Julianne Wish, Member Contributions
This is one of those questions that work at home moms (WAHMs) often ask themselves – in fact, it’s often something potential WAHMs ask before they even begin working from home: how are you going to balance work, home and family? No one is perfect at this, and no one has the perfect formula. But, there are some good tips out there on how to balance these important elements of your life. Here are some of those tips.
Organize Your Time.
As a mom, it can sometimes seem like everyone wants a piece of your time and attention every minute. It helps to look at time as a big pie – if you take out a piece now, that’s one less piece that you’ll have later. So, divide up the pie.
You can make a pie chart of your day if you want to, but a day planner or online calendar will work just fine. This might work best if you do it weekly rather than daily. And it does not have to be done in this order – just because business tasks are listed first here does not mean they are the most important. If family time is a bigger priority for you, then list it first.
First, list everything you need to do for your business that week, dividing it up into urgent priorities and not-so-urgent ones. Then estimate the hours that the urgent ones will take, and plug those hours into your work week. Those are the non-optional work hours. Then, plug in the less-urgent business activities – maybe using a different color – so you know those are not absolutely vital.
After that, make a list of household chores for that week – laundry, meals, errands, etc. Divide those up among the non-work hours. Take into consideration thinkgs like weekly events (religious activities, soccer games, etc.) that will require more laundry. If possible, set this weekly household task list up to repeat each week so these things will be on autopilot and won’t require re-scheduling each week. There’s no need to re-invent the wheel every week!
Make another list of family time. Do your kids go to school? Do you homeschool? What about family dinners and game nights together? What about a date with your spouse, or if your single, a date with a friend? Schedule in these social things into your calendar too, and rearrange accordingly. Maybe a non-vital business task can be set aside to spend some extra time with your kids this week.
Give yourself time off.
People who work in an office get weekends off. While you may not be able to spare two whole days every week, set aside time one day a week where you can rest and spend time with family. Organizing your time is fine, but a little down time can be therapeutic…even if you have to schedule it in!
Consider a mother’s helper.
Mother’s helpers can be such a help for busy WAHMs. Mother’s helpers come to your house rather than you having to drop your kids off with them. They are cheaper than a babysitter, and your kids still stay at home with you present. The mother’s helper can help out around the house, entertain the kids or even run a short errand.
Julianne Alvarez-Wish is a military wife, mother, business owner, professional writer, blogger and legislative advocate. She is the Director of Communications for Our Milk Money, the Colorado State Leader for the National Association for Moms in Business and the owner of Buy By Mom and Buy By Mom Blog. She is the Colorado Springs Stay-at-Home Mom Examiner for Examiner.com. She also blogs at A Wishful Thought. Her passion, purpose and goal is to help parents work from home so they can be home with their children.
Julianne Wish, Member Contributions
Moms are busy and by necessity you have to wear many hats. People tell you to focus in order to succeed in business, but how can you focus and stay motivated when so many things demand your attention? Here are some tips for busy moms who need to keep their focus and motivation.
Choose the Right Job.
If you are just trying to bring home some money and are willing to take on jobs you dislike, you will burn out before long. This is not to say that you can just do what you want and earn money at it, but it does mean that finding the right work at home job is important to your motivation. Choose topics that you care about, and use skills you enjoy using. Just because you are good at something doesn’t mean you want to do it all day.
Establish a Routine.
New and intersting things are fun and exciting, but routine helps keep you grounded. It’s a good idea to set your alarm for the same time each weekday morning and to head to the home office/computer at approximately the same time each day. Trying to scramble and figure out your work hours each day only wastes time and energy, and hampers your productivity.
Stay on Task.
It’s amazing what you can do if you buckle down and shut out distractions. It’s easy to think you spent two hours writing and article, but if you cut out the trips to the refrigerator and the bathroom, the email reads and replies, and the few minutes here and there you spent on social networking sites, you probably spent less than one hour actually typing. Taking breaks is fine – in fact, it’s necessary to avoid burn out – but schedule your breaks into your day rather than taking them at a whim.
Delegation is Fine.
Presumably, your family is going to benefit from the extra income you plan to generate with your home business. It would behoove everyone to support your efforts. Delegate some of the household chores and errands to the kids and husband (or whomever is in your family).
Ask others to help.
