If you’ve recently had a baby, or you’re going to become a mother in the next few months, you might have found yourself reconsidering your 9-to-5 job. Instead, you may be curious about starting your own business in order to have control over your own schedule. It may seem like an ambitious idea, but this option can be more flexible than working for a traditional employer while raising children.
Here are some helpful tips for mothers interested in entrepreneurship.
Create a Safe Office Space
Running your own business can give you the opportunity to work from home. This means that you’ll need to design a home office space. By ensuring that your home office is a safe place for your baby, you can easily keep an eye on your little one while getting your work done. Mother Mag recommends buying compact furniture to make your space feel roomier and getting plenty of storage options, like wall hooks for clothing and stackable baskets for your child’s belongings.
Divide Childcare Responsibilities
Even if you’re able to keep your baby close while you work, you won’t want to handle all of the childcare duties by yourself. Talk to your partner about the fairest way to divide up childcare responsibilities so that neither of you feel like you’re stretched too thin. You may also want to look into hiring a long-term babysitter who can help you out several days per week. Very Well Family recommends asking for recommendations from family and friends and screening each applicant carefully.
Establish Structured Routines
Having routines for your workday and your baby will help reduce your stress and allow you to create predictable plans for each week. This is especially true when it comes to bedtime routines! Aim to stick to a repetitive schedule every week. Naturally, every week will be a little different, but having a general idea of what to expect can help you manage all of your obligations.
Maintain a Reasonable Workload
Sometimes, you might be tempted to say “Yes” to projects that you don’t necessarily have the room in your schedule to handle. It’s important to realistically assess your capacity for new projects so that you don’t become susceptible to burnout. You don’t need to overextend yourself in order to succeed as a business owner.
Getting comfortable with saying “No” to offers when your schedule is full will serve you well. After all, you want to make sure that you have plenty of time for your family! And if you need help figuring out your ideal workload, you can turn to other working mothers for words of wisdom.
Outsource Tasks to Freelancers
As a parent, you’ll already have a lot on your plate at home. Even during weeks when you have a light workload, your schedule can still feel packed. Therefore, it’s a good idea to outsource certain tasks and projects to freelancers when possible. You can work with freelancers for social media management, blog content creation, and web design.
Creating a business website is essential, so you’ll want to prioritize hiring a web designer! To find the right web designer, you can look for freelancers on online jobs platforms and read their reviews. Additionally, you can check out their estimated delivery times, and rates. You can research how much do web designers make to determine reasonable rates.
Becoming a mother and an entrepreneur represents a major life change. But today, many mothers enjoy the freedom and agency that entrepreneurship offers! With these tips, you’ll be able to get your business off the ground while welcoming your new little one.
Guest blog by Kristin Louis