Milicent Ukachi is a Top-Rated Upwork Executive Virtual Assistant with over 6 years of experience. She specializes in driving business growth and efficiency through strategic content marketing and administrative excellence.
Milicent Ukachi shared with Today Africa how rejection motivated her to succeed as Top-Rated Upwork Executive Virtual Assistant
Can you share a bit about yourself, about your journey into freelancing and what inspired you into becoming a virtual assistant?
Before I ventured into this, I was a teacher. I actually had a school, but something happened and I had to shut down the business. So I was a bit depressed, let me put it that way. I was not happy, I felt like a failure because I put so much into that business and it just collapsed like that.
And I really felt very bad. So I had a younger sister that was already into freelancing for some months. This actually happened in 2022. And she reached out to me and told me about the Digital Witch Community.
She told me a bit about it. I was like, what is this one again? I really don’t understand what my sister is talking about. Then she went behind my back and registered me for the training and came back and told me that I need to attend it.
And I was like, why did you go and register me for something I’m not prepared for? And she said I would like it, that I should go on and try it. I said, okay, let me just go for one of the classes and see for myself.
And I joined online for one of the classes, and that was it. I was just hooked and I was so interested in what they were teaching. I participated in everything, making sure I was there in class all the time. And that was what started my journey into remote working.
A month after, I set up my Upwork account. Just the way we were instructed and taught. I got my first job within that one month. And I think it was a $200 job. So the thing is that when you go through this training you just have to go through more training.
And I did a lot of that. I went to so many training sessions. I think today, if I have to check my certificates, I have over 20 of them. Some were paid, some were free. And I even did some that had no certificates like Alison.
I have a lot of certificates on Alison. I have not collected them yet. But I did some courses there and my certificates are just there waiting for me to pay for them and collect them. Because with Alisin you could learn anything. You don’t pay for the courses but you pay for the certificates.
So I have lots of them there. So I did a whole lot to learn to improve. Let me put it that way. And it’s been good. There were areas that I had issues. I had some difficulties, but that never stopped me. I just kept on learning, looking for opportunities to learn and just get better at it.
How did the rejection of ALX motivate you into pushing more or wanting more out of life?
This is more like a roller coaster. We have this community called Exceptional VAs, virtual assistants, that’s what we call ourselves. We came together to form a community, a paid group.
And we have these Saturday gatherings by 9 a.m. just to reflect, talk about our winnings, our issues, regrets, so many things. So one of them now said, oh, she’s looking forward to graduating from the ALX virtual assistant program that she did. And every one of us congratulated her.
I told her congratulations, but anytime I hear ALX, I feel kind of bad. I remember what they did to me and they were like, what happened? And I said during my early period of trying to get more training on what I wanted to do.
ALX was one of the places Ekwutosi, the owner of Digital Witch support community, encouraged us to apply for the virtual assistant. Then it was the early period, I don’t know whether we were the first set or how many sets we were.
But it was the early period when ALX started this free training for virtual assistants. She encouraged us that we should apply and go and learn more. So I applied. I’m not the kind of person that likes to lie about my age. I don’t lie about my age. Why should I lie about my age?
I put everything there and then I was 49 years old. And I got the email after some time, they told me, we’re so sorry, we cannot accept you because of your age, we have our age limit. I felt so bad. I was like, why will you put an age on something like this?
So I told one of my daughters, one of my twin daughters, the one that studied accounting, I told her to try it out, that this would be good for her. She just entered university then. I told her to go for it. And she applied and she got it. And she did the ALX.
But while she was learning the ALX, I found another place to go and learn my own virtual assistant training. I did my own training on one side. And the funny thing was that as she was learning, she was telling me what they were teaching, I was like, is that all?
The funny thing is that it is me today that is teaching her some things that she doesn’t know about. And she did it, and she did well, and all that. She got the certificate. And she told me what the training was like. I said okay that’s fine.
But I think I have learned a lot more than that. That was what I replied to her. And so that was how it started. But I did not let that rejection pull me down. I just wanted to learn more. I wanted to learn more. And I have done so much training.
I wear so many hats. It’s not just virtual assistants. I’m also into script writing. I’m into digital marketing and copywriting. And I still teach online. I’m a teacher, like I said, I’ve been teaching for over 20 years.
I’m a certified Montessori teacher by profession and a primary school teacher as well. I still teach online till today. That will always be my first love. It’s something that will not let go. But like I wrote in one of my posts there are transferable skills from teaching that have really helped me in my work as an executive virtual assistant.
And that has really helped me. So I’m not the kind of person that lets a rejection make me stop from wanting to go on to enhance myself. And I apply that to so many things, not just even my work. So many things. I tell my daughters the same thing: don’t let anybody tell you that you can’t do this. Don’t let anybody say you can’t do that. And it has been like that for me.
