The paid test task
Skip the interview. Pay them for one hour of real work. You'll know within a day if they're the one.
Skip the interview. Pay them for one hour of real work. You’ll learn more from a 1-hour test than from a 30-minute call.
The whole point: see how they work, not how they sell themselves.
The brief
Send the same task to your top 2–3 candidates at the same time. Keep it tight, realistic, and small enough to land in 60–90 minutes.
For an admin VA
“Here’s a Loom walking through my inbox setup. Please triage the attached 30 emails into Action / Read / Archive using the rules in the Loom. Reply to the 5 marked with stars using my templates (linked). Send it all back as a Loom showing me what you did.”
You’re testing: did they follow rules, did they use the templates verbatim, did they ask good clarifying questions before starting.
For a marketing VA
“Here’s a 25-minute Zoom recording. Please pull a 45-second reel from it. Caption it, add a cover slide, send it back ready to post. Tone reference: [creator A] and [creator B].”
You’re testing: did they pick a good moment, are the captions clean, did they match the tone references.
For a videographer (Airtasker)
Skip the test task. Look at their portfolio. Book a paid mini-shoot — 30 minutes for a flat fee. If you like the footage, book the full job.
What you’re actually evaluating
- Speed to first reply. Did they confirm they got the brief and ask any questions within a few hours, or did you hear nothing for 24?
- Quality of clarifying questions. Did they ask anything? Or just dive in and hope?
- Delivery on time. If you said 24 hours, did they hit it?
- How they handle feedback. Send one piece of corrective feedback before they’re fully done. Watch how they take it.
- The final deliverable itself. Last. It matters less than you think — you can train output. You can’t train communication or reliability.