Are you tired of working and travelling more than 40 plus hours per week, with little time or energy to see your friends and family? You need to take a peek at life from the perspective of working from home. You can enjoy a full, balanced life, achieve a better overall use of your time and create a happier family.
There are many people who are well suited to flexible working patterns and working from home not only improves these people’s productivity but greatly enhances their quality of life. Successful home based workers have discipline, self motivation and high level organisation skills.
It can be difficult to balance the needs of both your work and your family at home. The important thing to remember is that your home based job deserves the same attention and dedication as an office position. This typically means sitting down to work at around 8 or 9 a.m., setting yourself a schedule and focusing on your work, and being ready to pick up the kids (or go shopping) by 3 pm.
Make sure that you don’t get into the trap of working later and later. If you need extra time once in a while, it is often better to schedule some extra time in the evening when the kids are fed and tucked into bed.
Working at home can be challenging with babies and toddlers as they need to have someone they can go to at any time. You cannot focus or make phone calls with a young child climbing up your leg and demanding your attention. In this case you may find that family day care or babysitters can be just as invaluable as they are for office-based work.
And try to leave housework until that 3 or 4 pm knockoff time. The trick is not to feel guilty about it. After all, you wouldn’t be doing it if you were working at an external office.
Successful home-based work is all about time management. In normal office work, most people spend about half of their day actually doing their work. The rest is spent in meetings, taking internal calls and emails, and, of course, gossiping. When you work from home you can be much more productive if you are a disciplined time manager. Achieving this rests on your ability to plan and achieve the most important tasks first. As Brian Tracy suggests in his book ‘Eat That Frog’:
“You can overcome procrastination and keep going with a great plan.”
You will find the adoption of a simple diary and setting tasks at the start of the day (or the night before) is very important. When you set out major and minor tasks in the order of priority, and check them off as you go, it saves a lot of time. Brian says that 10-12 minutes of planning every day can save up to 2 hours of ‘muddling around’.
Believe me, this is true, especially given the amount of email that interrupts our workflow if we let it. Completing tasks will also unlock your creativity and mental powers.
Work at home job opportunities are on the increase and in huge demand. The growing and future trend of flexible work practices in Australia will only see this situation improve.
(Image 
D’Arcy Norman)
Leah Gibbs is the Founder and Business Manager of Lifestyle Careers.
Lifestyle Careers is an online recruitment job board. Our niche and specific focus is the advertising of flexible employment and work at home positions. It is designed for professionals wanting to balance their work and personal life.
