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9 myths about working from home



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mimivan




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, May 09 2007, 3:03 pm
Don't Get Me Wrong! I love working from home and thank Hashem for the opportunity. But I think people who are considering working from home should read this article, because when many people think of "working from home" they have certain ideas of what this means.

While I think this article is a bit exaggerated for (I think?) comic effect or for emphasis, there is a lot of truth to it. What do you WAHMs (work at home mothers) think?

Breaking the 9 Most Common Work-at-Home Myths
By: Sylvie Fortin

So, you want to work at home, do you? You think it’s going to mean less hours, more time with your family, and big income, right? To best answer this question, let's get real about this whole "working from home" thing. Let’s take a look at the Facts versus the Myths of telecommuting:

Myth 1: I will be able to spend more time with my family

Yes, you'll be home more, but you will spend every spare moment working. Your family will be eating the dinner that you cooked, but you will be in your office, working, hoping they leave you some crumbs that you can eat cold at your desk. You will become that odd person that sits at the desk in the corner that your family waves at while they go on with their lives.

Myth 2: I'll work while the baby is sleeping.

Everyone else's baby sleeps—yours won't.

Myth 3: I won't have to spend money on childcare.

Spend a day working with your toddler in your office, then decide whether you need childcare or not. After a day of “work for 5 minutes, take the stapler away; work for 5 minutes, remove pen from child's nose; work for 5 minutes, then spend 2 hrs cleaning up,” you’ll not only want childcare, you’ll need it!

Myth 4: I will be able to run all my errands and do all my housework...and still handle all my work.

The laundry will become mini-mountains in front of the washing machine. The dishes will pile up until you need to use the cat bowl for your breakfast cereal. The banking will get done once a month. Your grocery shopping will become a mad dash as you grab random items off the shelves. All of this will be because your client calls you up on Friday night (okay, for us, Saturday night!!) on his way to the cottage, and he needs to have a week's worth of work done "over the weekend."

Myth 5: I'll be my own boss, and work when I want to, and take time off whenever I want to.

Actually, this is true. Being your own boss means you can choose your own hours! Yep! You get to choose which 20 hours out of every day that you want to work, and which 4 hours of every day that you can have all to yourself. You will be a slave to your contracts—you will work nights, weekends, and holidays—anything to meet your deadlines.

Myth 6: People won't take advantage of the fact that I am home. They will respect my designated work hours.

Working from home is an excuse for everybody and anybody to procrastinate from their own lives; to bring the kids by, to have a cup of coffee, to stop by while running errands, to call to gossip in the middle of the day, and on and on. You’ll quickly realize that people do not respect your home office and working hours.

Myth 7: I will treat my work just like a real job onsite.

Wrong. If you treat your work at home career like most people treat their onsite career, you will definitely fail. Working from home is nothing like an onsite job. You will have to be more dedicated, more responsible, more obsessed about perfection than you ever were onsite. After all, you are competing against millions out there who all want the same job you do! You have to be better, smarter, more efficient, and more capable that others in your field or you won't stand a chance!

Myth 8: I will dress up every day to start my workday with an attitude of professionalism.

Yes, you will...for the first week. After that, you will find it easier to just keep your pajamas on all day....and then you will start to wear the same pajamas for days on end. When you bathe, you will change from one set of pajamas into another set of pajamas because it's easier than changing into "real clothes."

Myth 9: I will make the same wages as I did when I worked onsite.

Actually, no. You can make a lot more money than you did onsite, but you will have to work twice the number of hours to do it, because you will have to constantly improve upon your skills and learn more than your peers to stay competitive.

You're starting to get the picture, right? Telecommuting is hugely different from what you may have imagined it to be! It is hard work and long hours with no social life at all. So, right about now, you're either thinking that you would rather not do this or you're thinking that this is EXACTLY what you want to do with your life! If the latter, welcome to the world of the work-at-homes and best of luck to you!
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cdawnr




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 11:14 am
I wish I had seen this yesterday when I needed the pick me up.

I have been telecommuniting for 10 months and it is sooo hard!

First of all, it missed a biggie...don't know how to phrase it, but the kitchen becomes a magnet. Working from home is ideal for weight gain! lol.

No really. Yesterday (wed) is the hardest day of my week because my 3 yrold and my 17 month old are home as the day care is full on those days...but my coworkers still call and somehow ALWAYS have an emergency...Yesterday was particularly terrible and I totally lost it at my ds, I felt terrible, finished the project and called in and said, sorry I am out of here for the day.

The biggest challenge to working from home is the guilt...when you are working you feel guilty not being with the kids or doing housework and when you are with the kids you feel guilty not working. My laptop is a continual draw for me especially since I really enjoy the work that I do.

I can often be found at the computer at 9:30 at night after the kids are asleep just finishing up....for hours!
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chocolate moose




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 11:17 am
is that supposed to be funny?

so, why would anyone work at home, then?
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cdawnr




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 11:49 am
Well, before we moved to the middle of nowhere, I chose to work from home 2 days a week after my 1st baby was born. I lived in NJ and commuted into Manhattan. Loosing that commute time and energy wasted was awesome. Also, it did give me more flexibility for things, and I do often get things like laundry at least started. Also if I wanted a cleaning person or repair person to come< I didn't have to take time off or have a stranger (cleaning lady) come into my house or have a key to my house, which always weirded me out.

When my dh got transferred to mid-nowhere, it was a way to keep my job Smile But I do miss grownup contact (one reason I joined this forum).

