Balancing a career and kids – in your home
A lot of parents – particularly moms – see working from home as the perfect solution to being there for their child while earning a living. But if you don’t do it right it might just make your juggling act even trickier. As Lisa and Rich Banjany found when they set up their home business, it might be too much to expect your kids to entertain themselves while you try to clock in the hours – and trying to do your work in 30-minute sessions (if you’re lucky!) isn’t the best way to ensure its quality.
As far as young children are concerned, if you’re there, you’re theirs. You might well have the discipline to ignore your chores and grocery shopping list while you meet your deadlines – but it’s way more difficult to ignore your child when she needs some attention. If your work is fairly flexible and you don’t have set hours, you might be able to fit in with your child’s routine, working while he naps or while he’s at kindergarten.
When your kids are your priority – after all, that’s why you wanted to work from home in the first place – but work also beckons, you need to be realistic
If he’s there and you need to work it really all depends on his age and whether you can pick and choose exactly what you’re doing. If it’s phone-based work doing it with a crying baby in the room isn’t really an option. It’s going to be hard working around a toddler too, as they can be pretty demanding! This is when you might have to adjust your schedule to fit in with his, getting up an hour early to squeeze some work in before he wakes, or burning the midnight oil to make your deadlines. It get easier with older children but you’ll still have to make the effort to ensure they don’t feel they come second to your job. Try these tactics…
Keeping your child busy while you work
If you can’t work while your baby or toddler naps (or if he doesn’t know the meaning of the word nap!) then you’ll need to help him to be independent.
Most young children are happier and more amenable to left to amuse themselves in the mornings – and if you’re one of those lucky parents whose child does actually nap, this can mean a couple of hours of relatively undisturbed work. With a baby or toddler, your best bet is to set your laptop up in a room that’s totally childproofed and has a big selection of toys he can pick and choose from while you work. Paint the walls with washable paint or think about transforming the bottom half of one wall into a giant chalkboard so your toddler or preschooler can hone his artistic muscles while you get on with things. Set up an activity table with paper, coloring books, and crayons or coloring pencils. Preschoolers also love role-play, so if you set them up with a kiddy laptop they’ll leave you alone so they can get on with their own ‘work’!
It’s easier with an older child – they’ll likely need far less input from you when it comes to creative projects or games. Get them doing origami, collecting flowers from the back yard to press, embroidery, educational computer games. You might even enlist their help with the simpler aspects of what you do – they could check your stationery supply, list anything that might need reordering, sharpen pencils.
The childcare option
If you only need to work for a couple of hours a day, do think about arranging childcare for those times. It may seem counter to your grand plan to raise your child yourself by working at home but it is one way to make sure they get the undivided attention of a familiar caregiver.
If you’re lucky you might be able to get your mom or another relative to do it; if not, see if you can come to a reciprocal arrangement with another local mom or think about hiring a responsible local teenager to come spend a couple of hours with your child after school. Alternately, check out formal daycare providers that might offer part-time hours. Another good option is local churches which often lay on ‘Mom’s Morning Off’ sessions where you can drop your child in to play for two or three hours.
If your job really can’t be done with kids in attendance and you tend to squeeze it into school hours for that reason, you’ll need to arrange vacation camps for older children – keep in mind that these are tax deductible.
Being professional
You’re not only a parent – you have a career. This means you’ll need to appear professional to prospective employers. Don’t even think about scheduling phone calls when your children are there because despite your bribes (or threats) they will choose that moment to flush the remote control down the toilet, strangle the cat, beat up on each other, trash the house and practice their number for American Idol at a decibel level that would the average jumbo jet to shame. If you need to meet with a client do it elsewhere unless you have an office with a separate entrance – another good alternative is to rent a conference room at a local entrepreneur business center, or see if your local library has an office you can rent.
One more thing on this topic: supply clients with your cellphone number. Preschoolers aren’t too good at taking messages and neither are moody tweens and teens. And let’s face it, if your child doesn’t have his own cell you aren’t even getting in the ballpark of your landline when he’s home from school…
Plan in family time
One big problem of working from home is that the line between kid time and work time can often get blurred, especially if you don’t have a home office that you can symbolically close the door on when you’ve finished working. If your computer is sitting in the corner of the family room it’s all too easy to dive on there for a few minutes when you should really be devoting some attention to your child – and those few minutes can add up to an hour of you snapping at him to go away when he comes within a yard of you.
You need to set strict work hours and your child needs to be your top priority when you’re off-duty – if you’re just going through the motions, he’ll know. Plus, he’ll be a lot more likely to give you some breathing space when you work if he has some idea of when he can confidently expect to have some time with you.
To that end, draw up a color-coded family schedule that makes it clear to you when you need to put your work down and be Mom and clear to your child when he can’t disturb you. Obviously working relatively undisturbed is easier if you do have a home office or workshop but Supernanny came up with a handy visual cue to let the Banjany kids know Mom was working – a simple strip of duck tape stuck to the floor at the doorway to the kitchen where mom Lisa was baking cookies! Variations on that theme could include a temporary sign on the door or even a child safety gate.
Remember the practicalities…
If you‘re running a small business from your home you’ll need to check out your state’s zoning and licensing laws and find out if there are any permits you need. And don’t ignore the tax laws for small businesses – keep a careful record of your profits and losses and check the with the IRS as to whether you might need to pay estimated taxes on a quarterly basis.