Few people don’t relish the idea of rolling out of bed and into their offices still in pajamas. The freedom to work whenever and wherever is unparalleled to most perks offered by big business. But is a dream job like this possible? Feasible?
Several opportunities exist, the first involves seeking out companies that are looking for individuals to work from home. It’s not easy, surely, but there are legitimate ones out there. Job boards or specific company contacts might yield positive results, even if its only one day per week, that’s still a day you don’t have to commute or spend money tapping the vending machines. If it seems discouraging, don’t worry; major companies have entire teams of researchers looking for opportunities like these, and most of them come up with limited findings.
Some of the best opportunities to work from home can come from the companies where you already work. It’s called remote work, and there are a variety of software systems on the market that will allow you to access your personal computing materials from home as though you were sitting in the company’s office. Much of this software is not too expensive, so you can mention price point with employers before they do. Even if you have to make a personal investment in the software, it’s a small sacrifice for what you’ll be saving on gas and miscellaneous expenses.
Advertised work-from-home opportunities are all over the place. If you open your inbox, you’ll no doubt see boastful claims of “$4,000 earnings per week” and other such nonsense. With any of these, if it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is. Realistically, the envelope stuffing, data entry, and other related positions that do legitimately pay only pay about six to eight dollars per hour. They do exist, but cutting through the scams to find them is really the challenge. You may want to check with companies who process large volumes of information or direct mailing businesses that don’t have machines for particular envelope stuffing tasks.
Of course, there’s always the option of starting an at-home business. For many people, this is the e-Bay store they started reselling items in a year ago or the specialty shop they opened for their craft items. If you find something with a market, a few hours a week of dedicated time can catalyze a business. Enough time—and success—and you just might be able to replace your day job with the personal business.
Online outsourcing has become incredibly popular recently with sites like E-Lance and Guru drawing hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues for individuals who have leveraged their work expertise from home. Individuals have gone on to create lasting businesses for themselves after writing a carefully-thought-out profile and providing portfolio samples. The process for most of these sites can be lengthy, especially if you take the tests to validate your skills, but the payoffs can be great. Both of these sites allow free access accounts, which entitle you to a few bids on the vast collection of projects available. If you like the service, you can sign up for more bids and a higher account access. Whether you’re a housewife/husband or a seasoned professional, these sites have opportunities that can produce revenues for you.
Markets cater to advertising, writing, language translation, administrative, multimedia, legal, and engineering professionals, along with anyone who has even a slight bit of experience with these fields. The only downside of these global systems is the likelihood of individuals from other countries placing dramatically lower bids (and winning). Unfortunately, living wages are different the world over, and what you can do for a price in your home office, another team of people in another country can do for much less (and still be making a living wage). Still, higher bidders still win, and it only takes a few long-term relationships to provide a steady income stream.