Career Coach:
Top 5 Tips for Making a Home Based Business Work

by Nicole Aliev

(February 12, 2004) A year ago, I decided that 14-hour days and sacrificing family time in favor of corporate wages was no longer an option. I wanted shorter hours, greater flexibility, and a work environment that would support my family needs and personal values. After researching and planning my options, exploring my passions and clarifying my goals, I began to understand the kind of support I would need to pursue my plans, and to identify the barriers I had to overcome. My solution - a home based career and life coaching practice.

Having worked with many home-based clients, and having experienced the rewards and challenges of working from home, I’ve compiled a list of helpful hints. Here are my top five tips for maintaining focus:

1. Manage your approach to administrative work:

After the luxury and support of a large office, you are suddenly responsible for completing the more menial tasks of running a business, like sorting and replying to mail, tracking invoices, doing the photocopying etc. This not only takes up time, but to some is mindless and annoying work.

There are two solutions for this:

a. Hire a virtual or actual assistant to help out a few days a week. This could include employing your spouse or older children, for which there are certain tax benefits, such as health insurance write-offs, and tax-free pay.

b. Do it yourself, but set aside a specific time to do it each day or week, so that it does not infiltrate the more strategic tasks of running the business.

2. Join a business community group, or establish a weekly teleconference with individuals in a similar business or position to yourself:

Loneliness and lack of input or feedback, often means there is no one to balance ideas or actions when you work on your own. This can make you feel more vulnerable in a world of competition as well as lead to a lack of intellectual stimulation.

I joined a weekly call hosted by Rob Schwartz, owner of Today Coach, which provides a community of small business owners from all backgrounds with the opportunity to share ideas, marketing solutions and to discuss problems facing their business.

3. Ignore household demands:

Linda Stephen, president and designer of Sol Cards, Inc., a Mamaroneck company specializing in handmade origami cards and art, told me, “My constant challenge is to ignore home messes and errands during work hours. She said. "The best thing to do is to have a rule to ignore all non-work messes and tasks during work hours. Lower your expectations for a perfectly organized life.”

4. Keep an easily viewable Brag List of your achievements, and a reminder of your Business Goals close to hand:

When business is slow, it is easy to find your sense of self worth affected and your motivation levels low. There is no one to share the load with, or to give the positive and motivational feedback we all need.

My solution is to create a Brag List of the things I am proud of both personally and professionally, that I can refer to when I begin to question my competence. I also have a picture of a desired holiday destination close to hand as a motivation for me to reach my business targets.

5. Ensure friends and family are aware of your business hours:

As nice as it is to work from home with the convenience of all that is familiar, it is also a hindrance to getting things done, when friends and family know you are easily accessible.

Jeff Morgan, a Larchmont entrepreneur who works from home three days a week, recommends putting up a note with Business Hours on the door of his office as a reminder to family members that he is not there for play or household chores. He also refuses to answer the family phone line during these hours, to avoid distraction.

For me, working from home has been a lot of fun; it has also been a lonely endeavor and learning experience. The key to making it work has been to plan and adjust for the challenges that have allowed me the luxury of setting my schedule to spend more time with my family, and to maintain the contact and intellectual stimulation I need with the outside world.

Nicole Aliev runs Rat Race Be Gone, Coaching and Consulting. She conducts half-day career workshops to assist individuals looking to make a change in their career to understand their strengths, career passions, and the environment they wish to work in. The workshop price includes two free follow-up coaching sessions, to ensure individuals maintain focus. Nicole also provides personal coaching to individuals seeking to achieve career and life goals, by helping them to understand and market the value of their skills, while maintaining life balance.

You can reach Nicole Aliev at::
Phone: (914) 381 2010 email: Nicole@ratracebegone.com
Web address: www.ratracebegone.com

Next Career Workshop:
February 17 (6 pm-9.30 pm) and February 19, (9 am-1pm)
Redmen Hall, 17 E Elm St, Greenwich, CT 06830
Forthcoming Managing Stress Workshop:
March 7, (9.30 am-12.30 pm) New York City.

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