However fit and healthy we home business owners are, there might come a times when we fall ill. Whether it is the common cold or something more serious, when we happen to work for ourselves there are advantages and disadvantages of being your own boss.

For a start it is good that we no longer have to worry about calling in and explaining to our boss why we won’t be in that day. There are no more feelings of guilt – no matter how justified we might be in taking a day off. We are adults now, in charge of our own destiny and we can manage our own work around our illness.

However this has its downside as well. The chances are that there will be no one else to hand our workload over to as many home business owners work by themselves; much as we would be able to if we were working in an office or other location where there are other members of staff to turn to. We have to cope with our workload ourselves, which either means we have to work through feeling poorly or rearrange our day so we can work later on when we will hopefully feel a bit better.

One of the main problems with working from home is that we are working for ourselves – and thus there is no such thing as sick pay. So we really have to work hard to make sure we are prepared for times when our health may become poorly. For example, if we can put away a small percentage of our home business profits, as a small insurance policy, we can rest easy when we do need to take some time to recover.

But what happens about deadlines? What can we do when we have a deadline to meet and we aren’t well enough to deal with it? Once again we must build in some extra time in all cases. For example we need to make sure that we allocate enough time so that we can be on target to finish a job nice and early every single time. This way if anything goes wrong, we can rest in the knowledge that we have built in some extra time to fall back on. And in truth, if we have a reputation of hitting the deadline every time, not many clients would be hard pushed to give a little extra breathing room on that rare occasion when illness catches us.

The good news is that we don’t have to stick to a timetable either. For example you may feel better halfway through the day, once you have caught up on some sleep. In an employed position you wouldn’t be able to go in part way through the day. But when you are self-employed you can start your day a bit later and hopefully achieve a lot and feel better for doing so.

In truth there are good and bad points when you have your own home business and you fall ill. But in general you do have more freedom, and a little forward planning goes a long way in situations like these.

Author Bio: Naz Daud – CityLocal UK Business Directory Ireland Business Directory Ill Business Owners

Category: Business Management
Keywords: home, business, owners, ill, sick, home business, work, working, work from home, working from home,