Kimi K3.1 Pro: "Open" Doesn't Mean Safe for Client Data

Kimi K3.1 Pro is an open AI model, so anyone can download it for free, but the download is 1.56 terabytes and it needs data center machines to run. For a virtual assistant, that means "open" won't put it on your laptop, and it won't protect your client's files.

Kimi is the chatbot from Moonshot AI, a Chinese AI company. You'll see "open" used as if it means free, private and safe all at once. It means something much narrower.

What Open Means for Kimi K3.1 Pro

Every AI model is built on weights. These are the billions of numbers a model learns during training, and they're basically its trained brain. ChatGPT's stay on OpenAI's servers. Open weights means the company lets you download them.

Moonshot posted these on Hugging Face, a site where AI companies share models. The first upload there is dated November 2, and Moonshot had promised the weights by November 4.

Moonshot calls this an open-weight model. That's different from fully open source, where you'd expect to see everything behind the project. The page lists model files and the code to run them, with no training data.

It also has its own license, the rulebook for using it. You can use, change and even sell it for free if you keep the license notice, and two more conditions are aimed at giants.

AI hosting companies making over $20 million in 12 months need a separate deal. Products with over 100 million monthly users or $20 million in monthly revenue must display the model's name. That's not you or me.

Why You Can't Run It at Home

Look at the size on that page: 1.56 TB. Moonshot lists 2.8 trillion parameters, which is just the count of those learned numbers.

[INSERT IMAGE: hf-kimi-k3-1-pro-files.jpg] The Kimi K3.1 Pro files on Hugging Face, showing the 1.56 TB size and the license file

Storage is the easy part. The setup guide from vLLM, one of the tools Moonshot recommends for running it, describes its simplest working setup on NVIDIA hardware as eight GPUs, the powerful chips AI runs on. And these are data center chips, not the kind in a gaming PC.

So when people talk about running it yourself, they mean a company with serious hardware. That's still useful, because other businesses can host the model too. Hugging Face lists Together AI as one. But that's a developer service, not something you'd open to draft a client email.

How to Try Kimi K3.1 Pro

The realistic way is Moonshot's own Kimi, on the website or the iOS and Android apps.

Is it free? It looks that way, but Moonshot doesn't say so outright. The pricing page lists a Free plan at $0, without naming K3.1 Pro in it.

On November 7, K3.1 Pro was in the model menu on kimi.ai even before logging in, though K3 was selected by default.

Moonshot doesn't state how many K3.1 Pro messages a free plan gets, and the pricing page warns that K3.1 Pro requests may queue or fail at launch.

The model menu on kimi.ai, with K3.1 Pro at the top

Paid plans start with Plus at $19 a month, or $180 billed yearly. The full 1-million-token context window, meaning how much text it can hold in one chat, is listed only for Max and Ultra.

The Client Data Question

Here's where "open" trips people up. Open weights only keep data in-house if you run the model on your own machines. If you use Kimi's app, your prompts and files go to Moonshot, like any other chatbot.

For users outside mainland China, Kimi's terms come from NOVASCENT PRIVATE LIMITED, a Singapore company using the Moonshot AI name, and they were updated November 5.

The privacy policy says it can use your prompts and files to improve its services, including training its AI models. The terms let you opt out by emailing membership@moonshot.ai, but with a catch: "Opt-out applies prospectively only." Moonshot doesn't have to remove anything already used in training.

The policy says your information may be stored outside your country, without naming where. A help page on kimi.com says mainland China, but that site's policy is written for mainland users, so I wouldn't assume either way.

The terms also say not to submit personal data or confidential third-party information you don't have the right to use. Client inboxes are full of exactly that, so you'd need real permission first.

Kimi Business is different. Its supplement says customer content isn't used for training by default, unless the customer authorizes it or the law requires it. That's a business contract, not the free app.

What This Means for VAs

I'm not singling out Kimi. These are the questions I'd ask about any AI tool before client work goes near it. Who holds what I type? Is it used for training, and can I turn that off? Does my client know I'm using it?

If you're curious about K3.1 Pro, try it with made-up details or your own non-client tasks. My 30 free VA prompts are a good place to start.

Then put the client side in writing. If a client asks why you can't just use the newest free model, my post on setting AI expectations with clients will help with that talk.

And the next time someone says a tool is "open," you'll know what to ask: open how, and where does my client's data go?

Do your clients have a rule about which AI tools you can use? 

DeepSeek Super Agent: Why It Thinks Like a Virtual Assistant

DeepSeek Super Agent is an open-source research prototype for software teams, so it's not something you'll use with clients this week. But its rulebook reads like a job description for a great virtual assistant, and that's why I think VAs should know about it.

Quick note: several products use the name "Superagent." This post is about DeepSeek's, the one that made AI news on October 31.

What Is DeepSeek Super Agent?

DeepSeek is the Chinese AI company behind the DeepSeek chatbot. On October 31, its team published a design article called "Exploring Super-agent Design" and put a working prototype, dsh-superagent, on GitHub. As of November 7, the project has more than 20,000 stars there, which is GitHub's version of bookmarks.

