Life is full of chores and too many little things to do .  There is a new service in town that I read about in Fact Company and I am on my second month of giving them a go.  In principle – this is a fantastic concept and service.  Fancy Hands call themselves personal assistants in the clouds and describe themselves as:

Every day there are things you need to get done, but they’re not necessarily things that you need to do. Just email us and we’ll take care of it.

Sounds even better than a virtual assistant.  I am not being modest here – I am very good at researching and finding things on the Internet.  If only I had the time – which is why, despite my research skills, I thought Fancy Hands could save me time.  So far I am not convinced — not to say this isn’t a great idea or service.  I will give it another month and will certainly recommend it to people who are terrible at researching.  It is worth the $30 investment for you to find out if it will be of benefit to you.

Do you know what your time is worth?

Time is money. Right?  So do you know if this is a worthwhile investment or not?  Check out this post in Small Business Trends.

Here is how I am using Fancy Hands.  If I think the task will take me more than 10 minutes and it is easy to write up the email – I will send it along. Sometimes they give provide an answer that is not really what I asked.  I usually find that what comes back is only a starting point for me.  Then I have to let my right brain kick in to think of a source they haven’t tried.

Here is a good example.

Let me begin by clarifying that what I was looking for in this request required going to sites in French.  Now, Fancy Hands does not have people who speak other languages although they are planning on expanding.  But my French isn’t very good either – which is why we have Google translation or other “one button” services.

I needed to find a place that would board my cat for 10 days in Paris.  I knew that this was actually going to be harder that it might seem.  House visits are common but boarding is not. My first “answer” gave me two cat sitting not boarding services.  The next email gave me four kennels that took dogs not cats and one possible place for cats.  I started my own search and confirmed what they had found in one minute.  However, I decided to be a little more creative and even without French, in 5 more minutes I came up with some addresses.  Two options had websites, rates and one was even in English.  The trick?  I made the connection that I needed boarding due to my upcoming move – so I looked for Expat Services or Groups with Bulletin Boards and searched their data base.  The two places are actually in the far suburbs of Paris .

Perhaps they should hire me and the Leadership Lessons

• Make sure your strategies are working.
• Don’t waste your time doing it over again.
• Be sure you delegate to the right person.

Credit where credit is due: I did have another question a few weeks back and it seems I got someone who may have had some French.  Even thought she claimed her French was rusty, she was able to come up with three resources that I found very useful.

FANCY-PANTS* Definition: Overly elaborate, swanky or pretentious – especially of dress.  Also applied to people who act in that manner.

*Origins: An American phrase – which is no big surprise as it derives from the American usage of pants to mean trousers. The first reference to the term in print is in an advert in the Maine newspaper The Bangor Daily Whig And Courier, in October 1843. In that, a company of auctioneers called Williams and Prince advertised the sale of “Fancy Pants – Cassimere”. That clearly refers to pants that were fancy. Cassimere was a type of soft closely woolen twill cloth. Not especially fancy by later standards but quite exotic for Bangor in the 1840s.

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