What’s your view on age discrimination in the workplace?
Personally, I don’t think there’s a need for that. The funny thing is that some people hear me speak on the phone. They’ve not seen my face. They assume I’m in my 20s because when they hear me speak and I want to tell them my real age, they are shocked.
They’re like, are you serious? And you are this active, you are this proactive, you want to do this, you want to do that. I don’t think age should, age discrimination should be something we’ll have to deal with.
And I think people should be given opportunities to prove their worth and it should not be the one that will determine that in most cases. I don’t feel my age most times. Because I feel more alive, more vitalized, and more energized when I do things I like.
And age doesn’t seem to be an issue for me. For me, age discrimination should not be something we have to worry about. We have to deal with it. Give people the chance they deserve. Let people show their worth.
It’s when they are not doing the right thing, then you can say, okay, I don’t think you can do this. But to say you are using age as a factor to determine how effective somebody is, I don’t think it’s actually good. I’m not a fan of it and I don’t like it.
It has gotten to a stage where I see some jobs or some programs and I see the age limit and I just walk past, I don’t bother any longer because I don’t want to start talking and arguing and trying to let them understand that they shouldn’t do this.
They shouldn’t use age as a factor to determine if I’m good or not. I just let it go and I look for an alternative that could be equally as good or even better than what I have walked away from. So that’s my own take on it. I don’t think it should be so. It should give people a chance to show their worth.
If they don’t show it well and they don’t do well, then you have a good reason to say, I’m sorry, I don’t think we can work together. But then you should give them a chance first.
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You are a top rated plus freelancer on Upwork. So how did you achieve the top rated plus status?
One of the requirements is the fact that you get to a level where you have a long term relationship that’s a form of work with a client. And then you reach a certain level of payment on up work to get that you start off with of course, talent badge.
That you are seen as having good talent but I never got the talent badge. I jumped straight into getting a top rated badge. You get a top rated badge first before getting a top rated plus badge.
So what was funny with mine was that I got my top rated plus badge within a month after getting the top rated badge. I was a bit shocked because I actually thought to get the top rated plus badge, you need to have earned in the hundreds of thousands to get that.
And you should have a long lasting client’s working relationship for a longer period of time. But I guess I did not know that quite well until I got mine. I went back to go and checked the rules again and I realized that, oh, I actually have long-lasting relationship clients.
I saw that I have worked with some for over six months, some for a year, and some for four months or more. And I was like, okay, I now see why I got this.
I got the top rated plus badge in the month of April. And I have been consistent with my work. And it’s been good. It’s been helpful. The badge really helps a lot because clients get to see that you really must be good at what you do to get this badge.
And most of the time you just get direct messages from clients asking to work with you and all that. I had to turn down some of them because I don’t really have time. The thing is that some of these jobs involve me alone working with them.
I want to give my best to what I do. And I don’t want to spread myself thin and end up having issues with clients here and there because I’m not able to complete the project successfully. So I had to turn down some and stick on with the ones I am doing for now.
And of course teaching will still be my number one love. I still teach children online and I still do that one. I don’t think I’ll let go of that one because I like doing it a lot.
As a virtual assistant and as a freelancer, how do you adapt your services to suit the client’s unique needs?
You need to be very careful on how you accept jobs. It’s not everyone that comes your way that you have to say yes to, to be frank. I’m lucky that some of my jobs are part time and time flexible.
They’re not looking strictly for you to work at a particular time. They just want to get the work done and you just show them results, submit results. The ones that stick with time are usually the ones I teach online, which is because of the time zone.
I do that at night though right now we are on holiday. So I do that one in the night. So I teach for like an hour, an hour plus. But most of the work I do has to do with being flexible. It’s for me to work at my own pace and at my own time. And I make sure I meet the deadline and submit the project.
So I’m very careful with the kind of jobs I accept. I wouldn’t want to accept jobs that are too restrictive, except when we have to go on call and have meetings online then we schedule that and plan towards it and then have our meetings.
I also do that as well. So all this kind of helps me in reaching my goals of helping my clients and we are both satisfied with what we do together.
As a mother and a freelancer. How do you maintain work-life balance?
Well, my kids are grown up, so they are not like I have little kids to take care of. And even when they were little, I would need extra help and hands to help me. That one, for sure, any freelancer who is a mother would need help.
And it’s been very good to have a supportive husband like mine, who is quite supportive. My kids, too, are quite supportive. If you read through some of my posts, I told you about three of my daughters being my VAs.
They’re not even with me. Two in school then the other one is in Uyo. I just send them tasks to do for me, and they do it and submit. And I pay them, of course. So my children are grownups. They are not kids. Three of them have their Upwork accounts themselves.
