MartyThe desire to work from home is often mentioned as a top reason for going from being an “employee” and striking out on your own working for yourself. When you do make the leap from just having a job to full fledged entrepreneur, it requires a disciplined approach to your daily work in order to keep things on track. You no longer will have a supervisor or manager watching you every second and telling you what to do and when to do it. Success as an entrepreneur requires you to have self motivational skills to get things done and management your work time effectively. What follows are my top success and time management tips for the newly self employed home business owner:
Create a schedule for the day and stick to it.
Decide how many hours you want to work on specific projects and be accountable to complete those tasks within that time frame.
One of the benefits of working from home is the control you gain over your schedule and hopefully you’re your time more effectively.
Keep your office separate from the rest of the house. Work should not intrude on your personal space. You need to keep work and home life separate.
Your home office doesn’t have to be an elaborate set-up, just something separate from your personal living space.
A separate phone line, computer, desk and files are some of the basic equipment needs that should be separate. Separately your work space from your living space will make it possible to make a clean break from work when you engage in personal activities.
Be serious about your work. This is the reason for setting up a separate work area.
Not only will you create better quality results, you’ll complete scheduled tasks that much faster.
The resulting benefit is increased quality personal time which is the reason most people decide to work from home in the first place.
Network with like-minded people. Since your work location will be in your home, it’s important not to get trap in your own little silo.
You will need to get out from time to time to meet and network with people involved in similar businesses as yours.
I also suggest you seek out online methods of networking such as joining industry forums and chat groups revolving around working at home. Contacts you make can be a lucrative resource in growing your business.
Like I mention above, get out and meet people at least a couple of times a week.
If you don’t have normally have formal business meetings, visit public places where you can work remotely.
Just the act of being among other people will give you a boost and keep you from feeling too isolated.
This is an important point and critical to your overall business success if you plan on striking out on your own and working from home.
Plan you work tasks and activities and impose a deadline to complete each task and be accountable to yourself to meet those deadlines.
Enough said.
Working from home is not as easy as it sounds, and those who do so have to make that extra effort to stay motivated. Done right, you can have the best of both worlds!
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Good article.
I think the temptation to do other things, be it raid the fridge, relax outside, household chores, or watch tv etc makes working at home that much harder. Throw in family members wanting your attention too! Takes serious discipline to stay focused at home. I found it very hard. Not having a proper office in the home didnt help any. Ended up finding one away from the home
On a side note, I would like to contact you about the contest over at Marcus Hochstadt 
http://www.hochstadt.com/the-winner-party-celebration-in-the-cozy-lounge
Again very informative post here Drives the points home. Working at home is not as easy as it first sounds.
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Hi BlogMeTheMoney, Thank you for your comment and the kind words. I’ll email you separately regarding the contest.
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It’s so true, you really need to be discipline and have good time management when working from home. Plus, you must not be easily distracted, like watching TV or else you’ll never get much of your work done!
And most definitely, learn to give yourself a break, so always have set work times laid out.
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Hi Marie, thanks for your comment. I completely agree with you about having discipline in eliminating distractions while working. I find that’s a big challenge for me.
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The Top 5 Overlooked Secrets You Need To Know When Creating A Home Business | Money Maker Times.com…
All people want to ditch that 9-5 program and be their own boss. Work from home and earn tons of money. In this article you’ll be able to learn some secrets to make this dream come true. Some down to earth advice to make your home business really work…
Thanks wtricks for stopping by and for your comment.
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Rich Schefren even advises to home businesspeople to actually rent an office very close by He got a lot of flack for it, but he made a good point: most people are trying to get away from their boss and their workplace, and working at home does this, but so does working alone in a rented office somewhere.
I personally work in a home office like you mentioned. My wife even brings me lunch on the days I can’t get away because I’m working on a project She’s awesome.
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Good point Bryan. Renting separate office space is definitely a great way to go, especially if space is tight in your home and keeping business activities separate would be difficult. Thank you for your comment.
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