The problem it tackles is one we know well. With today's AI tools, you open a chat, give a task and keep checking on it. DeepSeek says a person can usually follow only three to five of these at once.

So the idea is one always-on agent (an AI that takes actions, not just answers questions). A part called the Router takes in every request. It passes each job to a Worker, which does that job in its own separate space. A third part, the Watchdog, checks that the Workers are really making progress.

Think of a lead VA who reads every message, hands tasks to the team and checks in on them. That's the shape of it.

Can You Use It With Clients?

Not really, and DeepSeek says so itself. The GitHub page calls it a research prototype, not an official DeepSeek product, and warns it isn't production-ready. Some ideas in the article aren't even built into this version.

The dsh-superagent page on GitHub, with DeepSeek's research prototype warning

It's also made for developers. It watches one GitHub project (the place where a team stores its code), plus Feishu, a work chat app, if a team adds it. It can answer with code changes. It runs on DeepSeek Harness, the company's open-source agent app, which is in public preview.

If you see posts calling this the tool that will run your whole business, take a breath. It isn't that yet.

The Part That Sounds Like Our Job

Here's what got my attention. The project's first document sets one rule for everything: "Take as little human attention as possible, and give as much value as possible."

Then it spells out what that means. The agent acts only when asked, or when a written rule allows it. It confirms a request once, stays quiet while it works, and comes back when there's a result or a decision to make. It asks one clear question at a time. If it fails, it says so.

If you've been a VA for more than a month, you know that list. Good VAs don't send five updates a day, and they don't bury the one question that matters in a long message. They protect the client's attention.

The design article even gives a personal assistant example. A meeting invite comes in, so the agent checks for schedule conflicts, gathers background and prepares a draft reply for the person to approve. That's a normal Tuesday for a lot of us.

The Number to Be Careful With

You may see the claim that Super Agent finished work in under 16 minutes, compared with over 29 for the usual way. Look closer before you repeat it.

In that test, the real coding was swapped for a tool that just used up time. DeepSeek was measuring how well the system juggled requests, not how good the work was. DeepSeek calls these results preliminary, and the 29 is from its slowest comparison setup. So it doesn't show that AI does a job twice as fast. One detail did stay with me: each test had about 300 messages, and only about 20 were real work requests. Spotting those 20 is a skill we practise daily.

DeepSeek also flags the risk. An agent that reads messages from everywhere can pick up untrusted instructions, and login details could leak if they reach the AI. If that isn't solved, the company says, this kind of system can only work in a small, trusted setting. For client work, that's the part I'd remember. It's also why I liked the idea behind 1Password for agents.

What This Means for VAs

This is a prototype, but the direction is clear. AI companies are designing assistants that watch messages, calendars and inboxes without being asked. I wrote about the same shift with Claude Duet.

Look at what makes DeepSeek's design work: written rules. Who may ask for things, what can happen without approval, when to interrupt and when to stay quiet. Someone has to write those rules for each business, and check what the agent does. That's work a good VA already understands.

DeepSeek's own advice is to start narrow, with proactive work only recorded at first, not acted on. That's smart for any new AI tool you try for a client.

So here's your small step this week. Write down your client's "when to interrupt me" rules: what's urgent, what can wait for the daily update, and what you can decide alone. If you're starting with someone new, my client onboarding questionnaire will help you get those answers.

Do your clients have rules like these yet? 

Zapier for Beginners 2026: Free Courses + 5 VA Zaps

A virtual assistant at a laptop with app icons linked by dotted arrows

Zapier for beginners in 2026 comes down to two free things: Zapier's own Academy courses, which come with certificates, and the free plan, which is enough for your first automations. Here's what each course covers, the honest answer to "is there a Zapier certification?", and five simple Zaps a VA can build this week.

First, the words. Zapier connects apps so work moves between them without you copying and pasting. A Zap is one of those automated workflows: a trigger (the thing that starts it, like a new email) and an action (what Zapier does next, like saving the attachment).

Why VAs Should Learn It

Clients ask for it. VA Masters looked at 322 VA job descriptions from February to August 2026. Zapier appeared in 5.6% of roles, and Zapier and n8n together showed up in more roles than ChatGPT did on its own (7.5%).

That's an agency's own data, but their conclusion is a good one for us. Clients aren't only hiring someone who can write a prompt. They want someone who can wire a process together.

Zapier for Beginners 2026: The Free Academy Courses

Zapier Academy has four main stages, plus two courses for managers.

Zapier Academy page showing four courses: 01 Chat, 02 Delegate, 03 Automate and 04 Engineer

01 Chat (55 min) is about getting finished work out of ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot or Gemini. It isn't about Zapier yet, so skip it if you already use AI every day.

02 Delegate (about 25 min) connects your AI chat to your apps through Zapier MCP. MCP is a way to let an AI like Claude or ChatGPT read and act inside your other apps, with you deciding how much it may do.

