Chapter 17
Successful Home-Based Business Strategies
We are built to conquer environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction or happiness in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve.
—Maxwell Maltz
For those who have done it, creating a successful home-based business is a true accomplishment: carving out a niche in a competitive world and doing something that you love, where, when, and how you want, is most certainly something to be proud of. What does it take? What distinguishes excellent from mediocre home-based businesses? Like many endeavors described in this book, it requires both attitude and strategy. Model both, and you are on your way.
Balancing Act
There is a direct correlation between creating a thriving home-based business and striking the proper work–home balance. Working from home requires not only that you find a balance but also that the people around you do, too. As I discussed in the last chapter, you need to learn, fairly quickly, when and how to take your work hat on and off. When you work at home, there is a fuzzy line that is too easy to cross. By setting down some ground rules, you give your work the rigor that it may lack but certainly deserves:
- Create a schedule and keep to it. Sure, you can deviate—that is half the fun. But deviating from your schedule should be the exception, not the rule. By sticking to a schedule, you signal—both to yourself and to the world—that although you are at home, you really are at ...