They do get jobs once in a while to do themselves. So they know what it entails. I’m a very organized person. I tend to organize my tasks for each day. I organize everything. If I have to cook, I prepare time to cook for that. If I have to do this, I fix the time for it. But when mommy is working, nobody disturbs me. They let me do my work.
So, like right now I’m in the room myself having this with you. They are there. Nobody’s stopping. They know mommy is having an interview so everybody respects that. I’m lucky. My kids are grown up. And like I told them, I’m doing what I enjoy. I’m renewing my life, let me say it that way.
So it’s well balanced. I know how to balance things around with my work and my family. We’ve come to an understanding and we do support each other and that has really helped a lot.
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What do you have to tell people that have been told that they are too old to be a freelancer or a virtual assistant?
You asking that question makes me laugh because I have met lots of people that find it hard to believe that I’m into this kind of work, that I have the mindset and the time to do this. And they ask me, how did I do it?
Ever since that post came out, I’ve been bombarded with so many requests on how I do it. And I told them when you set your mind on something. You can do it. I don’t know why people should think age should be a thing.
We have this mentality in this part of our country that because you reach a certain age or your kids are grown up, you just relax and wait for your children to take care of you. No, I told my kids, please go and take care of yourself first. Help yourself first.
I don’t understand why people should think that. Because in my 50s, you think I can’t handle a computer. You think I can’t be a digital tech savvy person? No way. It’s funny and I tell them when they get to my DM and ask me and I tell them who told you you cannot do it?
If you set your mind to it, you will do it. The post I published today I wrote it in less than 10 minutes. But because this is something I am used to doing, this is something I have learned to do, this is something I have been trained to do. If you are trained to do something, you will get to know it well.
And it’s become part of your lifestyle, certainly when you keep on doing it. I don’t like the fact that people think because you’re of a certain age you can’t do some things. In the digital witch community, we have people in their seventies also working and earning money.
I want to keep on doing this for as long as possible. And I’ll be working to earn my own money by myself. I don’t know why people should think that because you’re a certain age, you think you can’t do something. I don’t think you should think that.
So when they come to my DM, I tell them, see, you set your mind to do something, you will do it. You will do it if you really want to do it. Don’t let society or anybody tell you, you cannot do it, you cannot achieve it. You can’t achieve it if you set your mind to it.
It’s just for you to make sure that you’re ready to be consistent, ready to put in the hard work and of course, you’re ready to spend money because when it comes to Upwork, you have to spend money to get money. You see those connects that you use in applying for jobs.
It’s like trying to recharge your phone and you spend money. So you are going to spend money to buy connect to be able to get jobs. Except you have a killer, well-optimized profile that clients will just go over your profile and see that you are the best fit for what they want.
And they just contact you straight and offer you the jobs. That happens a lot to me and to a lot of us that have well-optimized profiles. So of course the badge, the top rated plus badge also helps on its own.
But you have to work hard to get to that stage and you have to keep on working and not relent and settle back. Not the one that you would do small and then you go back and rest. It’s like you open your shop and close the gate but the door is open.
Anybody will come peep in and see the goods but nobody is there to attend to them. That is how it is on Upwork. You have to be there. If you are not there, nobody will see you. And I advise people that don’t think that you can’t do it if you set your mind to it.
You mentioned being consistent in what you are doing. So how do you stay consistent as a virtual assistant?
I had some issues too and I stayed off working remotely, Upwork, everything for about six months last year because I was just like drained. I was tired and fed up and all that. It happens. But then when you fall, you get up. You don’t stay down there.
If you want people to pity you then be ready to stay there for a long time. It happened to me. It’s not a matter of the fact that one does not fail. But it’s for you to get yourself up, dust yourself up, and then you continue.
Consistency happens, then after a while it stops. I was not so consistent on LinkedIn. I started being consistent on that first post I posted, because I was off LinkedIn for over six months. The last time I posted on LinkedIn before that post was six months ago.
I wasn’t just into it, but now I feel that I have to keep on doing it. Ever since that first post, it’s like, I can’t stop. I have to keep on. And that is what I mean by consistency. Because the fact that you would have known about me if you had not seen my post.
You would have heard about me if you had not seen my post. That is what we talk about being consistent too, because you’re not the only one. Other people have noticed and have reached out to me.
People that are asking advice, people that tell me, oh, I’m inspired. Now, people are telling me that it is giving me ideas in my head on what I could utilize this opportunity and do and perhaps help more people to make them understand that you can actually do this.
You can actually succeed in this sector. It’s not only for young people as we were made to believe before. There are so many things you can use in being consistent. You can create your content calendars if you want to be able to write, and then you schedule them, and then publish them when it’s due.
And so I do that, but I’m the kind of person, even as a teacher, I don’t follow calendars. I don’t know. That’s something with me. I work with what I see. If I enter a class and I see the children are not ready for class, not ready to be taught.
