Amigas, I am what you would call a work from home mom. I love it! I love the commute from my bedroom to my office, there is hardly ever any traffic, although there is the occasional Lego accident. I love that on my breaks I can go into the kitchen and make myself a home cooked meal. I love that I am available to pick up and drop off my kids from school. It is the perfect work situation for me, but in all honesty I had to learn a few things in order to make working from home work for me, my family and the people who pay me to work from home. Oh, and I'm a total sharer, so you know I'm just dying to share these work from home tips with you!
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Here are eight secrets to success for work from home moms:
1. Always get dressed. Trust me, I tried working in my pajamas and it felt sloppy, it was sloppy. Now, I get up, get dressed, have my coffee and start working. I feel more professional and I swear it makes me more productive, not to mention the UPS guy seems to appreciate that I'm wearing actual clothes instead of my ratty PJs when I go to the door.
2. Set up a dedicated work space. Even if you don't have an entire room that you can use as an office, you need and deserve a space that is only for you and only for your work. Grab a corner, get a small corner desk and let everyone else know that they are not to mess with your work space.
3. Don't answer the phone when it doesn't work for you. For reals, if your kid is screaming their head off and the phone rings, you don't have to get it. That's why you have a very professional sounding outgoing voicemail message. Let the voicemail do its thing and when your kid is done screaming, you will get to it.
4. Tell people the best way to reach you. I keep phone calls to a minimum because it is simply not the most effective way to communicate with me. E-mail works best for me and no one seems to mind when I ask them to e-mail me.
5. Meet in a public space. If you have to meet with someone on a professional level and your home is a mess, meet them somewhere else. You can go to a cafe or even a shared workspace location, some let you buy a day pass for as little as $25 or a conference room for an hour for $75.
6. Don't apologize for your situation. Don't apologize to employers or clients about working from home or having kids. They won't apologize to you for working from a traditional office space or for not having kids. Instead, be good at what you do and make them happy to be working with you.
7. Be greedy with your time. Sometimes when people find out that you work from home they think that means you have all kinds of extra time, which is simply not the case. If you have to say no to things because you don't have the time, say no and do not for one second feel guilty about it. No, you cannot go to your kid's school in the middle of your work day to make photocopies and that's okay.
8. Do NOT work 24/7. When you work from home it's easy to always be working, to always be trying to finish up one more thing. Don't do it! Put yourself on a schedule and work that schedule. When you are done with work for the day, BE DONE WITH IT! You need time away from work and your family needs and wants time with you.
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