-•- HomeOfficeDigest.com Newsletter - Issue 153 -•-
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THE HOME OFFICE DIGEST NEWSLETTER
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BE YOUR OWN BOSS
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With the new year upon us now is a wonderful time to tie up any 
loose ends from 2001. If there's a program you haven't been 
promoting for a while, drop it! If there are a few free email
addresses that are now overrun with spam, create some new ones.
If there are any websites you started last year that just didn't
make the grade, shut them down. Leaving loose ends open can have
a negative impact on your business. If a past customer tries to 
reach you at an email address that you no longer check it may 
end up costing you more business than just that of the individual
attempting to reach you. As the boss it's your job to make sure
your that your business is running smoothly and professionally. 
Take the time now to make sure all your loose ends are closed!


FEATURED ARTICLE
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Balancing Your Priorities with Your Search for At-Home Work
by: Angela Wu

Once you've surfed the web, you can't help but notice all 
the ads and websites meant to hook the hordes of "work-at- 
home wannabes". 

Understandably, there's no shortage of people who want to 
make their living from home. Many parents want to be able 
to stay at home with their children while contributing to 
the household expenses. Others want to ditch the world of 
long commutes and corporate politics. Still others have 
disabilities that may prevent them from working a 'regular' 
job. 

Regardless of the reasons, "work at home" is undeniably a 
hot topic. The International Telework Association and 
Council (ITAC) states that 19.6 million teleworked in Q3 
1999. By 2003 that's projected to be a whopping 137 
million worldwide! 

Two ways to pursue a career from home are to either 
telecommute for an employer, or start your own home based 
business. 

As the editor of three newsletters, I regularly come into 
contact with people looking for at-home work. A large 
percentage of them prefer to work for an employer -- they 
like the idea of having well-defined responsibilities and 
a regular pay cheque. They're not interested in the 
ups and downs of building a business. 

Thus many websites have sprung up claiming to offer 
telecommuting jobs. While it's possible to land one of 
these highly competitive positions, it's certainly not 
easy. 

One of the problems is simply oversaturation of the market. 
Many people seeking at-home work are looking for clerical 
or administrative jobs; yet when I look through posted 
telecommuting jobs, I see primarily technical positions 
available. That said, would you be willing to go to school 
to get an education that may improve your chances of landing 
a work-at-home job? 

Telecommuting positions are usually 'perks'; something 
offered (or hard-won) by employees with proven track 
records. 

Consider working in an office first in order to reach 
your final goal of working from home. If all goes well, 
you can present your employer with a telecommuting proposal 
after you've established yourself -- perhaps just one 
telecommuting day per week first, then gradually build 
up to several days a week. An excellent site for help 
on how to create a telecommuting proposal is 
http://www.telecommutingproposal.com/ . 

Of course there are companies that hire telecommuters 
from outside as well. Be aware, however, that some of 
these companies (not all) may take advantage of the desire 
to work from home - for example, with low pay and few or 
no benefits. 

Keep your options open! You may have to consider jobs 
that you otherwise would not. Consider freelance or 
contract work in addition to 'permanent full-time' jobs. 
An excellent site for freelance jobs can be found at 
http://homebasedwork.com/freelance.html . 

It all comes down to what your priorities are. 
Telecommuting can be a wonderful thing for many people, 
but you may have to 'sacrifice' some things in order 
to get it. How much work are you willing to put into 
your desire to work from home? What are you willing to 
give up in order to achieve this goal? 

I'm not saying that you can't find rewarding telecommuting 
work at a company for which you've never worked before ... 
far from it! However, it's highly competitive and 
employers can afford to be choosy. Your best best is to 
be prepared, stay open to new possibilities, and do your 
research. 

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Angela is the editor of Online Business Basics, an exclusive 
newsletter for eBusiness beginners. She spent several years in 
the corporate work force before building her home-based business. 
Visit her online at http://onlinebusinessbasics.com/article.html 
OR mailto:businessbasics@workyourleads.com for a series of 10 free 
reports on building a business on the web. 
 


DOWNLOAD OF INTEREST 
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If you're like me you generally have ICQ, MSN Messenger and Yahoo
pager running at all times. I need to be in contact with clients
using different IM protocols, but switching between them can be
a hassle. If you're looking for a way to bundle all three Instant
Messaging programs into one check out Jabber! Jabber is a nifty
little program that will let you chat with your buddies on all
three of the previously listed services through a single program.
Jabber is free and is available at http://www.jabber.com on the
download page. Although you have to register with each IM service
individually, the benefits of having access to all three services
in one place is well worth the initial hassle. This is one little
download that I highly recommend!


WHAT ARE THEY THINKING
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I recently ran across a website run by an individual that was 
promoting a new business opportunity. Although there is nothing
odd about someone creating their own site to promote a business
they are a part of, I found it odd that this person had an image
link to website about celebrity deaths. I'm not one that's easily 
offended, but I'm sure that a lot of visitors to this particular
website were very upset by seeing what was described as a partial
of Chris Farley's autopsy photos. What in the world was this guy
thinking? I realize that the net is full of some very strange web
sites, and I'm sure we've all probably visited at least one of 
them at one time or another, but a website promoting a business
isn't the place for links to some of the oddities on the web. 
When you are promoting a business keep in mind that other who
visit your site may not have the same unique taste you do.


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