home office

Low Cost Home Office Solutions When You Don't Have Enough Space
by Gregory Grabowski, PE, LEED AP
Everything in your home business is a constant compromise between what you need and what you can get
Many of you with businesses based out of your homes have converted your “office space” from some other room in the house: a den; spare bedroom; or garage. Today’s economic environment along with rising energy and fuel costs compel more and more people to give up on leased retail or shared office space in favor of working out of the home.

With foresight and consideration to space needs, noise control, lighting, access, and infrastructure, almost any home can offer up a suitable and businesslike space for your livelihood.

Making the Right Space into your Work Space

Your business and personal style will dictate your space needs. Are you at the computer all day? Do you need to layout drawings or fabrics or samples? Are you best at work standing or sitting? Do you meet with clients at your home office? How much time are you on the telephone during a typical day?

Everything in your home business is a constant compromise between what you need and what you can get, how it merges with your personal style, available workspace, and the nature of your work. It’s important to be realistic here — you will typically spend a couple thousand hours a year in this workspace, so it pays to get it right!

Survey each available room in your home, including bedrooms, the garage, basement, and attic, and compare attributes and qualities. Measure the area you’ll need for horizontal workspace, filing cabinets, and bookshelves, and plan it out on paper. Be sure to account for access to adequate power and broadband Internet, and most importantly, adequate ventilation, light, and noise control. Be flexible — it may be time to move the kids out of the bonus room and set-up shop there.

A Businesslike Environment

If the nature of your business requires a lot of telephone time, then the environment necessary from your workspace dictates predictable noise control. Spare bedrooms or basements away from street noise are ideal for this. Perhaps you meet with clients and need a workspace adjacent to your meeting space — if your home situation allows, a good handyman can transform two adjacent bedrooms with adjoining closets into a handsome office / meeting room area, creating a businesslike space segregated from the family.

No one wants to hear your “house noises” when they are on a conference call with you. While you may not be able to eliminate all the extraneous sound from your workspace, you can mitigate it with consideration to a solid door, wall treatments (fabric or cork-board), carpeting, soft seating, and plants. Soft background music can be an important feature of your working environment as well — you’re the boss so you make the call!

This is also the time to invest in dedicated and energy efficient task and indirect lighting to illuminate your work space and brighten the walls and ceilings.

Essential Adaptations

Once you select the room, it must be dedicated to its new role. It is no longer the “den” or “basement,” and family members may have to be gently reminded of this in order to maintain the necessary boundaries around your work. Essential adaptations in finishes, wall coverings, installed or portable shelving, and office equipment will transform this former family area into your new office.

In extreme cases, if your need for space requires major renovations to your home, this must be given the same level of investment/return calculations that you make every day in your work. Do you need a dedicated client area with a separate entrance to your house to segregate the work space from the family area? In these cases, a careful review of the cost-benefit as well as resale value of your home must be taken into consideration.

Knocking out a wall to join two spaces together is certainly one option; however, the addition of square-footage to your home may be the most economical path forward. If you are leasing retail office space for $1,000 a month, building a home addition may only be a two-year return on the investment, and it can add real dollars to the resale value of your home. Be sure to consult with both your accountant and tax professionals if the remodeling costs can be structured such that you maximize your potential text benefits and investment costs. Local building codes and permitting requirements must also be taken into consideration when adding dedicated office space to the home, so be sure to check with a local architect.

Size Does Matter

In the limited space of a home office, every inch counts. Make the most of the furnishings and cabinetry available today, and don’t be afraid to go vertical with shelving, storage, and filing. Your desk, task-seating, and the furnishings around you can provide you with work and creative space where you wouldn’t imagine. For example, a simple magnetic whiteboard on just one wall of your workspace can provide you with scheduling, brainstorming, and task-list essentials. Consider a two-drawer filing cabinet on wheels with a fabric seating surface that doubles as a portable stool. When not in use, just roll it under your desk. The possibilities are limitless, and the solutions can be elegantly simple.

Consult a Professional

As a professional, you make your living by selling your products or professional services to others, so it makes sense to pay for professional assistance when planning your dedicated home business space. Interior designers and architects have studied the built environment and understand the nuances, local building codes, and interior considerations necessary for an excellent space. They should be considered a part of your team when designing the space that you will spend most of your work-day in.

Your home space is yours — make it work for you.

Gregory Grabowski, a registered Professional Engineer and reserve Naval Officer, focuses his Project Management talents to design and build facilities for corporate and government clients worldwide. His professional experiences have taken him to six of the seven continents. He resides in Southern California and enjoys adventure sailing.

how to Write a Business Plan

Do you want to start a business? Great. Have you got a plan? If not, your business is just a dream.

Banks and lending institutions look closely at your business plan when they decide whether to lend you money. A business plan contains the main criteria you and your employees use to determine success. In addition, it is what you need to help make decisions about what to do and when to do it as you run your business.

If your business is very small and home-based, some of these suggestions may be unnecessary. However, at least develop a plan that outlines goals, expected costs, a marketing plan and an exit strategy. A business plan shows how you expect to succeed and details how you will measure that success.

Here is a simple guide to the basics of a good business plan:

An Outline of Goals and Objectives in an Executive Summary

The executive summary introduces your business strategy. This is the most important section for banks and lending institutions. You must persuade a loan officer in the first few pages that you have a viable business proposal.

This summary is also an important communication tool for employees and potential customers. They need to understand your ideas and your business before they can support it.

