Moms Who Work From Home

5 Time Management Strategies

Moms who work from home face special challenges. Chief among these is the difficulty of finding time to get your paying work done when there is so much "mom" work constantly beckoning.

You try to keep a neat house, but no one picks up after themselves. They all expect you to do it.

By the time you clean up the remnants of breakfast, it's time to start making supper.

The kids have to be carted to school and their various appointments and after school activities and you're the chauffeur.

I won't bring up the never ending pile of laundry...

Somewhere in the midst of all of this, you've got to find time to devote to earning a paycheck. You're a mom who works from home so the hours you work are flexible. But there are still hours which must be dedicated to making money if you are going to make a financial contribution to your family's monthly budget.

Here are 5 strategies that will help you manage your time so that you can meet your income goals:

1. Always work with your body clock. There is nothing worse than trying to fight your natural rhythm. And in the long run, it will just wear you down. I'm a morning person. My energy level is highest before noon, so I try to do the most important jobs on my schedule between breakfast and lunch. This way, the important tasks get done when I'm fresh. I then work on the easier stuff later in the day.

   If you're a night owl, do the big stuff late and the easy stuff early. People who punch time clocks don't have the luxury of arranging their work schedules to suit themselves. Use this benefit of working at home to your advantage.

2. Every evening, make a list of what you hope to accomplish the next day. I know you've heard this a million times, but it bears repeating because it really works. It only takes a minute and keeps you organized and on point.

   You can quickly scan the list, in the morning, and make note of which tasks take priority. Do these when your energy is highest. Fit the rest in where you can.

   Don't expect to complete every item on the list. Life will simply not allow this to happen. As long as the most important tasks get ticked off, you'll be o.k.

3. Prepare for those precious "blocks" of time when the kids are all out of the house or asleep. These are your most productive working/earning hours, so don't waste them doing all the little preliminary tasks you could have done at less opportune times.

   When you know you've got some prime working hours coming up, get everything that threatens to eat into that time done and out of the way before hand.

4. Find a way to work during the time you spend waiting. This is more adaptable to some moms who work from home than it is to others.

   If you are a crafter, you may be able to keep some work in a tote that you can grab on your way out the door to take one of the kids to the doctor.

   If you work online, you can carry your laptop with you--especially if you have some offline work that you don't need an internet connection to do.

5. Teach your kids and your significant other that "mommy works". Do not fall into the trap of playing Susie Homemaker to them. You will do yourself, your daughters, and your future daughter's in law a disservice if you do.

   One of the biggest challenges faced by moms who work from home is not being taken seriously by others who are unfamiliar with this lifestyle choice. You need to establish firmly in the minds of your immediate family, that at home work is still real work!

   The most effective way for moms who work from home to do this is to regularly take an hour to work when the family is at home. Place the other adult or the oldest child in charge and tell them you have to work for the next hour and cannot be disturbed.

   Then go into your dedicated office, and do not allow them to disturb you for that hour. They will not instantly respect your work time because they are so used to having instant access to you. But, if you are firm in your resolve, they will soon develop a healthy respect for mom's work time and mom's job.

   This is, no doubt, the hardest of these time management strategies for moms who work from home to implement. Women in our culture are trained, almost from birth, to serve our families. When you first begin to do this, and they pull against it, you will feel guilty.

   Do it anyway.

   At 46 years of age, I can tell you that you deserve the respect this will get you. When you're my age, you'll have adult children who understand that even though their mom was at home with them, she was still a working mom. One of them may decide to join the ranks of moms who work from home. You will have set a marvelous--and realistic-- example.
   
   
   

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