Working from home and setting boundaries

For many people who work from home, one of the biggest challenges is setting boundaries to separate ‘work time’ from ‘personal time’. I’m sure you can relate to this, but there seems to be a perception out there that if you work from home, you are automatically available 24/7 to your clients, friends and family. Whilst working from home certainly provides the ultimate flexibility to work the hours that suit your lifestyle, it can be difficult to create boundaries.

Here’s a typical scenario: You’ve put aside the morning to work on an important project. The kids are at school/daycare, there’s nothing urgent on the home front that needs attention and you’re completely “in the zone” and ready to get started. There’s a knock at the door, it’s one of your besties who thought they’d visit for a coffee. What do you do?

If your first reaction is to crack open the Tim Tams, consider the possible consequences. Firstly, you may have just created the impression with your friend that your work isn’t important. Secondly, you have now lost the opportunity to finish off that project which means that tomorrow you’ll have to work twice as hard or you’ll need to work tonight to finish it off. Sound familiar? Try working like this for a few months and you’ll soon be a walking example of premature aging as the stress takes its toll on you.

So how do you fix it? There’s a few things you can do to help create boundaries with your family and friends so you can be more productive.

Track your time for a week

I know, as tedious as this sounds it’s actually quite empowering to do this. For a whole week track everything you do from time spent on answering emails, talking to clients and prospects on the phone, time spent on client work and how much time you spend on marketing. At the end of the week you’ll have a good understanding of the times that are most productive for you in terms of income producing work. You’ll also have a good idea of how many hours a week you actually need to work and what tasks you could possible outsource. When you consider all of the extra time you spend actually running your business this may surprise you!

Allocate work hours for yourself

Make a decision on what your core hours will be, block out the time in your diary and schedule in your projects. If you know your scheduled in advance you’ll be in a much better position to negotiate turnaround times with your clients before you get swamped! Tell your friends and family what your work hours are and make sure you actually work them. This will show that you are serious and it will help to establish a routine.

Deal with interruptions

If your friends want to catch up for coffee when you’re working, politely let them know that you’re tied up with work for a few hours and arrange to meet them another time. You’ll enjoy catching up with them even more if you are not feeling pressured with looming deadlines and unfinished work.

Be upfront with your clients

Let them know that you can be contacted via email or phone during the day and give a time frame for how long you will take to respond to messages and emails when you’re not available. Create clear boundaries with your clients early in the relationship so you can avoid changing bad working habits later on.

Of course the key to success in balancing your work and personal time is to be flexible and use your common sense. Life happens, and things don’t always go to plan, but once you have some boundaries in place, you’ll be in a better state of mind to manage the unexpected. If something’s not quite working, do what you can to change it and don’t be afraid to let clients/friends know what you need.

Over to you …

How good is your work life balance at the moment? Do you feel that you have a good balance between work time and family/friend time? Or are you stressed out and frazzled trying to fit in your work time around other commitments and a crazy schedule?