A Brief Account of How You Started the Company

Clearly explain the origins of the company. Be sure to include how you or your business associate came up with the idea.

Your Goals for the Company

Explain in a few paragraphs your short- and long-term goals for the company. How fast will it grow? Who are your main customers?

Biographies of the Management Team

Include in the management section the names and backgrounds of management team members. Be sure to include their respective responsibilities.

The Service or Product You Plan to Offer

An important aspect of the summary is a discussion of how your product or service is different from others currently available.

The Potential Market for Your Service or Product

You must convince lenders, employees and others that your target market is relatively large and growing. You need to do some research for this section. For a local business, determine the demand for your product or service within a specified geographic radius. Base this on what you determine is a reasonable distance from your business.

If it's a Web-based business or a one that relies on both the Internet and local traffic for customers, evaluate demand on a local and/or national basis. A report from a professional research company can be expensive. You may be able to get basic information from the Web's many search engines and directories.

A Strategy to Market Your Product or Service

How do you plan to tell the world you are open for business? Will you rely exclusively on word of mouth? Usually, this is not a good plan unless you already have established a good reputation. Will you advertise in print, television, on the Web or all three? Will you use online marketing tools to get listed on search engines and advertised on other Web sites? Make sure you include how much money you plan to spend on marketing.

A Three- to Five-Year Financial Projection

This should include a summary of your financial forecasts, with the spreadsheets you used to reach your projections. Show your balance sheets,income statements and cash-flow projections for the entire forecast period. This is where you tell lenders how much money you want to borrow to cover your start-up costs. The assumptions that you make here can make or break your company's success. If you are unfamiliar with this kind of financial modeling, seek a professional for help. It is definitely worth the money.

An Exit Strategy

This is one of the most important aspects of a good business plan. Many small business owners look to sell their company as part of an exit strategy. You might pass the company to someone else or take it public. You can base your exit strategy on a monetary figure, revenue growth, the market's reception to your idea or an agreement between the top officers. Whatever you decide, you need to plan so you and your investors recover your investments.

Book of Dr.john c.Maxwell

The Big Idea

New York Times best-selling author Dr. John C. Maxwell has a message for you: TALENT IS NEVER ENOUGH. People everywhere are proving him right. Read the headlines, watch the highlights, or just step out your front door. Some talented people reach their full potential, while others self-destruct or remain trapped in mediocrity. What makes the difference? Maxwell, the go-to guru for business professionals across the globe, insists that the choices people make – not merely the skills they inherit – propel them to greatness.

Why You Need This Book This book offers time-tested wisdom and attributes that you need to maximize your potential and live the life of your dreams. It’s what you add to your talent that makes the greatest difference. You can have talent alone and fall short of your potential. Or you can have talent plus, and really stand out. You will learn how: Belief lifts your talent. Initiative activates your talent. Focus directs your talent. Preparation positions your talent. Practice sharpens your talent. Perseverance sustains your talent. Character protects your talent… and more! Belief Lifts Your Talent It’s called the guarantee. At the time, many people said it was just big talk. Not true. It was a mark of the confidence possessed by the person who uttered it. That strong sense of belief made him a legend and his team members champions. What could it for you? If you want to become your best, you need to believe your best. You need to… 1. Believe in Your Potential . Your potential is a picture of what you can become. Inventor Thomas Edison remarked, “If we did all the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astonish ourselves.” 2. Believe in Yourself! It’s one thing to believe that you possess remarkable potential. It’s another thing to have enough faith in yourself that you think you can fulfill it. 3. Believe in Your Mission. What else is necessary to lift a person’s talent? Believing in what you are doing. In fact, even if the odds are against your accomplishing what you desire, confidence will help you

Give a blossom to your life by working in home.

Travel Reservation Home Business

Maybe you have traveled to different places, have tried different travel agencies, and have spent most of your time enjoying the different views. But have you ever considered establishing your own travel reservation home business?

Setting up a travel reservation home business is not that easy but with the correct guidance and proper instructions, you can immediately start right.

Now is a good time to start your travel reservation home business. With its continuous growth, you can expect more income.

Surveys show that the travel industry in the United States alone had tremendously grown into what is now one of the biggest contributors in the U.S. economy. In fact, there are over $4 trillion yearly expenses in travel costs, hotel accommodations, cruises, etc.

All of these things show that the travel industry will continuously grow as one of the most successful money-making scheme in the country. So why not partake from this tremendous amount of money?

However, before you start with your travel reservation home business, there are some factors you must consider. Here’s the list:

1. Be aware of the initial expenses in starting up the business

Setting up this kind of business will really take a handful of expenses at its initial start up. Some of the common start up costs are software fees, affiliation fees, and national organization fees. Other expenses will still depend on the kind of travel reservation home business that you will set up.

2. Do your homework

Not all travel reservation home business are created equal. Each business will depend on the kind of travel reservation home business that you will set up. Will you work as an independent contractor or work the other way around?

Doing your homework will ease the difficulty of setting up. Everything you need to know will be obtained through research.

3. Make you home office a pleasant place to work

Set up a good place to work. This will have positive effects on the way you deal with your customers. Pleasant thoughts will emanate from within due to the comfortable working environment that you have.

Given all that, starting up a travel reservation home business may not sound easy as it may seem but with the right start up strategy, you can definitely expect good profits in return.

Keep in mind that travel reservation home business may require a lot of work since you will be the one to do all the tasks like answering phone calls, processing bookings, etc. However, with dogged determination and complete devices, everything will fall into place

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