As a work at home mom, time management is important if you’re going to balance the demands of your children, running a household, and of course running your career. You essentially now have two full-time jobs, when you probably had a full-time work schedule and a part-time home schedule.
Many hours are spent outside of the home working, so when a mother decides to stay at home and still provide financial stability, she may also want all that extra time with her children and family as well. Here are some time management tips that may help balance time between family and work.
1) Create Family Schedule
You can use a simple dry erase board and place it in a common place for everyone to see; sometimes, this may be the kitchen. Have each member of the family log their activities and appointments for the current month in a specific pen color of their choice. This will easily allow you and your family to identify who needs to be where and when. It keeps everyone organized.
Upon completing the schedule, you may also consider meeting with your children and identifying designated morning routines, homework time, night routines, such as getting close and school bags ready for school, and most importantly bed time. This information can be placed on a separate note next to the calendar.
2) Set your Work Time
Now that you have our family’s schedule set, you can set your own work hours. Many times this may depend on the work you do and the clients you serve. Allow for flexibility, but maintain regular work hours when possible. So when unexpected things do arrive, you can still manage your time.
One of the best times to set your work schedule is when the children are at school, doing their own homework, or when they are in bed. Of course, this is contingent on your client base. Children love having mom home, but you should also teach them when it’s your work time so that you can stick to your schedule.
3) Assign Days for Household Cleaning and Errands
Cleaning the home, going to the grocery store, cooking dinner, and even doing business-related tasks need to be planned for certain days of the week. Errands can be done in the morning when it is less busy, so you will have the afternoons for your children and work.
You can seek help from other parents and even your partner to take on some of the family schedule items, so you can manage your time easier. After all, you truly can’t do everything. By cleaning your home a little each day, there will be no big mess on one day, cutting down on cleaning days.
4) Use a Personal Calendar
Now that your family’s schedule, work schedule, household cleaning days, and days for running errands have been identified, you can easily create your own calendar. Either electronically or by hand, your choice, you can identify when you have time for certain things and when you don’t.
When other situations arrive, you will be quickly able to see what your schedule is like and if you can take on more tasks or not. In this personal calendar, you may also want to schedule some “meâ€
