Quick answer
Track your admin for one normal week, add up the hours, and multiply by four. Most solo business owners land between 20 and 40 hours a month. Start at the lower end. It is easier to add hours than to fill hours you don’t need.
Guessing your hours usually goes wrong in one of two ways. You buy too few and still do most of the admin yourself, or you buy too many and pay for time nobody uses. A week of simple tracking fixes both.
Step 1: Track one normal week
For five working days, note every admin task and roughly how long it took. A notes app or a sheet of paper is enough. Include the small things: the ten minutes rescheduling a call, the twenty minutes hunting for an invoice.
Step 2: Mark what could be handed over
Go through the list and mark each task that repeats and follows steps you could explain. Leave out anything that needs your own judgement.
Step 3: Do the sum
Add up the marked tasks and multiply by four for a monthly figure. Then add about a fifth on top for the first month, because a new assistant is slower while learning how you work.
What each level usually covers
| Hours a month | Per week | Typical use |
|---|---|---|
| 20 hours | About 5 | One area, such as keeping your inbox under control or scheduling your social posts |
| 40 hours | About 10 | A mix: inbox, calendar, records and regular posting |
| 80 hours | About 20 | Most of your day-to-day admin, plus content tasks such as short videos |
These are typical patterns, not promises. A busy inbox alone can use 40 hours, and a quiet one may need five.
Signs you chose too few hours
- Your assistant runs out of hours before the month ends.
- You keep doing tasks you meant to hand over.
- Work is rushed in the last week.
Signs you chose too many
- You are inventing tasks to use up the time.
- Hours are left over two months running.
Tip
Review after the first full month. Ask your assistant for a simple summary of where the hours went. If your tasks and client records live in one system, such as Tekmatix, that summary takes minutes to pull together.
The bottom line
Measure first, then buy. One tracked week tells you more than any rule of thumb, and starting small costs you nothing if you can move up a level later.
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Disclosure: the Tekmatix link in this post is my referral link. If you sign up through it, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.