03 Automate (about 35 min) is the one for this post. You describe a repeating job in your AI chat, the AI builds the Zap, and you read it, test it and publish it yourself. Nothing goes live until you say so. Zapier suggests taking 02 Delegate first if you haven't connected an AI to your apps yet.

04 Engineer (about 65 min) is for people who have already built Zaps and want them to hold up for a whole team.

The other two, Admin Essentials (about 60 min) and AI Transformation Leaders (about 2 h 30), are for Enterprise account admins and the people running AI adoption at a company. Most VAs can skip them.

Zapier's FAQ says every course is free and a free Zapier account is enough. Finish a course and you get a certificate of completion with a link to add it to LinkedIn.

Is There a Zapier Certification?

Not one you can sign up for on your own as a learner, as far as Zapier's own pages show. The Academy gives a certificate of completion for each course. That's a nice proof of learning, but it isn't an exam-based certification.

The closest thing is the Zapier Solution Partner Program, which used to be called Zapier Experts. It's for consultants, agencies and solution providers, and partners go through a certification program and earn badges as they go. To apply, Zapier asks for an active business website (a LinkedIn or Fiverr profile alone doesn't count) and an email on your own domain, not Gmail or Outlook. Zapier says applications are typically reviewed within 7 to 21 business days.

So on your profile, be exact: "Zapier Academy, 03 Automate (certificate of completion)". Don't write "Zapier certified" unless you've earned a certification through the partner program.

The Free Plan in One Paragraph

Zapier's pricing page lists the Free plan at $0 with 100 tasks a month, unlimited Zaps and two-step Zaps (one trigger, one action). A task is used each time a Zap successfully completes an action (some actions use more than one), and triggers don't count. Premium apps need a paid plan, so if an app shows a Premium label, pick another. For simple two-step Zaps, a hundred tasks is roughly three runs a day across all of them.

5 First Zaps for VAs

All five are two-step, so they fit the free plan. Build them in your own test account with fake data first, then in a client's account only with their permission.

1. Invoices to Drive. When a Gmail email with an attachment gets your "Invoices" label, save the attachment to a Google Drive folder.
2. New form, instant ping. When someone submits your Google Forms intake form, send yourself a Slack direct message.
3. Meeting log for billing. When a new event is added to Google Calendar, add a row to a Google Sheet with the title, date and time.
4. Draft, don't send. When a new row is added to your lead or task sheet, create a Gmail draft. You review it and press send yourself.
5. Starred email to task. When you star an email in Gmail, create a Trello card so it lands on your to-do board.

If you're not sure which trigger to pick, describe the job in plain words to an AI, the way the 03 Automate course teaches, and check what it builds before you turn it on.

What This Means for VAs

Zapier sits between "I can use ChatGPT" and "I can build systems". That middle step is where a lot of admin work lives: the copying, filing and reminding that eats your afternoon.

Take 02 Delegate and 03 Automate, build Zaps #1 and #4, and write down the steps for each one so a client could follow them. That written process is half of what makes an automation trustworthy, and my VA SOP template gives you a place to put it. For other free courses worth adding, see free AI courses for virtual assistants.

Build your first Zap this week, then tell me how it goes in the comments.

Anthropic Academy Free Courses: 4 Worth a VA's Time

Anthropic Academy is free, and it just moved. Anthropic's courses now live on a site called Claude Academy, which promises "free courses, tutorials, and use cases from Anthropic's education team," and as of October 31 it lists 28 courses.

That's a lot to sort through, and many of them are for developers. Here are the four I'd point a VA to first, plus the catch about certificates that's easy to miss.

Is Anthropic Academy Free? Yes, Under a New Name

If you search "Anthropic Academy," you'll probably still land on the old course site. Open Claude 101 there and a banner says the course "now lives on Claude Academy." The old site stays up for people who learn through their employer. Everyone else goes to academy.claude.com, and anthropic.com/learn now opens Claude Academy too.

You don't pay to enroll. You sign in to save your progress, and most courses expect a Claude account so you can practise as you go. For Claude 101, a free Claude account is enough, though a few lessons cover features that need a paid plan.

The Claude Academy courses page, showing Claude 101, Claude Code 101, Introduction to Claude Cowork, Introduction to Claude Tag and Claude Platform 101 with lesson counts and completion badges

The 4 Courses I'd Start With

1. Claude 101 (13 lessons, 1 quiz, about 2.5 hours). This is the starting point. It goes from your first conversation and better prompting to Projects (folders that give Claude standing context about a client), artifacts, skills and connectors, then finishes with use cases by role.
2. AI Fluency: Framework and foundations (14 lessons, 1 quiz, 4 hours). This one isn't about buttons. It teaches the "4D framework": Delegation, Description, Discernment and Diligence. In plain words: what to hand to AI, how to brief it, how to check what comes back, and how to own the result.
3. AI Fluency for small businesses (8 lessons, 1 quiz, 3.5 hours). Most VA clients are small businesses, so this is the client's view. It covers privacy when you share business data with AI, which tasks should stay human-led, and drafting an AI use policy for a business. The course says any chatbot works for the practice, not only Claude.
4. Introduction to Claude Cowork (14 lessons, 1 quiz, 2.5 hours). Cowork is Claude working directly with your files, folders and apps on multi-step tasks. You need a paid Claude plan (Pro, Max, Team or Enterprise) for this one. On September 16, Anthropic announced that Cowork and chat are merging into one Claude, and the Academy says what you learn here still works.