There are definite benefits, and I think the point was not to scare anyone off, it was just to give people an honest assessment. Working from home is not a walk in the park--it just has a different set of challenges than working in an office.
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DefyGravity




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 11:56 am
cdawnr wrote:
First of all, it missed a biggie...don't know how to phrase it, but the kitchen becomes a magnet. Working from home is ideal for weight gain! lol.


For me it's the opposite, I eat so much better when I work from home b/c it's easier for me to make healthy lunches.

I've actually lost over 20 pounds since I started working from home!
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cdawnr




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 12:04 pm
DefyGravity wrote:
cdawnr wrote:
First of all, it missed a biggie...don't know how to phrase it, but the kitchen becomes a magnet. Working from home is ideal for weight gain! lol.


For me it's the opposite, I eat so much better when I work from home b/c it's easier for me to make healthy lunches.

I've actually lost over 20 pounds since I started working from home!


Defy,

Can I come work at your house LOL
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amother


 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 12:16 pm
Ditto Defy; Working at home was the best thing that ever happened to my waistline. But my house is in the pits. It's a sore issue with DH b/c he thinks since I'm home all day, it should be my domain, while in actuality I have less free time now than I did when I was working in an office.

Clear boundaries really need to be set up when you telecommute- not just between you and your clients, but with your family as well. I'm still working on this part.
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queen




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 12:39 pm
Each person has to know their own self.

I personally love working from home/being my own boss.
However I DO send my child to a sitter as I'd never be able to get any work out with her around, and am serious about getting my work out.

Keep in mind though- when you run your own business you pay a lot more $$$ in taxes, than if you worked for someone else.
(of course there are upsides to this as well- you can make more. but each situation is individualistic.)
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Meema2Kids




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 1:15 pm
I work mostly from home. However I do go into the office one morning a week, which I find essential (both to my sanity and to my career). I agree about needing to have boundaries. When it's time to work, that's all I do (although sometimes I do throw in a load of laundry while waiting for my computer to boot up or something). I do work while the kids are napping; I've learned that I can't always count on that every day but over the ocurse of the week I can get a few hours like that. The other times, there is a sitter or DH is watching them. But that is hard too; I'm in the house but I'm not available, they'd rather come to me for some things than DH.

My biggest problem right now is that my office is in a corner of the bedroom which I think affects my sleep. But after we move it will be in the basement and IY"H that will be much better.

I think the article has some good points, but agree they are somewhat exxagertated - plus everyone's situation is different. I couldn't work as many hours as I do if I had to be in the office during normal working hours, so this works out great for me. And I'm SO glad I don't have to commute every day!!
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suomynona




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 2:21 pm
I find working from home really hard. The only benefit I have is that my son goes to the babysitter for only a few hours even though I work full time, because yes, I do get a lot of work done when he naps.
when I do go into the office I love the social aspect. When I work from home I have no human contact. I have much less patience to work and I end up wasting more time.
Like cdawn said, it was a way to keep my job when I moved away.
I just spent a few weeks in the office and loved it. It was so hard to get back to working from home after that.
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mimivan




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 10:23 pm
chocolate moose wrote:
is that supposed to be funny?

so, why would anyone work at home, then?


I think people who work at home can relate to the fantasies they had about working at home...like these picture postcard ads "Work at Home, spend more time with your kids! Enjoy life! Be our own Boss ! Set your own hours!" and in these ads there are pictures of laughing families on the beach or on their porch etc....

I think the article is exaggerated, because people can feel jealous of those who work at home, and it is meant to quash any of these fantasies or jealousies. Am I grateful to Hashem that I can work at home doing something I enjoy. YES! But were the advertisements wrong? Yup!

I think what the author is saying is people who want to work at home just because that means they won't need a babysitter won't last long working at home, because that's not true. "Be your own boss" means being the CEO of your own operation, which means putting in overtime.

So, b'h I'm glad I do, but I certainly wouldn't work at home doing something I hate. And it does save the commute, means slightly more time with my kids because I'm not traveling, but they still need babysitters and ganim! It is at least as hard as working in an office, if not harder, but b'h...I like it.
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suomynona




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, May 10 2007, 11:21 pm
not everyone who works from home is their own boss and makes their own hours.
I have a regular job, just from home. I have set hours and I have a boss.
I guess the good part of that is that I don't work overtime more than I would in an office.
I just find it SO hard to focus at home.
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TzenaRena




 
 
    
 

Post Fri, May 11 2007, 12:23 am
Quote:
All of this will be because your client calls you up on Friday night (okay, for us, Saturday night!!) on his way to the cottage, and he needs to have a week's worth of work done "over the weekend."
So true. For me that's the equivalent of Thursday, or Thursday night, when I want to get started with making Shabbos.Then I'll get a client. Smile B"H for that. Fridays, I don't take clients.
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cdawnr




 
 
    
 

Post Tue, May 15 2007, 12:30 pm
Oh, I should just clarify...while I am working my kids are both in daycare.

Once my kids reach about 8 or 9 they start to cry if they see me go near the computer!
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mimivan




 
 
    
 

Post Sat, May 19 2007, 9:22 pm
cdawnr wrote:
Oh, I should just clarify...while I am working my kids are both in daycare.

Once my kids reach about 8 or 9 they start to cry if they see me go near the computer!


is this 8 or 9 months? o'clock? years? Just curious
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