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June 19, 2007

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FOR MANY ENTREPRENEURS, the decision to start a home-based business has to do with family. Sticking close to home, they reason, will keep them connected to children while providing extra income for the household.

The problem? Simultaneously keeping up with the demands of children and a small business can be taxing, often making the entrepreneur feel exhausted, stressed and even resentful. For Michelle Knoll, who's raising three young sons while running a public-relations business out of her Minneapolis home, "naptime and bedtime are probably my most productive times of the day," she says. In a few years, when her kids are in school, working on the business will probably "seem like the easiest thing I've ever done, because I've done it with screaming kids and 'Mom, Mom, Mom' in my ear," she says.

Indeed, "a lot of home-office parents at the end of the day are wrung out," says Jennifer Kalita, a Washington, D.C., small-business consultant and author of "The Home Office Parent." "And they feel like they haven't accomplished anything 100% — they feel like half a parent, and half a business owner." Eventually, something's got to give and too often that ends up being the needs of the children, she says. That's especially common when the home-based business becomes a critical revenue stream for the family.

Recent research underscores that many home-based entrepreneurs are struggling to balance work and family life. Nearly three out of four home-based entrepreneurs said they found themselves making sacrifices to be an entrepreneur, according to the OPEN from American Express Small Business Monitor, which surveyed 626 small-business owners in April. In the areas where home-based entrepreneurs found themselves making the sacrifice, "family" ranked at the top, followed by friends, personal finances and health, the survey found.

Home-based entrepreneurs who are raising children often struggle with guilt, too, says Alan Weiss, president of Summit Consulting Group, a business-consulting group in East Greenwich, R.I., and author of "Life Balance." Mothers, in particular, feel guilty shutting the office door when their children are so close by; they also feel like "bad" business people if they need to care for children during work time, he says. "The guilt makes you worse at business, and it makes you worse at your personal life," he says.

The key to being a successful home-based entrepreneur — and a successful parent — is to carve out times during the day to devote to business and family. "It's just a lifestyle that requires a lot of planning and boundary-setting," Kalita says. She and other experts recommend the following:

Sit down and plan a schedule that works for the family, even if it's nontraditional. Bonnie Marcus of Westport, Conn., was pregnant with her first child when she decided to launch her own stationery business, Bonnie's StylePress, in 2002. After giving birth to her son, Marcus worked out a plan with her husband, a dentist who kept daytime hours, to hole herself up in her home office as soon as he came home from work. "It was hard as a new mom, but I went to work from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m.," she says. "It was almost like having two babies at once." A year later, after the birth of a second son, Marcus relied more on babysitters and family to lend a hand while she tended to the business, which is on track this year to surpass $1 million in revenue.

Honor the time slots you devote to business and kids. Veteran entrepreneur Wally Bock, a home-based consultant in Greensboro, N.C., says he taught his five children (now grown) to respect that when his home-office door was closed, "you don't open it unless it requires 9-1-1." But he also respected their requests for his time, especially for ball games and recitals, which they'd mark down on his calendar in a grand ceremony. "If you get it on my calendar, it's sacred," he recalls telling them. "My kids now tell me that turned out to be a really neat thing they remember." Now, Bock plans to use similar rules when his grandsons come for a long visit this summer.

Focus on work, but don't push children out completely. Home-based entrepreneurs often stress the need to shut the door so they can concentrate on work while a babysitter or nanny cares for the child. But during downtime — when no client calls are scheduled, and when more menial tasks can be performed — many say they invite kids to work alongside them. Nicola Ries Taggart, who runs her life-coaching business, True Insights Coaching, out of her Alameda, Calif., home, says she keeps a box of crayons nearby so her 2-year-old can color and do her "own work" while Mom gets stuff done at her desk. Kalita, the home-office expert, says it's important to include kids so they don't equate the business to "all your time away from them."

Learn to multitask. That's the recommendation from Janet Galati, who is raising her three daughters, all under the age of 7, while running her direct-mail business, Money Mailer of the Chain-O-Lakes, out of her Lake Villa, Ill., home. She uses the service of a babysitter in the mornings so she can visit clients, but spends the afternoons telemarketing, faxing and simultaneously watching the kids. "It takes a ton of organization, and the ability to focus and re-focus your attention quickly," she says. (Indeed, during our interview, Galati displayed those talents, occasionally telling one or more of her daughters to "let Mama finish her phone call" before turning back to answer questions.) While it's challenging, the best part of working from home is "sitting on my beach, watching my children play in the sand....as I make phone calls to set appointments with clients," she says.