You might consider getting a friend to act as a motivational partner who can hold you accountable if you haven’t accomplished your business goals. He or she can check in on you at regular intervals to see how you’re doing and to encourage you if needed. Tell this person what your goals and intentions are so that he or she can check your progress. For some people, it really helps to know someone is ‘looking over their shoulder.’
Be a Nice Boss.
Just because you are your own boss doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be a nice one. Give yourself time off and frequent breaks, but also crack down when things aren’t getting done.
Julianne Alvarez-Wish is a military wife, mother, business owner, professional writer, blogger and legislative advocate. She is the Director of Communications for Our Milk Money, the Colorado State Leader for the National Association for Moms in Business and the owner of Buy By Mom and Buy By Mom Blog. She is the Colorado Springs Stay-at-Home Mom Examiner for Examiner.com. She also blogs at A Wishful Thought. Her passion, purpose and goal is to help parents work from home so they can be home with their children.
Julianne Wish, Member Contributions
Like any job environment, working from home requires a certain type of individual. There are skills and characteristics of the home employee that may or may not fit your style. So if you are considering working from home, you might want to ask yourself if it’s right for you. Here are some things to consider.
The Work Day
Do you value the time when the work day is over and you can go home and do what you please? If this is a valuable aspect of your outside-the-home job, then think carefully if you want to work from home. Setting your own hours sounds wonderful, but it is not as easy as it sounds. You don’t go home from your home office!
Computer Knowledge
If you are going to work from home, you’ll need a working knowledge of computers. You don’t have to a software designer, but knowledge of the basics is important. It’s also a good idea to have resources you can turn to, such as technically savvy friends.
There’s no IT department to turn to in the home office, and computers require maintenance and updates. If you have trouble downloading software, or if your machine freezes up, you will need to have some knowledge at your disposal to fix the problem. Also, you are undoubtedly using an internet connection to work from home; find out if a back-up plan is feasible for you in case you can’t get online.
Task Orientation
Some people are more task oriented than others – that is, some people find great satisfaction in making a list and getting everything on it done. Others find staying on task difficult, and may get distracted easily with other interests and ideas. You don’t have to be naturally task-oriented to succeed at working from home; but you do need to be honest with yourself about your abilities in this regard and plan accordingly.
Motivation
Remaining self-motivated can be challenging for some. Again, you can’t rewire your brain to be the personality type you need to succeed; but understanding your limitations and strengths regarding motivation can help you put safeguards in place before you begin.
For example, if you have trouble staying motivated, you can ask a friend to hold you accountable periodically. He or she can check up on you weekly with an email or phone call, asking you if your’re on task and if you’ve reached your goals.
Perks
If you already have a day job, carefully consider the perks that job offers and decide what you will do about providing those yourself. Health insurance and taxes, for instance, are often things an employer takes care of behind the scenes. You’ll want to look into those things on your own before starting out in the work at home world.
Julianne Alvarez-Wish is a military wife, mother, business owner, professional writer, blogger and legislative advocate. She is the Director of Communications for Our Milk Money, the Colorado State Leader for the National Association for Moms in Business and the owner of Buy By Mom and Buy By Mom Blog. She is the Colorado Springs Stay-at-Home Mom Examiner for Examiner.com. She also blogs at A Wishful Thought. Her passion, purpose and goal is to help parents work from home so they can be home with their children.
![Work/Life Balance Part III – Get A Day Planner]()
Julianne Wish, Member Contributions
Having a planner – whether it be paper or electronic – is the first step to getting yourself organized. However, just having a planner in your possession isn’t enough – you need to use it and maximize it to make it work for you.
- Size. This is largely a matter of personal preference. Some people prefer large 8 1/2 x 11 planner while others may prefer a slim electronic version. It should comfortably fit in your purse or pocket.
- Views. You planner should have different views so you can look – at a glance – at a day, week, month, etc.
- Location. Always have it with you. It won’t help you if you always leave it somewhere.
- Recording. Write everything in your planner. Your planner should be the first place an event gets recorded. If you follow this your planner will be up-to-date and a good central reference for you.
- Access. Use a tab or paperclip to ‘today’ so you can quickly reference your schedule. Many electronic PDAs have this feature.
- Lists. Have ‘to-do-‘ lists and daily action plans. ‘To-do’ lists should be categorized. For example, home, family, social, business. Items from your ‘to-do’ list will will become items on your daily action plan so you can work toward accomplishing your ‘to-do’ lists.
