Freelance writers who are just starting their career working from home face many challenges in getting their career off the ground. They need to learn how to be productive, organized, and learn about their taxable income. Perhaps, one of the biggest challenges we face however, in convincing friends and family that our work at home career is every bit as demanding as their work away from home jobs.
When I began working from home a few months ago one of the first challenges I faced was finding uninterrupted time to work. It seemed as though as soon as family and friends learned that I was no longer going outside the home to work they thought that meant that I was available to run errands, take on extra projects, or simply to visit at any time that was convenient to them. Despite the fact, that all knew I was writing for a living, I continually heard phases such as “Now that you are no longer working….” or “Since you have extra free time….”
While some of these people quickly learned, that I meant it when I said I was working, others continued to act as though I had all the time in the world to dedicate to the things they wanted or to spending time with them at their convenience. In a few cases it took drastic measures to get them to understand that far from having extra time on my hands that my time was in many ways more limited than ever before.
In one case, I had a friend who would call several times during the day, and simply refused to accept the fact that I did not have time to chat whenever she wanted to talk. Even when I stopped answering my phone she would call and leave messages disrupting my work. After, several weeks of trying to get her to see reason I decided that teaching her a lesson was the only way to get my message across. One day while she was working I called her work several times making idle chitchat. When she finally complained that her boss was getting annoyed, and that I was disrupting her work I pointed out that since she felt it was okay to interrupt me during my working hours I felt she wouldn’t mind if I did the same. It ended the problem, and also resulted in her being angry for a week or two.
If you are thinking about starting an at home career of any kind here are a few helpful tips that might save you from having to go to the extremes I went to in order to get people to respect your at home working time.
1.Establish a schedule and notify all your family and friends that you will be working during those hours and that you expect to not be disturbed.
2.Turn on your answering machine and don’t pick up the phone unless it is an emergency during your working time.
3. If people drop by for an unscheduled visit, simply tell them that you are working and unable to visit. Don’t make any exceptions or they will expect you to always make an exception in their case or at least waste your time trying to convince you to reconsider.
4.Don’t make social phone calls of your own while you are working. Disrupting your own schedule to talk to friends will give them the impression you are not taking your work seriously.
5. If you feel you have to make time to spend with a friend, make it in advance and make sure you let them know that you need advance notice to rearrange your work schedule. That way they will understand that you made an exception for them and will not expect you to make time at the drop of a hat.
If you treat your new career as the professional job it is others will follow suit. Being successful when working from home, means being able to have time to work without constant interruptions from friends and family members.
