However, political world can step over line by power-hungry or untrained corporate politician. The one way to judge such an action is based on your own personal lines. If indeed a situation seems to purposefully step over into your personal life, then you must make a judgment call. Such situations can occur when your associates are able to create conflict in your personal life.

The one most important lesson to learn is that one should never provide access to one's personal world within corporate world. Indeed, for congenial interaction, it is accepted that you provide some basic information about your personal life. However, keep it simple and do not provide any information that could create issues with others. It is important to maintain a distance between realities in your "personal world" and realities of your "corporate world".

--- How many of me are there? ---

Indeed, this entire scenario can complicate one's life with idea of maintaining two different "selves". However, to balance your world with your corporate world successfully, it is best to view your corporate world as a "sub-world" of your entire life. In all cases, all of human interaction is lumped under one world, with a multitude of sub-worlds and environments. You have your corporate world, your "buddy" world, your hobby world, and you family world, as just examples. Indeed, you experience different rules and expectations (i.e., politics) in each. Therefore, by learning rules of corporate sub-world, just as you have your other worlds, you can easily integrate and manage politics to achieve greater success in your career as well as your life.

--- What's next? ---

In corporate world, it is not a question of ethics or integrity; it is a question of results. Properly trained managers are able to use politics as an effective tool to obtain results that fall in line with corporation's vision and mission. You, as employee, must learn how to separate your personal world from corporate world so that you can effectively understand purpose and direction of corporation without falling prey to your own personal ideals.

Each corporation is as much a living, breathing, and consuming being as is a human. Just as your cells fight for survival of human, corporate politics is not about individual, it is about survival of corporation. By understanding where line exists that separates your two worlds and adapting to idea that political motivation is about results, then indeed, your interaction within this strange, new world will be more effective and successful.

But this doesn't answer question - how long should you be available to take calls, and what should you do with people who call outside your posted hours? Recognizing that there is a three hour difference for many people, you should try to be available during that period that overlaps different time zones. If you live on east coast, 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM will provide decent coverage. Voice mail or an answering machine should be available for those hours you are not actually taking calls.

While voice mail or an answering machine will provide coverage, you must respond to inquires received on a timely basis. While you have a better chance of closing sale if you are available when they do call, this is next best alternative.

Another thing that you should do, is to try to capture their telephone number, best time to return call and their email address if they do call outside your normal working hours. This works especially well if you follow up with an email sending them a carefully crafted message. In that message thank them for their inquiry, and if they respond, be sure to return their call. If they don't respond to your email, you should still follow up, however, odds of making a sale have decreased dramatically.

No matter what you do, you will not close a sale with everyone who calls. If you present a "business like" image, odds that you will be successful, will increase dramatically, and you will realize that dream of no commute, not having to play office politics, and hopefully there will be some income.