Tips for Being an Organized Work at Home Mom

Working at home comes with many advantages, it also comes with its own unique set of challenges.  You may find it is much more of a struggle organizing home paperwork then it was when you were housed inside of an office building.  It may also be much harder for you to manage your time.  Much like working in an office finding the right balance between work and home life is key to having a successful career or business.

The importance of a schedule can’t be emphasized enough.  Both a work schedule for you and a daily flow schedule for your kids will help you have the most productive, happiest days.  Mom’s working at home may have an unrealistic vision of what can be accomplished in a day.  Then when you haven’t accomplished everything you set out to you feel overwhelmed and defeated.  A very specific schedule and goals can stop this from happening.  It can also help to prevent you from falling into all of the procrastination traps that mom’s working out of the house can easily find.  If you hold yourself to a schedule it will be harder to justify the thirty minutes you just spent browsing the internet shopping for a new fall purse. 

First decide when you are going to work and how many hours you will need to do your job.  This will vary depending on your children and how many hours your job or business will require.  If you are at home alone with an infant or toddler that needs much of your attention nap time may be the obvious choice for work time.  Likewise if you take a child to preschool or have a nanny or other help during the day these would be good hours to designate as work hours.  In addition to knowing when you are going to work, know when you are not.  If your preschooler likes to tell you all about what they did that day schedule an hour break when they come home to spend with them looking at their new artwork and giving their stories your full attention.  If you schedule in the break you won’t have to be thinking about work you should be doing while your four year old tells you their day’s adventures.  Also know that if you are working around an infant or toddler’s schedule right before nap or a meal are not going to be good times to attempt to be productive.

When putting together your schedule be specific.  Moms working at home may schedule their day casually, such as I will work on project A in the afternoon.  Until suddenly the deadline for project A is looming closer and closer and you are nowhere near complete.  Try something like this instead, from 6-7am I will return emails in relation to project A, from 7-8am I will complete an outline, ect.  Make sure the goals you set for your time blocks are actually obtainable.  If you can never complete what you want to you’ll start feeling overwhelmed and like you are constantly playing catch up. 

Reduce your to-do lists.  This is an important part of organizing home paperwork.  If you have to-do lists written in five different locations chances are things are falling in to the cracks.  Find one central location to track all of your to-dos.

Keep your work area organized and clear of things not work related when at all possible.  If you find your kids things, or extra mail and house clutter, keep ending up at your work area try a drop basket.  Keep a small basket, or dedicate a drawer, to things that don’t belong at your desk.  Then at the end of the “work day” distribute these items to their actual home.  This way you won’t get distracted ten times a day when you go to put away a child’s toy.

Plan your kid’s schedule ahead of time.  Take twenty minutes in the evening after everyone has gone to bed to pull out activities, art projects, or cds that you will want to use tomorrow.  Having activities on deck will save you time the next day from having to think of something and prepare it on spot.  Plan and prepare snacks or any part of tomorrow’s meal that you can.  For example chop vegetables, defrost, or pre-measure ingredients. 

If you plan time for work and time for family you really can have it all!  Organizing home paperwork is a central part of being successful and happy as well as avoiding becoming overwhelmed and late with your work.  Your family will grow and change.   You have to be always flexible since you will have to grow and change with them.  Take each new day as it comes and know even if yesterday didn’t go as you planned you have today to try again!