Growing up I always had kids around me. From teaching them at church to a steady stream of parents I babysat for. For me being a mom was always something that I wanted to do and be a lawyer (I accomplished one of my goals).
Between my first and second year of college I got a summer job at a daycare. It was actually one of my favorite jobs. It was such an improvement over working in retail because I could never put the customer in time out. Working at the daycare that summer caused me to pause though. Many of the kids were dropped off when we opened and then picked up when we closed. They spent 12 hours of their day with us. They spent more time with me than with their parents. And, honestly, it broke my heart.
Fast forward a few years, and we have our first baby. And, yes, I had to put him in daycare as well. We lived in New York City, we needed both incomes. It didn’t leave us much choice. But for full-disclosure, daycare was provided by our work (my husband and I worked together), and it was one floor below my office. I am fully aware that I had the best circumstance that I could ask for. And I am grateful for that.
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How to Create a Part Time Work from Home Job
However, it started my mind on the path of how can I be home. I wanted to be as involved as I possibly could be in my kids’ lives. A part time work for home job as a virtual assistant wasn’t even a niche people thought of at the time. So it was going to take years to get to the place of working from home.
Where are you at on this journey? If you are reading this blog I am assuming a few things about you. You are a momtrepreneur working from home with your kids already, or it is something you aspire to do. Are you looking at your financial circumstances and thinking that this will never happen? I’ve had those same thoughts. But I want to tell you that you can do it. It is possible to go from mom to virtual assistant. It won’t happen overnight, but you can create your own work from home job, and be successful on your own terms.
Creating My Own Part Time Work from Home Job was Scary
I am not going to lie to you, starting a business is scary. And every business book that tells you it is a lot of work is telling you the truth. There are so many questions when you start on this journey: Where do I find clients? How do I even do this? Can I do this? What should I do? And that is just to start with.
Have you ever had someone or circumstances push you to do something that you would never do on your own? Like standing on the edge of cliff, looking into the churning waves below, and someone nudges you to take the risk and jump into the water. Now lots of people have jumped into the waves before you, but when it is you taking the leap it sends your heart racing and a cold sweat dripping from your forehead.
That’s what happened to me when I started out. I was laid off and I had a 3-month severance package. That gave me 3 months to get this up and running, and to land my first client. Because we needed to make money as soon as my income ended. At this point in our lives, we decided that we didn’t want to put our kids in daycare, but we still needed my income. We had to make this work…no pressure, right?
Prepare for a Part Time Work from Home Job before You take the Leap
If you are at this place or may find yourself here, there are a few things to do to really prepare for a part time work from home job.
1. Re-imagine the budget
Take a good, long, honest look at your budget. What can you cut back on or completely cut out? Are there services you can renegotiate? This is not an easy or painless process. It is usually the fun stuff that gets cut first.
It doesn’t have to be just the fun stuff though. For example, we were able to renegotiate our phone service, which saved us about $20 a month. Not a huge savings but add it to everything else we were working on. It adds up.
Because I did get laid off and that income was coming to an end, we needed to get an idea of the minimum amount I would need to make. We cut back on a lot of expenses, so we could have an honest look at that amount. It is important to note, that we weren’t trying to replace my full-time income. The goal of this experiment was to only work part-time. We concluded that if I could bring in 50% of what I was currently making that would work for us.
What is the minimum you need to make to get started? This is just to get started. It will only be temporary. As you get more clients this amount will increase each year, so you can start adding more back into the budget…and that’s the fun part.
If you need help learning how to budget, I do recommend Dave Ramsey’s resources.
2. Examine the schedule
Break the 9-5 mindset. Let me say that again, BREAK IT. You are creating your own part time work from home job, you don’t have to work 9-5. You are the queen of your schedule, so make it work for you and your family. Decide how many hours you need to work and can actually work every week. Do this before you land your first client. This is always one of the first question I ask or get asked: How many hours a week do you think it will be?
When we started on this journey, I wasn’t homeschooling because I still had a 9-5 job at the start of the school year. I was laid off in November, yes, Merry Christmas to us. So we had 2 kids in school and 2 at home. My husband was working his full-time, 9-5 job. We had to seriously consider what hours to actually work.
Here’s what that schedule looked like once I landed my first client:
- Get up before the kids and work 1-2 hours
- Take them to school, come back, work another 2 hours
- Get lunch, put the toddler down for a name, and work another 2 hours
- Pick the kids up from school, and I am done for the day
It did take some time to find my groove, but I did. This same schedule may not work for you, but the exciting part is it doesn’t need to. You get to decide what works for you.
3. Decide what you want to do
If you have read any business books or business blogs (I hope you have) you know the conventional wisdom is to specialize and find your niche. Call me a rebel mom because I am going to get out of the box on this too. If you don’t know what to niche into, or what to be special about, that is ok. And if you want a great book on being a generalist, check out Range by David Epstein.
I didn’t decide what to focus on until 4 years into doing this. And I am glad I waited to decide what I actually wanted to specialize in because it gave me clarity. During these 4 years I was able to determine what I really didn’t want to do, which is just as important as deciding what you do want to do. Also, it gave me an idea of what my clients really needed and were looking for. It gave me an opportunity to really work on the specific skills, so I could be better.
When I did decide it was time to become more focused these two books really helped: Start with Why by Simon Sinek and Great at Work by Morten T. Hansen.
You can still start a business and get clients if you don’t know your niche.
Where are you at on this journey? Have you taken the leap or are you standing on the edge ready to make the jump into your own part time work from home job? Check out Part 2: Start a Virtual Assistant Business and Part 3: What You Need to Start to find out the next steps.
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