Homework

We always struggled to work from home in London because our flat was so very small that there wasn’t room for a dining table let alone a desk! (In fact my only criteria for our new place was that we could eat at a table). We had to have an office in London but we always felt that it would be nice to work from home. When we moved to a house we found ourselves with a dining room and a breakfast room so the dining room has become our office. Now we debate whether we really need an office somewhere else. So what’s best?

The pros of working from home. Well, there’s no commute! I’m not an early riser but Simon gets up at the crack of dawn and comes downstairs before we’re all awake and gets a good few hours in while the house is quiet. We have breakfast together and are always home in time for family dinner. Lovely. There’s no money wasted on expensive lunches in cafes. Coffee is readily available. The space doesn’t cost us anything (interesting that I wrote about food before cost savings…). In fact we can include some of our household costs in our company accounts. We can work anytime, even into the evening if we want or in the middle of the night if inspiration strikes. And the kids can pop in and say hello! Really lovely.

The cons. Well, some of them are the same as the pros. The kids can pop in and say hello. Lovely, yes, but sometimes a huge distraction, especially when they don’t want to leave (and want Pingu on the computer). They can be noisy around the house and sometimes have their friends to play. Bedlam.  Being able to work anytime can make it hard to switch off – you can’t leave your work at the office when the office is where you live. The project that is nearly finished is just sitting right there in the next room, calling to you “finish me, while I’m still fresh in your mind”. It’s hard for children to understand what work is all about. They see you at home and want you to play.

Working from home can be quite isolating with only Twitter for company. And then there are those practical issues – what if we want to have a meeting? What about using our home address for business? And our daughter loves to answer the phone with a hearty “Ayo”. Cute but not very business-like.

So there’s cost and comfort versus professionalism. But isn’t it more common now for small businesses to run out of a home? Isn’t that what “cloud working” is all about? Meeting at a local hub, using free wireless internet access, online applications and project management systems. Skype gets around the phone issue to some extent. Is the cost of an office worth it? And what about paying for something that we won’t be using for the part of the year we are away.

We’re sticking to the home office for now. We need to fix some of the problems this raises – one phone line, home address, find a good meeting place that isn’t a local cafe. If we are planning to spend a good part of the year away then making this work is key. Being flexible, able to move our work around but give our clients and partners the stability of a fixed address and contact information. But most important we need to be strict about our work/home balance. And that goes both ways, making sure we get the work done when more tempting activities are nearby (painting, cake baking, running around in the garden…!) and making sure those other activities get a look in when work is all-consuming. How do other people make it work?