bank Incubators.\u00a0 We met some remarkable men and women mentors there.\u00a0 Mentors were Jayshree Naidoo (Standard Bank), Nwabisa Mayema (Nnfinity) Westleigh Wilkinson (OPEN), Nathan Heller (Spinstreethouse), Charles Maisel (Innovation Shack), Karen Eksteen (Technology Innovation Agency), Zachariah George (U-Start), Nicola Tyler (BRG), Brendon Williamson (Paygate) and Yehuda Raff (iPartnersafrica).<\/p>\n

One of these amazing women is Nwabisa Mayema, who along with her partner, Nicci Stewart, run\u00a0Nnfinity (www.nnfinity.co.za<\/a>) NnFinity exists to ensure the sustainable growth of female entrepreneurs through relationships, networks and business knowledge sharing.\u00a0 If this sounds as exciting and interesting to you as it does to us, get hold of them now!\u00a0\u00a0 Nwabisa is one very extremely busy lady and realises how brilliant it is to have a company like VCS to assist with those tasks that just never get done because she is so occupied with work.\u00a0 Nwabisa is also a director of The Collective Genius (www.thecollectivegenius.co.za<\/a>) and phew is she busy!<\/p>\n

Oh there\u2019s been so many interesting meetings.\u00a0 Karen Eksteen of the Technology Innovation Agency took time out of her incredibly busy schedule to meet with us and hear how we at VCS provide experienced personal assistance and office management. TIA is a national public entity that serves as the key institutional intervention to bridge the innovation chasm between research and development from higher education institutions, science councils, public entities, and private sector, and commercialisation. TIA\u2019s vision is to be a world-class leading technology innovation agency that stimulates and supports technological innovation to improve the quality of life for all South Africans. TIA\u2019s mission is to facilitate the translation of South Africa\u2019s knowledge resource into sustainable socio-economic opportunities. So very motivating and you can see more about TIA on www.tia.org.za<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We have spent quite a bit of time in the V&A Waterfront, which is based on the edge of Cape Town\u2019s historical harbour (www.waterfront.co.za<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\"poi_western_cape_v_a_waterfront\"It is exhilarating to see how this once deserted harbour (oh yes I remember those days when there was just one pub called The Ferryman\u2019s and some raves in old warehouses) is now a thriving and buzzing entity in its own right.\u00a0 The V&A Waterfront boasts over 80 places to eat, loads of shops, entertainment and a host of leisure activities (ranging from helicopter rides to supping \u2013 stand up paddling on the cana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mother Nature has waved her snow wand and seemed to have dusted South Africa in snow!\u00a0 Today Table Mountain looks like Old Van Hunk and the devil have had an enormous pillow fight and the pillows have all burst, covering the mountain in puffs of clouds that look like bruises against the deep blue winter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"series":[],"class_list":["post-1156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"episode_featured_image":false,"episode_player_image":"https:\/\/moretimeforyou.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/YouTube-Size-1.png","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"light","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"stitcher":{"key":"stitcher","url":"","label":"Stitcher","class":"stitcher","icon":"stitcher.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/moretimeforyou.co.za\/feed\/podcast\/vcs-more-time-for-you-vcs-slices-of-business-life","embedCode":"

Riding the wave! By Virtual Concierge Services \u2013 More time for You!<\/a><\/blockquote>