Working from home, especially with children, can be quite challenging. Organizing a productive work space and schedule is a definite must. All Business touches on this subject in their article titled, “Ten Tips for Setting Family Ground Rules for Your Home-Based Business“.
I definitely can relate to the need for an established routine and sticking to it. Without my daily routine, I find myself neglecting my family and household duties. It’s important for me to step away from my computer, at dinner time, and not return until morning. How do you manage to balance your time between family and work?
I have to become better at time management by applying Getting Things Done to my daily life routine. I try to see every part as an integrated of the whole picture. I try to avoid to get interupted during dinner time and then I have to take a break, e.g. power nap. I am almost always available on my mobile phone during the day, but sometime I have to turn it off.
I do the same thing. I try to work within normal business hours and do not answer the phone most times either. And when the work is done - the computer is off. (That doesn’t mean that I won’t return again at 1AM though
I was feeling guilty about neglecting my kids after school and so was trying to continue to work and also catch up with their day and their schoolwork commitments at the same time. A recipe for disaster. A friend of mine - a professional organizer - suggested that I give myself permission to stop working from 3:30-4:30. By leaving the office environment for that hour, I was able to truly listen to my kids and make sure homework was started - get dinner going and just enjoy the fact that I was able to have that quality time with my kids. After an hour - they are bored with my company and I can go back to being focused on my business - not short changing either parts of my life.
Of course that is more difficult in the summer - but by assigning each hour of the day with a specific focus, I have found myself to be more productive at work and at home.
D
My business is writing, so I’m fortunate that I can do a lot of work really late at night or really early in the morning. These days, while school is out, I get up at 5 and work a few hours before the kids get up. I still occasionally have a hard time completely removing myself from my work. But I try to do one major thing with the family (besides meals and the bedtime ritual) everyday. Today, we went for a long walk and bought ourselves a treat. Tomorrow, we’ll probably go to the library and to lunch. It’s not huge, but it’s something they’ll hopefully remember.
[…] I read a post by Paula at Small Business CEO about balancing work and family as a home-based business owner. She talked about the importance of creating a routine and having the discipline to walk away at […]