VA Institute Team
INGRID BAYER
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Accredited Trainer, Coach and Mentor
Ingrid Bayer is a mum, wife and business owner with a career spanning over 30 years in legal secretarial and business administration. Operating from her home office on the beautiful Mid-North Coast of NSW, in 2008, Ingrid started operating as a Virtual Assistant.
Within two years, she had grown her business to include managing and overseeing a team of VAs, and has gone on to forge a very successful VA business.
In 2017, Ingrid established VA Institute of Australia – www.vainstitute.com.au – drawing on all that she has learned in life and her VA business so far (which she still operates) to provide practical assistance and mentoring to other Australians who want to set up and run their own successful Virtual Assistant businesses.
In 2019, Ingrid established Find a VA - www.findava.com.au - as an additional resource from which to source leads for the growing number of graduates that have undertaken the VA Institute VA Startup or VA Reboot Programs.
Ingrid is active on the speaking circuit, has written two books about setting up a successful VA business, and continues to champion the growth and development of our Australian VA Industry founded on the principles of Excellence, Authenticity and Sustainability.
ANGELA REVELL
Chief Executive Officer
Coach & Mentor, Global Operations Manager,
Angela is located in the beautiful seaside town on Penguin down in Tasmania. She has her hands full with a household of 3 boys and her cheeky husband, but wouldn't have it any other way!
With almost 20 years providing virtual assistance in both the technical and administrative space, Angela firstly started operating within her father’s family technical business before stepping out on her own in 2012, after her father retired.
After connecting with Ingrid and the VA Institute in early 2019, Angela joined the VA Institute team as a contractor, providing technical services. It wasn’t long before her broad skills were utilised in other parts of the company, with Angela eventually moving to the role of Global Operations Manager. As an integral part of the VA Institute, Ingrid invited Angela to the VA Institute and Find A VA as a Co-Director and Joint Owner in early 2022.
Trained in the technology space and working in the Technology Industry for almost two decades, Angela enjoys all thing technical. You will find her deep within streamlining business practices, setting up new software platforms & CRMs or creating website.
Whilst sharing her knowledge of all things IT, Angela guides the VA Institute around current platforms and implements new systems, along with coaching, mentoring & training to VAs and OBMs. Passionate about micro & small businesses, Angela enjoys guiding entrepreneurs, VAs and OBMs to their full potential.
TONI WALKER-LEAR
Sales Director & Onboarding Specialist
Toni has worked across a number of different industries over the last 20 years from the beauty industry to civil construction. Toni has a strong background in sales and marketing.
Toni chose to become a VA after running her own publishing business and looking for a new challenge. She was helping clients out as a VA but wasn't really set up to be the best she could be for herself or her clients.
Being a VA is such a fantastic job and Toni loves being able to provide solutions to all her clients' needs as well as being able to work around her family life.
Toni is our VA Startup Mentor who speaks with startup VA's to help them move towards starting their own business as well as onboarding all new enrollments to the VA Startup Program.
Mel Clarke
Creative Team Co-ordinator
Mel can be found in her happy place when she’s working with micro and small business owners.
Driven by the thrill associated with positive outcomes, Mel loves a good challenge, and believes with a “real” cup of coffee and some good tunes, anything is possible.
Initially trained in office administration (many moons ago), With a career spanning over 25 years, Mel has a diverse skillset in business development and management.
Mel can be found coordinating the talented creative team at the VA Institute. She loves being a part of the creative journey with the VA graduates as they get ready to launch their new business.
Phillippa Smith
VA Summit Event Co-ordinator
Phillippa takes great pleasure in ensuring events run smoothly and receives great satisfaction from seeing people enjoying their experiences.
Her creative side really shines through when she is planning events, and she loves to come up with out-of-the-box ideas to make the ideas come to life.
Phillippa has organised events from small team meetings to large conferences, as well as learning and development programs such as Leadership Assessment Centres.
A recognition of her success as an event manager was achieved during her corporate career through winning the ANZ Outstanding Achievement Award for her work on a Leadership Summit.
Within the VA Institute you will find Phillippa deep within the annual VA Summit planning and she is the driving force behind the success of these events and enjoys creating the program for the events theme of CONNECT | GROW | LEARN