If your client's team works in Slack, add Introduction to Claude Tag (11 lessons, 2.5 hours). It teaches you to tag Claude in Slack channels and hand it work, but it only helps if Claude Tag is already installed in their workspace.

Do You Get a Certificate?

Here's the catch. The old site promised a "certificate of completion." On Claude Academy, finishing a course and passing its quiz earns you a completion badge. A few short courses, like Introduction to agent skills, don't list a badge at all.

[MAYE (optional): finish Claude 101 and add a screenshot of your completion badge here. Note whether there's a "share to LinkedIn" option.]

Then there are the real exams. Anthropic runs paid Claude certifications: Claude Certified Associate ($99), two Foundations exams ($125 each) and Architect – Professional ($175). But its certification FAQ says certification "is currently available only to organizations in the Claude Partner Network," and you need a partner company email to register. A personal email won't work.

So as a freelance VA, you can't sit those exams yet. If a post tells you to "get Claude certified for free," it's mixing up the free badges and the paid, partner-only exams.

The Ones You Can Skip for Now

The developer side of the catalog covers Claude Code, the Claude API, Claude on Amazon Bedrock and Google Cloud, and two courses on MCP (Model Context Protocol, the plumbing that connects AI to other apps). They're free too, but they assume you're comfortable with code.

If you want the "how does AI actually work" background without code, take AI capabilities and limitations (13 lessons, 3.5 hours). It explains what large language models (the AI brains behind Claude and ChatGPT) can and can't do, including how much they can hold in mind in one conversation.

What This Means for VAs

A badge won't get you hired on its own. What it gives you is a structured way to learn Claude properly instead of picking up tips from random videos, plus something concrete to mention when a client asks, "Do you know Claude?"

The 4D framework is the part I'd take straight to clients. It gives you words for the work they're really paying for: deciding what to delegate to AI, briefing it well, and checking the output before it reaches their inbox.

Claude 101 plus AI Fluency comes to about six and a half hours, which fits in one weekend. If you're brand new to Claude, my beginner's guide to Claude for VAs is a good warm-up first.

Comparing this with other providers? Here's which courses are really free across Anthropic, OpenAI, Zapier, HubSpot and more, in my roundup of free AI courses for virtual assistants. And if you're weighing a paid option, here's my breakdown of Google AI Essentials vs the AI Professional Certificate.

Open Claude 101 this week and finish the first section. It's free, so all it costs you is one evening.

Virtual Assistant AI Skills: What 322 Job Descriptions Ask For

About one in four VA roles in a new 2026 dataset names AI in its requirements, and the tool named most often is ChatGPT, in 7.5% of them. If you're trying to become a virtual assistant with AI skills, that tells you where to start.

The numbers come from one recruitment agency's own data, so I'll show you exactly what they cover. Then we'll look at which tools get named, which VA roles ask for AI most, and what Upwork and LinkedIn add.

Where the 2026 Data Comes From

VA Masters, an agency that places Filipino VAs with overseas clients, published "AI in Virtual Assistant Job Requirements 2026." It covers 322 VA roles opened from February to August 2026.

Three things to know before you quote it. First, it's the agency's own pipeline, not the whole market. The report itself says its clients may be more comfortable with tech than the average small business.

Second, its recruiters write the job descriptions after a call with the client, and the client approves them. Third, the figures were corrected on September 15. The headline went from 26.4% down to 23.9%, because Zapier and n8n had been counted as AI tools. Use 23.9%.

Which AI Tools VA Job Posts Name

Here's the headline: 23.9% of the roles mention AI in any form. Only 10.2% name a specific AI tool.

ChatGPT is named in 7.5% of all 322 roles, and Claude in 4.7%. After that the numbers get small fast: Gemini, Midjourney and HeyGen at 1.2% each, Runway at 0.9% and Synthesia at 0.6%.

[INSERT IMAGE: va-masters-ai-tools-table.jpg] VA Masters' table of AI tools and automation platforms named in 322 VA roles, February to August 2026

The report notes that the video and image tools near the bottom show up almost only in creative and social media roles. It also discloses that VA Masters uses Claude in its own operations.

Now the part I found most useful. Automation tools are counted separately, and they're not small. Zapier appears in 5.6% of roles and n8n in 2.5%. Together, that's more roles than ChatGPT alone.

Automation means connecting apps so a task runs by itself, like a form entry that lands in a spreadsheet and triggers an email. As the report puts it, "Employers are not only asking for someone who can write a prompt." If that's new to you, my Zapier for beginners guide starts from zero.

Virtual Assistant With AI Skills: Which Roles Ask Most

This part runs against the usual assumption. The roles that mention AI most are the creative and technical ones, not the routine ones.