I change everything and we will play a game first. The same thing applies with my creating content. I have a content calendar, but I’m not restricted by it because things happen. Today’s post, I didn’t plan it. I just created the post. I wrote, I was reflecting on so many things before this interview, like I said.
And I was like, what if I hadn’t done this? What if I hadn’t done that? What if I had let this stop me from going on? Would I be here today? So there are things you need to do to be consistent. Things happen around you.
My colleagues and I will talk about the fact that you can create content from anything, even when you’re in your kitchen cooking. Something will just enter into your head that I can create content from this. And they’re related to what you are doing, maybe in your workplace or so.
We use our eyes to see things, we use our ears to hear things. So you could get ideas from anything and then be consistent about that. That’s being consistent with creating content.
Being consistent on Upwork. Even though I really haven’t applied for jobs for some time, I still visit Upwork because of the algorithm, your visibility has to be out there for people to notice that you are there.
So I visit Upwork, even though I’m not applying for jobs, I could change my headlines, I could change my profile pictures, I could remove one skill and add another skill, I could change my bio. I just must do something for the algorithm to notice that Millicent is here and she’s doing something. That is part of being consistent.
And then you are applying for jobs. Don’t apply for jobs today and then relax after two weeks then you come back after two weeks. Upwork likes it when you are consistent with applying for jobs. Because they are usually the ones that suggest to clients, this freelancer should be invited for your project.
They will give suggestions to the clients. Because of your consistency in being there, they’ll be the ones to give a client suggestion that this freelancer should be invited for your project, who fits your projects.
And then you get invited for such projects and then you apply and then you are invited for an interview and you do well in the interview and then you get the job. So that is what I mean by being consistent. You just don’t relax and expect the jobs to fall on you.
The same thing with LinkedIn. If you have a target, you want to get jobs on LinkedIn, you want people to notice you in your niche.
Do the right thing, post engaging content that or educating one that people will learn a lot from and then you also engage in other people’s content as well so that they will know that you do exist and you are there. That is what I mean by consistency.
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What key lesson have you learned from overcoming rejections?
The lesson I have learned is that if you are too laid back and let little things trouble you, you will end up losing out and seeing the opportunity ahead of you. If I had taken that rejection and said, okay, I’m not doing it again, I don’t think this remote work thing is for me.
There’ll be so many things I would have lost out on.So for me, what I’ve learned is that I don’t take rejection as the end of everything. I have written over close to 800 proposals on Upwork. I don’t even want to quantify the amounts in terms of connects that were used to apply to those jobs.
But then you keep on getting rejections. You keep on hearing, no, no, no, nobody accepts you. But just one yes will change a whole lot. You will just forget about all those ones. So for me, rejection is not the end.
It even makes me want to even push ahead more, to know more, to do more, to understand more. And that has really helped me a lot. And I think a lot of people should also have the same opinion and idea to understand that rejection should not be the end.
It should even push you to do much more. Then you, even yourself, you’ll be surprised with the results. Because if you had stopped with that rejection and said, okay, this is not for me because one person rejected me, or two or three or ten rejected me.
I can’t count how many people have rejected me, how many jobs have rejected me. But it still didn’t stop me. I just kept on at it. And I think a lot of us that are freelancers should also have that same mindset as well.
What advice would you give to aspiring freelancers, more especially those that want to become virtual assistants?
Today’s freelancers are quite lucky. When I first started, we didn’t have so many opportunities. So many people were hoarding information. People were not open to telling us things. ChatGPT was not so popular then or maybe they were still creating it.
But the thing is that today’s freelancers have plenty of choices. When I first started, I wanted to throw off my teaching niche and focus on another niche. And I did so many things, but I still went back to the first one. I still went back to teaching. So first of all, know what niche, know what you want to do.
And I tell people that if you already have experience in some onsite jobs that you used to do. Work on that, upskill on that, or transfer such skills to whatever new niche you want to go into, and learn and upskill very well on what niche you want to be into. Be the guru, be the expert, be the master in it, and do so well.
Ask questions, network with people, join groups that can push you, that can support you, learn, do courses. Because those courses will be very important, especially the certificate, because you have some jobs that will request to see those certificates.
Just seeing the certificate alone, you’ve gotten the job. Because they will say yes, that for you to have gotten the certificate, you must have really done quite well. So you need to do some of those courses and get some certificates that have to do with this niche that you’re interested in.
But the thing is that you have to find out what you want to go into and become a master at it. And then you will do well. Then when you learn that, you learn other aspects, learn how to traverse the digital world, space, and everything.
You will do well, but you need to ask questions. You need to ask the right questions. When you don’t ask the right questions, you will not get good answers.
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