Polish Your Slips and Stay Home

Come on, who hasn't daydreamed on occasion, or daily, about waking up each morning and throwing on your hat and slippers as you walk to work down the hall. No nasty rush hour commute that keeps getting worse. No cheesy morning radio show to pollute you brain. No annoying co-workers to bother you all day long. Lunch in your own kitchen, and whenever you want it. Sounds good to me. More than at any other time real options are plentiful for finding a way to work from home.

Many employers these days offer part-time and full-time home based positions, but if you are thinking more radically, some common home based jobs and businesses include; Product Sales, Data Entry, Document Coding, Recruiting, Online/Affiliate Selling, Virtual Assistants, Legal Transcription, Medical Transcription, Customer Service Reps, Freelance Writers, Proofreaders, Editors, Surveys, Translators, Telemarketers, and Online Tutors.

Before you invest your time or money you must thoroughly analyze the offering. Many are legitimate, but the majority are useless time wasting scams. Take the emotion generated by appealing advertisements and websites out of the equation when analyzing work from home companies. It is imperative that you remain objective.

Key areas to analyze include:
Return on investment
Money making potential
Ease of use and implementation
Privacy Protection
Customer Service

Advantages are many...
The personal satisfaction of working for yourself.
No office politics and distractions.
No commute, saving time and money.
Flexibility in your working hours.
Control and independence in your workday and life.
Often, the potential for unlimited earnings.
The right personality and temperament...

Working from home, working for yourself, starting a business, or telecommuting is not for everyone. You should do significant introspection and be brutally honest with yourself as to whether you have certain personal characteristics crucial for successfully running your own business, or working from home.

Key self-assessment items to ponder.
Are you internally motivated, a self-starter?
Do you control your thoughts well?
Are you happy? Positive?
Do you need to be near people or have constant social interaction?
Are you self-confident?
Are you an even person, level headed?
Do you cope well with disappointment, or with success?
Do you get bored easily?
Are you truly disciplined?
Are you emotion or logic driven?
Are you realistic?
Do you ever blame people or events for anything in your life?
Do you have a do-it-now personality?
Do you procrastinate?

Tips to get started...
These will not guarantee success, but they are some basics that should be adhered to. Remember, if working from home or running your own business was easy, everyone would be doing it. Set goals, especially daily. Have an agenda and focus on key success tasks, not busy work. You must avoid being distracted. Taking personal phone calls, flipping on the TV, reading news headlines, and browsing irrelevant websites will get you nowhere, fast.Know when to stop and take a break. Work hard, but realize that it is imperative for mental functioning and creativity to schedule time to relax.Do not go it alone. Join professional groups or relevant associations, subscribe to magazines, newsletters, or message boards.

Have an appropriate designated workspace that is going to be used for work purposes only. Keep your work area and computer very well organized with no clutter.Decide what equipment, software, and hardware you need. Just starting out, you probably do not need the best fax, printer, and copier money can buy.Have a schedule, and stick to it. To be successful, you must avoid performing tasks during the day that are not key to your business.