Tech and development roles and analytics roles top the list, with 44.0% each requiring AI. Writing and content creation is right behind at 43.3%, then design at 36.7%, social media management at 35.6% and marketing at 33.0%.

Administrative and operations support comes in at 21.8%. It's the biggest category by volume, and it sits just under the average. So roughly one in five admin VA roles in this data asks for AI.

Below that: real estate at 20.8%, e-commerce management at 20.5%, sales at 13.0%, and finance and accounting at just 5.3%.

Two more findings worth knowing. Small clients aren't behind: among clients with ten or fewer employees, 26.7% of roles require AI. That's based on the 30.1% of roles where client size was recorded.

And the share isn't climbing fast. Leaving out March, which the report treats as noise, every month sat between 22.4% and 29.3%. What did rise was how often a specific tool was named, from 4.2% in February to 13.4% in August. The agency calls that an observation, not a trend, because February rests on a single role.

What Upwork and LinkedIn Add

Upwork's In-Demand Skills 2026 report (February 4) found that skills explicitly referencing AI grew 109% year over year on its marketplace. AI video generation and editing grew 329%, and AI image generation and editing grew 95%.

General Virtual Assistance is number one on Upwork's Customer Service and Admin Support list. Ecommerce Management is the fastest-growing skill in that category, up 130%.

LinkedIn reported on October 27 that members who list AI literacy skills are 78% more likely to get hired. Only 1.2% of members list an AI skill at all. LinkedIn names administration and writing among the fields now looking for these skills.

For scale, Indeed's Hiring Lab says AI mentions hit a record high in December 2025, and that was still just 4.2% of US job postings. Across all jobs, a job post that mentions AI is still the exception.

What This Means for VAs

If you do admin work, expect about one in five roles to ask for AI, at least in this agency's data. If you're in writing, design or social media, it's closer to two in five.

Name the tool, not just "AI." ChatGPT and Claude are the two employers write down most. If you can also connect apps with Zapier, say that too.

And since only 1.2% of LinkedIn members list an AI skill, listing yours honestly helps you stand out. Here's which VA skills to put on your resume.

This post is the "what." For the "how," read my guide on how to become an AI virtual assistant, with a three-month learning plan.

Free Virtual Assistant Client Onboarding Questionnaire + AI Follow-Up

A virtual assistant client onboarding questionnaire gets a new client's priorities, tools and boundaries in writing before your first day. Below is the full question list, ready to paste into a Google Form, plus an AI step that turns the answers into a follow-up email and a first-week plan.

Onboarding just means the setup period at the start of a new client relationship. Get it right, and the first week feels calm instead of chaotic.

Why Ask Before You Start

Most VA roles are now part-time and mixed. In VA Masters' study of 323 VA roles from its own database, opened from February to August 2026, 72% were part-time, and 46% were opened at exactly 80 hours a month, roughly 20 hours a week. Only 26% of roles were single-task.

That's one recruitment agency's data, but the lesson is useful. If you only have 20 hours a week across two or three kinds of work, you can't spend the first five figuring out what the client wants.

A questionnaire gets the basics in writing. It also makes you look organized from day one, which is half of what a new client is judging.

The Virtual Assistant Client Onboarding Questionnaire

Copy these questions into a Google Form or a doc. Delete what doesn't fit your services.

[MAYE: paste your Google Form "make a copy" link here]

Section 1: About you and your business

1. Your name, business name and website.
2. In one or two sentences, what does your business do, and who are your customers?
3. What made you decide to hire a VA now?
4. What would make the first 30 days a success for you?

Section 2: Scope and priorities

5. List the tasks you want me to take over, starting with the most important.
6. Which of these is urgent this week?
7. Is there anything you never want me to handle or touch?
8. Roughly how many hours a week or month have we agreed on?
9. If I run out of hours, what should I do first: pause, ask, or finish the top priority?

Section 3: Communication

10. How do you prefer to communicate (email, Slack, WhatsApp, other)?
11. How fast do you expect a reply during my working hours?
12. Do you want a regular update? If yes, how often and in what format?
13. Do you prefer a weekly call, or messages only?
14. Who else on your team will I work with, and what do they do?

Section 4: Tools and access

15. Which tools do you use (email, calendar, task board, CRM, cloud storage, social media)?
16. Which accounts will I need access to?
17. How will you share access? (Please don't type any passwords into this form. A password manager or separate user accounts are safest.)
18. Are there any files, SOPs or past examples I should read first?

Section 5: Schedule and availability

19. What time zone are you in?
20. What are your usual working hours?
21. When do you need me online, if at all?
22. Any holidays or busy seasons coming up?

Section 6: Voice and preferences

23. How should I sound when I write on your behalf: formal, friendly, short?
24. Share one or two emails or posts that sound like you.
25. Any words, phrases or topics I should avoid?
26. How do you like to give feedback on my work?

