Losing The Cubical & Becoming Self-Employed

Three years ago, I left my job as a Director of Marketing to make a new life as a small business owner. It is one of the best decisions I ever made. It’s not like the steady paycheck of the office job wasn’t good – because it was – but having the freedom of owning your own business has a lot of merit. You just have to weigh which is best for you and make the right decisions for you and your family. If you think you might want to work for yourself, here is a top five list that you might want to consider when planning that jump into the world of entrepreneurs.

WORK WHERE YOU DECIDE

If you make the decision to work from home, you gain the ability to decide on your work environment. You can work from your kitchen table if that makes you happy. I sometimes find myself moving around the house during the day. Sometimes I am in my office, while other times I have the computer on the back patio watching my dog play in the yard. If you want to wear a suit and tie, that’s fine, but no one is going to be upset if you are in sandals in shorts. You decide what makes for the more creative surroundings and where you can effectively do more business. You eliminate the rules of the office.

MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR TIME

Do you like getting up at the crack of dawn be at work? Of course you don’t. None of us do. What we like is the steady paycheck. However, imagine for a moment if you could work a flexible schedule on your time. Would that be worth it to you? I know that it was for me! It doesn’t work for all industries, but if you can swing it, you’ll enjoy the ability to go shopping in the middle of the afternoon or get in a quick nine holes of golf when you decide to be free. To me, this is why I chose the freedom of owning my own business.

LESS DOWNTIME AT HOME

Believe it or not, I get more work done at home than I did at the office. Why? Well, there are less distractions in my home than in the office work space. You would think the opposite to be true, but it isn’t. At work, you have people coming into your work area, there are breaks that occur at inopportune times, the phones ring, the boss stops by to talk to you about a new idea, etc… That just doesn’t happen in your home business. You can stay focused on the task at hand with very little discipline.

GO GREEN. WORK FROM HOME.

How much gasoline do you think you go through in a year? How many miles do you put on your car? All of that fuel is burned off into the atmosphere causing pollution. It’s a necessary evil, but what if you could change that? Last year, I put less than 7000 miles on my car. I don’t know for certain, but by cutting back on travel time by more than 50% I know I saved a lot. Additionally, I save on paper and ink, too, because everything I do doesn’t have to be printed out ten times for my colleagues.

YOU DECIDE YOUR DESTINY

Wouldn’t you like to decide the next project you are going to work on? What if you could determine the look and feel that your company promotes to the world? You can’t do this in the corporate world because someone else always has the final say. They know where you are going and when you are going to stop. Owning your own business puts you in command. Note: It is important that you still work at a home business. If you don’t, you’ll be put back into the working world where you started. The hard work will pay off!