How Your Kids Can Help You Work From Home
If you have been following me for any length of time, you know I talk about how I work from home with kids! (and puppies) It can be exhausting, exhilarating, maddening, surprising and everything in between!
According to Sara Sutton Fell, founder of FlexJobs, “There’s a common misconception that working from home means you can care for your kids while you work, but it’s really not fair to your job or your children to try to do both simultaneously.”[source]
Caring for your children while you juggle a work-from-home career can be hard, but these tips can help you stay organized, and involve the kiddos wherever possible! Hey, when you work at home, you can use all the help you can get, right?? Not everything you have the kids do will actually help you, (you can probably complete the task quicker) but it could teach them a skill and also make them feel needed and busy.
Check out these ways you can have your kids help you ask you work from home:
- Filing and Sorting
Sorting is a great activity for younger kids. This may not help you especially in your business, but it will keep them busy and teach them a skill! The confidence gained from a job well done is invaluable as well. Young kids can sort and count office supplies, and older kids can count and sort inventory, for example. Another idea for older children is to count supplies or inventory and enter into a spreadsheet. My daughter has found Google Docs (on her recycled, refurbished, laptop) and has a blast creating stories and documents!
- Shredding
After the little ones are finished sorting the paper you don’t want to keep, have them create a shredding party! Even if you have a pile of non-private papers for recycling, let them shred it! Whatever keeps them busy right? Just make sure if your child is young, they don’t shred their fingertips!!
- Cleaning
This will probably seem more “fun” for the younger ones, but having your child clean is a great idea to keep their hands busy. Dusting, wiping down, and sweeping can help you keep your office clean. If you have older children, a little incentive (like a dollar or two) can go far.
- Babysitting
Since you are home, your babysitter doesn’t necessarily need to be an older child! You can have the older one(s) watch the little one! They will gain valuable skills from this and also build confidence. You are also training your child to be your helper in the future as well as a paid babysitter when the time comes! This type of babysitting can simply mean reading books or playing games.
- Working In Your Business
This would depend on the type of business you have, and how old your kids are, but think about what skills your kids already have. Could they create social media posts for you? Many tweens and teens are a wiz on the iPhone and could probably put together a viral meme for you! Or, have them enter all of your customer information into a new spreadsheet. Be sure to pay your child something! This will build a solid work ethic for the future.
How To Work From Home When You Have Kids
It does take a little strategy and planning, but finding tasks your children can help you with can really pay off in the future. These mini-jobs can teach a skill, make your children feel needed, and, best of all, keep them busy while you work. Over time, the investment you make in training them, will build solid workers for the future. If you start them young enough, when they get older you can have them help with data entry, photography, marketing and other more complex tasks.
How do your kids help you work?