Section 7: AI and tools

27. Are you OK with me using AI tools (like ChatGPT or Claude) to draft or research? For which tasks?
28. Is there any client or business information that must never go into an AI tool?
29. Do you have AI tools you'd like me to use, or that your company already pays for?
30. How should I mark work that AI helped draft, if at all?

Section 8: Admin and billing

31. Who should invoices go to, and how often?
32. How will you track my hours or tasks?
33. Is there a contract or NDA (non-disclosure agreement) to sign before I start?

Section 9: Anything else

34. Anything about how you work that a new VA usually gets wrong?
35. Anything else you'd like me to know?

How to Build It as a Google Form

Open Google Forms, start a blank form, and add each question. Use "Paragraph" for open answers and "Multiple choice" for things like preferred channel or reply speed. Section breaks keep it from feeling like a wall of questions.

Google's Forms help page explains how to store responses in a linked Google Sheet, so each client's answers land in one place.

Prefer Notion? Paste the list into a Notion page and send the client a copy, or use it as your own call script.

Send it a few days before your kickoff call, and tell the client it's fine to skip anything that doesn't apply. Then the call can be about the gaps, not the basics.

The AI Follow-Up Step

When the answers come in, don't just file them. Paste them into ChatGPT or Claude (minus anything sensitive) with this prompt:

"Here are a new client's onboarding answers. 1) Summarize their top three priorities in plain words. 2) List any answers that are vague, missing or contradict each other. 3) Draft a short, friendly follow-up email that thanks them and asks only about those gaps. 4) Suggest a first-week plan that fits [X] hours. Don't invent details that aren't in the answers. Answers: [paste]."

Then read everything before it goes anywhere. Check that the priorities match what the client actually wrote, and that the email sounds like you.

The gap list is the real win. Say the client named social media as a top priority but listed no social accounts under tools. That goes on the list. It catches the "we'll figure it out later" answers before they turn into a messy week three.

What This Means for VAs

A questionnaire is quiet proof that you run things like a business. Clients notice when they don't have to explain the same thing twice.

Section 7 matters more than it looks. It opens the AI conversation early, before a client assumes AI makes everything instant. My post on setting AI expectations with clients has scripts for that talk.

And once you know the tasks, write them down as SOPs with my free VA SOP template.

Make your own copy of the questionnaire and send it to your next new client before your kickoff call. You'll walk in already knowing what matters to them.

Virtual Assistant Skills for Your Resume: The 2026 List

Only 1.2% of LinkedIn members list an AI skill. That makes AI the easiest way to help the virtual assistant skills on your resume stand out in 2026.

Below is the list I'd use, grouped into core, AI and people skills, plus a skills section you can copy.

The same LinkedIn report says members who list AI literacy skills are 78% more likely to get hired. AI literacy just means knowing how to use AI tools well, and knowing when not to trust them. Most people never write it down. You can.

Core Virtual Assistant Skills for Your Resume

AI sits on top of the basics. It doesn't replace them. Upwork's In-Demand Skills 2026 report ranks the top customer service and admin skills, starting with General Virtual Assistance, Data Entry, Digital Project Management, General Research Services and Executive Virtual Assistance.

Use those exact phrases where they're true for you. Clients and hiring software both search for the words they know.

Range matters too. The recruitment agency VA Masters looked at 323 roles from its own database and found only 26% covered a single type of work. The average role spanned two areas. So show a mix: admin plus research, or inbox plus social media.

AI Skills for Your Resume in 2026

"Knows ChatGPT" is too vague to help you. Name the task, the tool and the check you do.

Here's how I'd word them:

• AI-assisted research, with every fact checked against the original source
• Drafting emails, reports and social posts with ChatGPT or Claude, edited for the client's voice
• Summarizing meetings and documents with AI
• Workflow automation with Zapier (connecting apps so routine tasks run on their own)
• Reviewing AI output for accuracy before it reaches the client

That last one is the line I'd put first, because AI can sound sure of itself and still be wrong.

Demand is real but still early. In a separate VA Masters report, 21.8% of admin and operations VA roles required AI, roughly 1 in 5. I break down which tools those posts ask for in which AI skills VA job posts actually ask for.

Soft Skills, Written So They Count

Every resume says "good communicator." Prove it in a short line instead.

Swap "detail-oriented" for "caught and fixed double-booked meetings before the client saw them." Swap "reliable" for "replied to client messages within two hours on workdays." Only write results you can back up, because a client may ask about any of them.

Skills for a Virtual Assistant With No Experience

No clients yet is fine. Pull skills from what you've already done: school, a BPO or office job, a family business, volunteering.

Running a group project is project management. Keeping a small shop's records is data entry and bookkeeping basics. Answering customer chats is client communication. Write the skill, then a few words of proof in brackets.

A Skills Section You Can Copy

This is a template, not my own resume. Keep only the lines that are true for you.

