Page 50 - 25148.pdf

38 • The 100 Greatest Ideas for Building the Business of Your Dreams

at the end of the day. Try not to let things spill over into the living area of the house.
I know a couple who work from home each in a separate office. They place their
working areas strictly out of bounds for their young children. When the baby-minder
is there during the day, they actually communicate with each other by fax and e-
mail to avoid going through the living area and being distracted by the children.
They believe that home workers need to be even more expert at managing time than
office workers, even perhaps to the extent of attending a time-management course.

They have strict rules about starting and finishing times. They ban weekend
work and generally simulate a situation where their office could be in a

When someone different town, let alone building. When the kids are grown up you can be
rings an office more selfish - one of the great advantages of working from home is you
line they have a can do your work whenever you want. One of my colleagues, for example,
picture in their works every Saturday morning and goes fishing during the week when the

head of just river banks are quieter.
that - an office.

This is very

useful and your idea 25 - Find out what is tax-deductible

way of working
should not Treat your office as an office and charge the associated costs against your
cancel this tax bill. I remember the VAT inspector querying the fact that we had

myth out unless bought a fridge and put it in the office storeroom. This seemed very unfair
you want it to. to us since there are very few offices of any size that do not have a fridge in

them, and you can bet they were put against tax.
Allocate a fair proportion of cleaning repairs and redecorating to the business as
well as a proportion of utilities bills and, of course, the telephone.

Idea 26 - Don't stint on telephone lines

When someone rings an office line they have a picture in their head of just that - an