In addition to planning and budgeting for a home-based business, it can be helpful to set some parameters for your business. By establishing limits or boundaries to what your business is or is not—as well as how your business fits into your home and family life, you can avoid some problems and struggles that might pop up.
Having a home business is, by nature, a boundary challenge to home and family life. Where does our work world begin and end and how does it lap over into family life? Setting these parameters can be very basic and literal, or it can be more abstract. For example, do we have one family computer that will also be used for the home business? Will it be necessary to set specific hours of operation so that the kids can still do homework if the computer is being shared? Will our office or work space be in a shared space or will we have a room of our own to devote to work?
Are there specific days and hours that we will work? In a two-parent family, it might be necessary to talk through the “hierarchy” of work and jobs. Does someone’s job take precedence, while the other’s is considered part-time or supplementary—or are they both important? What sort of family or shared resources can go into the family business?
You can see how limits and boundaries can be important to the overall health and happiness of the family, as well as to the planning and sanity of the home business owner. In addition to hammering out a budget and a business plan, it is probably important that you think through and figure out the other parameters for your home business as well. While you can expect to revisit some issues as your business grows, it does help to lay some foundations before you get into trouble.
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