[MAYE: paste your Google Doc "make a copy" link here]

Core skills: Inbox and calendar management · Data entry and spreadsheet cleanup (Google Sheets, Excel) · Online research and reporting · Digital project management (Trello, Asana) · Travel and meeting coordination

AI and tools: AI-assisted drafting and research (ChatGPT, Claude) with source checking · Meeting and document summaries · Workflow automation (Zapier) · Canva · Google Workspace · Microsoft 365

People skills: Clear written communication · Handling confidential information · Time-zone coordination · Proactive problem-solving

Put this section near the top of your resume, under a two-line summary. Then make your Upwork profile match it. My 3 Upwork profile overview samples use the same wording.

What This Means for VAs

Your resume, your profile and your interview answers should tell one story. If your resume says "AI-assisted research with source checking," expect a client to ask how you check. My virtual assistant interview questions post has a sample answer for exactly that.

If you're still building these skills, start with how to become an AI virtual assistant, then come back and add each one as you learn it.

I share what I'm learning about AI for VAs every week on Instagram at @huneeroyo. Come say hi there.

How to Turn a Messy Spreadsheet Into a Claude Dashboard

You can upload a messy spreadsheet to Claude, ask it to clean the data, and get back a dashboard with charts you can click through and share, all in one chat. No formulas, no coding, and it works on the free plan, though sharing a link needs a paid plan.

If you've ever been handed a client's "tracker" with merged cells, three date formats and a tab called FINAL_v2, this one's for you. Here's how to get from that sheet to a Claude dashboard, step by step, plus the checks I'd never skip.

To test it, I made a practice sheet that looks like a realtor client's listings research: 312 rows of made-up home listings with duplicates, mixed date styles, misspelled neighbourhoods, missing prices and a stray "average" row in the middle. No real client data went in. I ran everything in a normal Claude chat on my Max plan.

What Claude Can Do With a Spreadsheet

Two Claude features do the work here, and both are in Anthropic's help center.

The first is file creation and analysis. Claude runs code in a safe, closed-off space on Anthropic's side, so it can read the spreadsheet you upload, clean it, and give you back a new Excel file. You can upload CSV, TSV and other data files, up to 30 MB each. Anthropic lists it for every plan: Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise.

The second is artifacts. An artifact is something Claude makes that opens in its own window beside the chat, like a document, a deck, or a dashboard. You can keep editing it and share it. Creating artifacts in a chat is also available on every plan.

One setting to check first. Artifacts and file creation both need the "Code execution and file creation" switch turned on. In newer versions of Settings, it's called "Create and edit files". On Free, Pro and Max, you'll find it under Settings, then Capabilities.

Claude Dashboard Examples: The Step-by-Step

1. Make a safe copy. Before anything touches AI, save a copy of the sheet and strip out what doesn't need to be there: customer names, emails, phone numbers. A dashboard about listings by month doesn't need anyone's personal details.

2. Ask Claude to describe the mess first. Upload the file and ask: "Before you change anything, list every problem you see in this data: duplicates, mixed date formats, blank rows, typos in category names." For my listings sheet, I swapped the last part for "typos in neighbourhood and property type names." This gives you a to-do list you can check, instead of fixes you can't see.

[ADD IMAGE: claude-problem-list.jpg]

Claude found every problem I'd hidden in the sheet: 6 duplicate listings, 5 blank rows, the stray average row, 18 missing prices and 5 prices with an extra zero. It even noticed the sheet mixed "Harbor View" and "Harbour View". Then it asked me three questions before touching anything, like whether "Single Family" should count as "House".

3. Clean it, and keep the receipt. Ask Claude to fix the problems and give you a cleaned Excel file, plus a short note on every change it made. You want the note, because your client will ask why a number moved.

In my test, the cleaned file came back with a change log sheet listing every fix, and the original file stayed untouched. Its average price, $489,704 across 277 listings, matched my own check to the dollar.

4. Ask for the dashboard with real questions. This is the step most people rush. Don't just say "make a chart." Say what the client wants to know. Here's what I asked: "Build an interactive dashboard from the cleaned data that shows new listings by month, the average list price by neighbourhood, the top five neighbourhoods by number of listings, and which neighbourhood's prices dropped since last quarter, with a filter by property type."

Anthropic's own tip for its dashboard feature says the same thing: say what you want to know, not just what to chart.

It took two follow-up messages. First, Claude showed me its plan and waited for my go-ahead before building anything. Then the "change since last quarter" column came out cut off on the right edge, so I asked it to fix that. The dashboard opened in its own window beside the chat, and the property type filter updated every chart on the page.

5. Check the numbers against the sheet. Pick three figures on the dashboard and find them in the original spreadsheet yourself. If the total for March on the dashboard doesn't match a simple sum in Excel, ask Claude to explain how it got there.

Claude told me straight out that it hadn't opened the dashboard to look at it, and asked me to check it over. Good thing I did. Harbor View showed a 29.6% price drop since last quarter, and Claude's summary said to treat that number with care. So I clicked the House filter, and the drop shrank to 10.4%. Harbor View simply had mostly houses listed from April to June, and mostly condos from July to September. If I'd sent the first number to a realtor, it would have looked like prices crashed.

I asked Claude to add one line under the table explaining the difference, and it did, with the numbers to back it up.

