Michelle L. Devon
Tips for Working from Home:
Five Tips about Self Employment Working at Home
There are practical aspects to consider before one
decides if self employment and working from home is the right choice. This
article provides tips
about working at home.
KC
Morgan had the right idea when she wrote this article about the
best and worst of working from home when she wrote, "The best thing about
working from home is often the worst thing about it, too…"
There is a lot of misinformation on the internet
today about working from home, and while the freedom to work out home sounds
appealing, the dedication required to be self employed, especially working from
home, is often more than what's required when working at a jobsite.
Let's explore some tips to being successfully
self employed from the comfort of your own home:
Work from Home Tip #1
To make full time pay, people who work from home
need to work full time hours, especially when just getting started working from
home.
Employees who work on a jobsite are required to
put in a certain number of hours per week in order to draw a full paycheck, and
if someone who is self employed wants to support their lifestyle while working
at home, they should expect to have to put in work hours too.
The good news is that when working from home, the
self employed can determine how much money they want to make, set their own
rates, and even refuse jobs that don't pay well.
Work from Home Tip #2
Working from home doesn't necessarily mean more
time to handle household tasks. In fact, especially when first starting a new
self employment career, learning to balance work and household chores is one of
the most difficult tasks to manage.
While working from home, the self employed
actually spend more time messing up the household than cleaning it! It's
important to find the balance between household chores and work chores.
Work from Home Tip #3
Managing interruptions and disruptions to the
work day when working from home is not an easy task. It may seem as though
working from home would actually have fewer distractions than working in and
office, but this usually is not the case.
Friends and family may not realize that working
from home requires more dedication to the work than working at a jobsite, and
it's easy to be taken advantage of, asked to run errands, and to hear that
death phrase, "Well, since you don't really work…"
Learning to manage time and personal interests
versus work chores is critical for the self employed in order to continue to be
successfully self employed and make money.
Work from Home Tip #4
Working from home doesn't always mean more
money than working for someone else. It is true that the self employed are
limited on their income only by their desire to succeed and earn, able to take
on bigger and better jobs, work longer hours, etc, to make more money, but there
are other factors to consider.
For example, when self employed, there is no
employer contributing money into Social Security and retirement accounts and no
one is taking taxes out of a paycheck, so taxes will be due at the end of the
year. The self employed usually can't take advantage of group health insurance
reduced rates that larger employers can offer their employees. There is also the
overhead cost to consider, such as the increase in household expenses since
working from home means someone is home all day using heating and cooling,
water, and other utilities.
Work from Home Tip #5
While working from home may seem appealing
because of the freedom aspect -- not having to ask an employer for time off
work, being able to come and go from work or the home during the day, etc, it is
important to note working from home requires a great deal of organizational and
motivational strength.
As a general rule, someone who is self employed
needs to be more organized and motivated then an employee working on a jobsite,
because there is the freedom aspect of not having a boss standing over watching
every move. It is easy to slip into a non-work mode and slack off, but then the
pay will suffer too.
Working from home can indeed provide freedom,
flexibility, an ability to choose the projects and type of work performed, and
to set working hours that fit the needs of the self employed. As great as this
sounds, and it can be a wonderful option for some people, there is a downside to
working from home that should be considered before deciding if working from home
is a viable option for you.
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