Wondering how are you going to work at home when your kids are around? Then keep on reading, this article is just for you!
Working from home with kids has become a hot topic these days. If you’ve just started to work from home with your kids I know you might be feeling really exhausted. In fact, even the idea of being a working-at-home mom with a full-time remote job might sound like something totally impossible for some of you.
For some moms, even the thought of working from home with their kids seems frightening! Are you one of them too? Don’t worry. Kids demand our attention all the time and it’s hard for us, parents to deal with them between long conference calls, tough projects, tight deadlines, and never-ending emails.
Whether you’re already working from home or running your own business at home and wondering whether to start a family or you’re a mom searching for a remote job, I hope these tips will help you enjoy the freedom and flexibility that comes with working from home!
Working from home won’t be really productive unless you manage your time properly and balance both your family life and career life well.
If you’re striving to stay efficient and productive when working from home with your kids and all the household work, these tips will surely help you since they’re from a full-time work-from-home mom.
Don’t forget to comment below and share your ideas with us so that we all can help each other as well.
So without further ado, let’s dive into the topic now.
Tip #1: Designate an area of your home as a working space
It’s very important to have a fixed place as the working area. So that you don’t have to carry your laptops, mobile phones, chargers, books, and other stuff from place to place every day. Trust me, arranging a particular area for this, will save you loads of time.
It’s good if you can have a separate room as your office room. So that your kids would have to knock before entering your office. But not every family can allocate an entire room to mom’s workspace. In that case, you have to go for another option. If all your bedrooms are full, you can still devote a designated area for your work, even in a small place.
If your office or office table is located in one of the busiest areas in your home, you can use a pair of noise-canceling earphones while your kids play with each other.
But in some cases, it doesn’t matter where you’re working from. You can either use your gym, the library, the car, or even a restaurant as long as your job is flexible.
Tip #2: Keep kids entertained
Now I’m going to provide a few kid-centric tips for you that have worked for me.
What I’ve understood from my kids is that they will rarely interrupt me when they have something to look forward to. I’ve tried things such as setting a few cool toys that they can play with and a special movie viewing only when mommy’s doing work during her “office time.”
I have set up an activity center for my kids to play in our home office and ever since they feel as if they’re having their own place to do their projects!! That way I can catch up on emails or do other necessary things freely.
Tip #3: Be ready for interruptions
Interruptions are something that reminds us of a horror story. I too face this daily and it has become inevitable. Sometimes when I’m on an important call my babies would want me to watch Tom and Jerry with them! Or maybe they’ve started starving suddenly!
If you’re a work-from-home mom, you might have experienced an unexpected yell of “Mommeeee”. Your boss will only hear your apologies instead of your professional tone. There’s a piece of simple advice for you. Just use the mute button as soon as you sense this in order to avoid your babies’ noises in the background.
When it’s not an emergency, give them a nonverbal “Don’t shout” or “Don’t disturb” signal if you need quiet time. But toddlers won’t understand your signals and they will always want your undivided care and attention. Something I’ve been using is tying a red ribbon on my office room door when I should not be disturbed unless there’s an emergency. Once again, this tactic too is not for toddlers, but for older kids.
If your baby is crying or fussing when you’re on the telephone, there’s only one way which is ending the call and rescheduling it if you can!
Tip #4: Seek help if you need
Working at home never means that you have to skip childcare. Surely, you’ll have times when you need help from someone. It might be a strict deadline, an urgent virtual conference, or a tough project that requires your 100% attention. In whatever case you might want someone to look after your kids.
When my first baby was just 1 year old, I hired a reliable high-school student to watch her 2 hours 2 days a week. That way I could fully concentrate on my projects. I’ve also tried affordable childcare a few times.
You can even pool your resources with other working moms in your locality and hire one babysitter to watch all your kids at the same place, same time. Or maybe you can do without a babysitter too. Get together with other work-at-home moms and let all the kids play while you work.
Last, but not least you can get support from your partner too. If your husband arrives home earlier, you can rely on him to take over your kids’ duty. My sister’s husband is a teacher, and he arrives home at 3 pm. After that, he can carry their three little kids to the park and arrange the dinner for them. Not every husband can arrive home early like him. So, if your husband arrives home after dinner, he can oversee bedtime.
Tip #5: Be honest with your clients and co-workers
It’s important to be transparent when you’re working from home.
As I’m a certified parenting coach, I have to deal with many people daily. I always start phone conversations by telling my clients that I’m working from home and they may hear noises made by my babies. Almost all people are understanding and okay about that. A simple trick that I’m using is the effective use of the mute button on my phone or headset. Whenever I’m not speaking, I can hit the mute button to make sure the conversation becomes a little quieter.
Tip #6: Capitalize on naptime
I have used the technique of setting work schedules around naptime. It’s true that it’s an age-old time management technique, but nevertheless, it has been a huge advantage for me. But there’s one thing that you have to keep in mind about naptime. Nap schedules change most of the time.
Tip #7: Get your baby on a schedule
This is something you can only think of but somewhat impossible to do especially when you’re having small babies. But you’ll never realize the value of a schedule until you actually follow a regular routine. I don’t suggest that your babies should have a strict time-based schedule. Instead, use a regular routine. As moms, we can use routine as part of our own time management habits. Routines help us in various parts of the day such as breakfast, school time, after school, nap time, bedtime, dinner, homework, etc.
These are just a handful of things I’ve been practising over the last few years to balance in my family life and career life as a mom to 3 little kids.
If you have any of your own experiences to add, do share them with all of us in the comments!