6. Share it. Artifacts start private. On Pro and Max, you can switch one to "Anyone with the link" or invite people by email. On Team and Enterprise, your client's admin decides whether links can go outside the company. Check who can see it before you send it, the same way you'd check a Google Drive link.

What About Claude's Dashboards Template?

You might see a "Dashboards" template in the Claude app. It's a different tool. It's in beta on paid plans (Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise), and it's built for data that lives in a company database or in a connected app like Salesforce. Claude writes the queries and each chart shows how it got its number.

For a spreadsheet someone emailed you, the regular chat steps above are what you need. If your client's data already lives in one of those systems, the template is worth a look.

What This Means for VAs

Reporting is one of the most useful things a VA can offer, and one of the most tedious to build by hand. With Claude, the cleaning and charting become a conversation.

But the value isn't the chart. It's that you asked the right questions, removed private data before uploading, and checked the totals before your client saw them. That's what makes a dashboard trustworthy, and it's still your job.

Start with a sheet you already know well, so you can spot a wrong number straight away.

If you build one, tell me what your client said about it.

Claude for Virtual Assistants: A Beginner's Guide From a VA

New to Claude? Here's my quick answer on Claude for virtual assistants: start with plain chat, move each client into a Project, and leave Claude Code for later. I use Claude every day in my VA work, and that's the order I'd recommend to any VA starting out.

Here's what each part does, which one fits which task, and how to keep client data safe while you learn.

What Claude Is, in Plain Words

Claude is an AI assistant made by a company called Anthropic. It runs on a large language model, which is the AI brain behind tools like Claude and ChatGPT. You ask in normal words, and it writes, summarises or plans.

There's a free plan. Pro costs $17 a month if you pay yearly, or $20 if you pay monthly, according to Claude's pricing page.

Claude for Beginners: Chat, Projects and Claude Code

These three names sound alike, so here's the short version.

Chat is the empty box you see when you log in. Use it for one-off jobs: rewrite this email, summarise this document, help me plan this trip.

Projects are separate workspaces, each with its own chats, files and instructions. Anthropic's help page describes them as "self-contained workspaces with their own chat histories and knowledge bases." Think of one Project per client. You upload their brand guide or FAQ once, write a few lines about their tone, and every chat in that Project starts with it. Free accounts get up to five Projects.

Claude Code is the version that works on your computer instead of only in a chat window. Anthropic calls it "a coding tool," but it also runs multi-step jobs for you: creating files, running checks, one step after another. It's included with paid plans, not the free one.

What I Use for What

I spend most of my Claude time in Claude Code, and I'm not a developer. I use it with skills (more on those below) for topic research, video scripts, putting together videos and thumbnails, and planning blog posts like this one.

If you want to use Claude as a personal assistant for your clients, I'd map it like this. Quick drafts and replies go in chat. Anything you do again and again for the same client goes in that client's Project. Long, multi-step work, the kind with ten steps and a checklist, is where Claude Code starts to pay off.

You can also connect Claude to the apps you already use. Its Google Workspace connectors (Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Drive) are available to all users, according to Anthropic's help centre. There's a Microsoft 365 connector too, but it needs a work Microsoft account (a business Microsoft 365 setup). Personal Outlook.com addresses can't connect.

Skills: Teaching Claude Your Way of Working

A skill is a folder of written instructions that teaches the AI one specific task. Anthropic describes it as "a folder containing a SKILL.md file that teaches an agent a specific task or domain." An agent here means an AI that can take actions on its own, not just answer questions.

I have skills for research, for checking hooks and headlines, and for making my writing sound less like AI. I never re-explain those jobs.

On October 22, Anthropic said it was donating Agent Skills to the Agentic AI Foundation and that "more than 70 agent platforms, including ChatGPT, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, and VS Code" have added support. So a skill you write for Claude isn't locked to Claude.

Auto Mode Is Coming

Also on October 22, Claude's official account posted that "starting next week," sessions in the Claude web, desktop and mobile apps "will run in auto mode by default on Pro, Max, and Team plans."

In plain words, Claude will ask for your approval less often, and "an automated check blocks risky actions" instead. You can switch back to manual whenever you want. If you're working inside a client's connected accounts, I'd keep an eye on this setting once it arrives.

Client Data: The Privacy Basics

This is the part I'd never skip. On the Free, Pro and Max plans, there's a privacy setting for whether your chats can help train future models. You'll find it under Settings, then Privacy. If you turn it off, new chats won't be used for future training.

Claude also has incognito chats. Anthropic's privacy FAQ says they "are not used to improve Claude, even if you have enabled Model Improvement" in your settings.

On Anthropic's business products, including Team and Enterprise plans, the default is that your chats aren't used for training.

The bigger rule is yours to keep. Don't paste passwords, bank details or anything your client hasn't agreed to share with an AI tool. When in doubt, ask them first.

What This Means for VAs

Claude doesn't need to be complicated. Make one Project for your busiest client this week. Add their tone notes and one key document, then use it for every draft you write for them.

When the same job keeps coming back, turn it into your first skill.