3by9

Working From Home Part I: Setting Your Own Hours

As I mentioned last week I am working on a new venture and in doing so I realized that this is the time of year that many of us begin to think of going out on their own with the new year coming up. Not to mention that you might have gotten laid off and are reading this and figure it is time to take matters into your own hands. Because of this I thought it would be good to offer some perspective on what it takes to be successful if you are going to work from home.

One of the main reasons I can think about why having a 9-5 is easier than working for yourself at home is that there is structure. You know when you have to go into work and you know when you get to leave (hopefully). While working you know you have 8 hours to get X job done, while when you work at home you figure you have all the time in the world.

If you don’t setup any structure when you work at home you will find that you start to get into a routine where you work all hours of the day, but never get anything done. You might wake up at 9am, but not finish with anything until 2am. Working from home you begin to develop the mentality that the job will get done when you get it done, not by 5pm.

What is the point of working from home though if you are just going to structure it as you would your normal day-to-day job? The good part is that you get to set your own hours, but again make sure there is some structure behind it. You could even get creative with the time and decide that you want to work from 9am-1pm and then start again at 6pm-10pm.

Don’t allow yourself to fall into the trap of extending your hours either. If you stop to develop a structure around your work routine then you will find that the rest of your life starts to fall apart. You may start to complain about never having enough time without realizing that you have all the time in the world if you set it up that way. Yes it is important to get the job done, but usually it won’t get done any faster if you work 16 hour days versus 8 hour days so you might as well save that time for your life.

Also keep in mind that this is easier than it sounds. I have been job single (you like that new term?) for 6 years now and I still don’t have a proper routine. I seem to be a bit too flexible with my schedule but rest assured it is for the benefit of my own life!