You must consider what kind of mindset to have in order to be successful working at home. This translates to “getting your head right” with the necessary thoughts and patterns.
A job at home is different than working in an office as it is not a repeatable routine. You’re entirely subject to your own drive and self-motivation. So, what hacks are there to help you be successful?
Many entrepreneurs have revealed that those who go from startup to success do these things (and more) without falter:
Be Resilient and Believe in Yourself
Resiliency is the ability to bounce back from adverse situations or troubling circumstances with a newfound perspective and positive attitude. It’s an important byproduct of believing in yourself.
When someone truly believes in themselves, it’s like fireworks go off in their brain. It enlivens and invigorates them to achieve their dreams. You can effectively quote the popular saying, “She believed she could, so she did.”
Believing in yourself requires great strength from within when you face the many negative influences in society today. Negativity can even come from those closest to you. You’ll notice that this is particularly true when you choose to work from home. It will be hard for them to believe you’re actually working and making a living at it.
More importantly, you’ll need to be thinking in advance with your goals and daily tasks to ensure that what you want comes true.
Stay Ahead of the Game
The game is really the world of activity that takes place around you as you try to achieve your dreams of a work at home lifestyle. It consists of pitching clients or applying for jobs, maintaining positive rapport with clients or employers, and completing your work in a timely and efficient manner.
To stay ahead of the game, you need to be setting goals and then breaking them into actionable steps that keep you on track for success. You’ll also need to be educating yourself in your industry(s) on a regular basis to ensure you’re on top of things. So how do you stay on top of things?
Work on the Hardest Tasks First
The best approach to getting tasks done efficiently is to work on the hardest ones first. It’s easy to get caught up in the simple work, even if you accomplish a lot of it, but most likely, the harder the task, the more reward — financially and emotionally. What you’re trying to avoid will in turn into your biggest asset.
Maybe it’s working on a course or book, or perhaps the hardest thing for you to do is job hunt or pitch clients. Whatever it is, get ‘er done. It’s important to make at least one big stride per day to keep your morale up. Working on harder tasks also makes the smaller ones easier and more fulfilling. But what about the quality of your work?
Do the Small AND Big Things Right
It’s necessary to ensure that when you complete a task, you do it to the best of your ability. This means doing it right the first time and ensuring the highest quality is achieved. Say you’re a freelance writer, like me. Small tasks to me are pitching clients and following Facebook Groups in my niches. The biggest task is writing articles and other content, like courses.
If you procrastinate on the big things, you’ll be rushed and unable to achieve the quality you desire. When you spend your time on all the small tasks without tackling a big one, then you haven’t done things in an equal manner.
The key is equality. Look at what lays before you and schedule those tasks into your day. Have a “power hour” with other professionals where you crank out a time for working on the most important things, or simply show up and work your shift with quality in mind. What else can you do to enhance your quality?
Try New Things and Take Risks
The hardest thing for many entrepreneurs is to take risks. This involves trying new things by searching out ideas that will challenge your status quo. Sometimes you get into a rut that makes it difficult to introduce the new into your routine. Make time for this type of risky behavior as if your career depended on it.
This might include a new niche to approach, a new product to develop, a new marketing technique to apply, or a new pitch to throw. It could also mean simply rewording your typical customer service lines to freshen up the routine. How exactly does this benefit your business?
Believe That You Can Grow and Do Anything
By launching out into the unknown, you’ll find that your confidence and courage grows along with your business. New ideas and pursuits will embolden you enough that you believe you can do anything simply by growing in that area of expertise.
Now, you don’t have to be an expert in every area. In fact, you can be more of a generalist with just enough knowledge in many areas to contribute without starting a huge following. This is financially sound too. But what are some ways you can show your new confidence?
Share Your Best Tips with Others
The best way to show confidence in yourself is to share your best secrets openly with others. This not only builds a loyal following but draws them in to what other products you have to offer. When sharing your best tips, you’re being authentic in your circle of influence. It’s one thing to dangle a carrot, it’s another to feed them the carrot.
Like a horse or dog who goes after the treat in front them no matter how hard they have to run, dangling something of true value goes a long way to build trust and acceptance as an expert. You can share a tip and then build a product around it, or develop strong relationships with managers that will be invaluable. But you must have an overall mission to succeed.
Choose a Mission that Reflects Your Passion
Knowing your mission in the position you’ve placed yourself should always reflect your passion. Whether it’s customer service, writing, designing, speaking, or business, make sure that you have an overall statement that expresses what your goal in life is meant to be.
This statement will be a lighthouse in a sea of boats lighting your path to a better place in the long run. Simply put, if your mission reflects your passion, you’ll be more likely to succeed. Along the way, however, you will falter. How do you deal with that?
Accept Failure as a Lesson Learned
It’s highly likely that you will fail — more than once. You’ll start things and never finish them. You’ll finish things and never get the recognition. All that comes down to staying true to your passion. If you’re still discovering that, then failure is a lesson learned along the way.
You won’t get it all right the first time, and it takes many tries to find the right path. But if you consider what you’ve learned from each mistake or mishap, you’ll be better prepared to share your experiences with others while bettering yourself.
This series of mindset must-haves will continues in Part Two of this article set. There are many mentalities you must acquire to be successful in a work at home environment. Although you may take something that is predictable but still at home, there are many options for being your own boss working entirely online. Either way, you have the ability to make it happen!
Rebecca L. Sutton
Rebecca is a savvy entrepreneur who has successfully worked from home as a freelance writer and marketer since 2010. Her work includes loads of ghostwriting for blogs, a recently published article in a local magazine, and successful targeted social marketing campaigns. Her writing is concise, contains depth, and always articulate in its purpose. She has a Diploma in Paralegal Studies and a B.A. in Communications from Virginia Tech that makers her uniquely skilled to write with authority and persuasiveness.
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