- Time. Learn to estimate time. When you add ‘to-to’ list items to you daily action plan you need to determine how long they will take to accomplish. If you’re like most people, you underestimate how long this take. Be realistic.
- Color code. This is one of my favorites. Not only does color coding make you planner visually appealing, it makes it easy to see – at a glance – what your day, week, month is bringing. Use general topics for colors: family, finance, health, personal, spiritual, etc. Use a different color for each topic. Use highlighters for paper planners and different color fonts/highlights on your PDA.
- Contingency Planning. Take into account ‘what-ifs’ when planning. Things pop up – phone calls, traffic, long lines. Don’t pack your day so full that you cannot possibly get your list accomplished. When scheduling appointments, allow enough time in between for travel, meals, etc.
- Changes. Changes are OK! You have the right to change plans and priorities. Your planner works for you!
Your planner is not rigid. Be realistic – your planner works for you – not the other way around. Your planner should be a tool to help you achieve your goals.
Julianne Alvarez-Wish is a military wife, mother, business owner, professional writer, blogger and legislative advocate. She is the Director of Communications for Our Milk Money, the Colorado State Leader for the National Association for Moms in Business and the owner of Buy By Mom and Buy By Mom Blog. Her passion, purpose and goal is to help parents work from home so they can be home with their children.
Ally Loprete, Community
Written by Ally Loprete
The thought of actually sitting down and scheduling some lazy “do absolutely nothing” time probably seems very stupid as well as a waste of time. Entrepreneurs, especially parents who are constantly on the go between their company and their families, really need to schedule some time to where they just sit back, relax and decompress.
When you are constantly on the go and running all over the place, attempting to work 7 days a week, in between playdates, naps, mealtime, laundry and grocery shopping, not only do you get overly exhausted by the 4th week, you run the risk of beginning to resent your company, the company that you started out loving. You may even begin to resent your children, the ones who you fell so madly in love with, you decided to work from home to be closer to them. Both responsibilites will soon seem like a ball and chain that you can’t get away from. This is not why you decided to work from home.
A written schedule can fix all of your problems. This is something that you should do every day of the week, whether you schedule your down time for the Saturday and Sunday weekend, take Monday off of work, take an extra long weekend, or just cut out of work early on one day a week. Your job as a parent continues all week long, so it’s important to account for ALL of your time.
1. Schedule in Realistic times to work, remaining flexible. For me, I am able to work Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoons when my oldest son is at preschool and my youngest in napping. Every once in awhile my schedule is blown by an early riser, but it’s a time I can count on for the most part. I can also work for a few hours in the evening when my husband comes home, and Sunday nights when the weekend festivities are over and my husband can take over.
2. Make a list of weekly tasks and dedicate a day to each task. Mondays are for blogging and posting, Wednesdays are for social networking, Fridays are for PR. Evenings are for responding to emails and getting organized for the following day.Weekends are for catching up, but never more than 5 hours in a single weekend.
3. Schedule in “Mommy” or “Daddy” time. I had made a promise to myself and both my sons that each morning until lunchtime I would not work at all. I could schedule playtime, take them to a park, arrange a playdate, or even do some mommy chores, but my laptop was to remain closed. I also used this time to do mommy chores such as go grocery shopping or folding laundry. Because I was able to find ways to include them in these mindless tasks, they did not appear to resent this time as it did not seem like “work” to them.
4. Schedule in time for you. Just as the body needs food to stay nourished and sleep to stay refreshed, taking time to relax and clear your mind will work wonders for your health and your productivity.
5. Schedule time with friends and family. Date night with your spouse, with another couple, game night with neighbors, a visit with relatives, or out with your friends for a social gathering. It’s as important to your sanity as a good night’s sleep. Commit to 1-2 nights a month, if that is all you can squeeze in, but make that minimum a priority. It should give you just enough of a break from your work that you can go back with the same appreciation for your company that you started out having.
Julianne Alvarez-Wish is a military wife, mother, business owner, professional writer, blogger and legislative advocate. She is the Director of Communications for Our Milk Money, the Colorado State Leader for the National Association for Moms in Business and the owner of Buy By Mom and Buy By Mom Blog. She is the Colorado Springs Stay-at-Home Mom Examiner for Examiner.com. She also blogs at A Wishful Thought. Her passion, purpose and goal is to help parents work from home so they can be home with their children.
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