This article seeks to redress imbalance by comparing and contrasting respective pros and cons of running your own home-based business and working for someone else.

COMMUTING

When you work for yourself from home, your commute is, at most, a few steps from one end of house to other. When you work in a traditional paid "job" your commute may be a five minute drive or it may be an hour and a half or worse. Both ways. That can add up to a substantial chunk of time over course of a week, a month or a year.

CHILDREN

If you work from home, you can be around for your kids. If you work outside home, you may be spending a fortune on childcare if your kids are too young for school and worrying about what they're up to between end of school day and when you get home if they're not.

On other hand, having kids around while trying to run a professional business from home can be a major distraction and constant source of interruption. You may find you need to use childminding services occasionally to take care of business undisturbed.

INDEPENDENCE AND AUTONOMY

When you work for yourself, you call shots, you make decisions and you do it without anyone looking over your shoulder and breathing down your neck. When you work outside home, you are subject to decisions (good and bad), whims and control of your boss. Your boss dictates your regimen.

On other hand, along with decision-making autonomy comes an awful burden. If you get it wrong, you may not make any money this week.

WORKING HOURS

When you work for yourself, you can set your own hours - both actual hours you work and number. When you work for a boss, you work when and for how long you're told (within limits, obviously).

Although setting your own hours may sound like freedom to you, all too often working your own hours translates into working all hours so you need to be able to set limits for yourself.

Also, when your boss dictates your hours, that may or may not fit in with your body clock. One of real advantages of working for yourself is that you can choose to work during your peak concentration time and not at all during your sluggish times of day. If your peak time is 5:00 am through to 10:00 am, you can work those hours and another couple sometime in afternoon catching up on brainless type tasks. If you work for someone else, you work when you're told and if that doesn't work with your body clock, too bad.

STATUS

If you're a professional in paid workforce, you may enjoy a certain status and prestige, if that's important to you. On other hand, working for yourself you may find it difficult to be taken seriously at all. Again, whether that's a relevant factor depends on how important things like "status", "image" etc. are to you. If they are important, take this seriously. Although it may sound shallow, if it's going to be a thorn in your side, give it some serious thought.

BOUNDARIES

When you work for someone else, you have a ready-made structure. There is a time for work, and there is a time to go home. When you work for yourself, these boundaries can become blurred over time, so much so that you may find you have difficulty turning work off since you are, after all, living in your work environment and vice versa.

PERSONAL DISCIPLINE

If you're a personally disciplined person, working from home will probably suit you very well. But if you find it difficult to motivate yourself to do what has to be done and you find yourself procrastinating over starting a particular work- related task, you may find distractions of being at home particularly difficult to resist. If you find yourself doing laundry and gardening when you should be working, this may be a problem for you.

CASH FLOW

This is one of biggies. THE big advantage of working for someone else is that you have a regular paycheck coming in. Leaving aside any worry of downsizing, assuming you do your job competently, you can reasonably expect to receive a certain, known amount of money at regular intervals. When you work for yourself, however, amount of money you make and when you receive it can be, at best, spasmodic.

On other hand, money you make from working from someone else is limited to your salary. When you work for yourself, sky's limit provided you are successful at what you do.

EXPENSES

When you work for someone else, your boss is responsible for capital expenditure and day to day expenses and you don't have to worry about it or even think about it, for that matter. When you work for yourself, however, you're responsible for buying your capital equipment (computer, photocopier, fax machine) and paying for repairs as needed. You're responsible for paying your own electricity and phone bills, printing costs and advertising expenses ... you name it, it falls on you.

BENEFITS

Similarly, when you work for someone else you get to participate in your employer's pension plan, you get paid health insurance and vacations as well as numerous other benefits. When you work for yourself, to get any of these things you have to pay for them out of your own pocket.

RISK MANAGEMENT

Your employer pays for various insurances to protect business unit from risk. The types of insurance taken out will depend on nature of business but will include, at a minimum, products liability, business interruption and like. Again, as a home business owner, you must foot bill for this expenditure.

LICENSES

Your employer is responsible for ensuring that business obtains and maintains all necessary business licenses. If you're boss, this is your responsibility.

VACATIONS

Dumb? Obviously. Narrow-minded? Yes. Wrong? Absolutely. Unfair? No question. Want their business? Well ... yes. OK, then you're going to have to play game and beat them at it. Here's how to do it. It's a little sneaky, but hey, all's fair in love and home-based business.

HARMLESS FICTIONS

The name of game is creating right image ... employing a few harmless fictions, in other words. First off, incorporate or register a fictitious business name. Nothing screams "PROFESSIONAL!" to Potential Client as an honest-to- goodness corporate or business name on your letterhead and business cards. Never mind that anyone can spend ten bucks and register a DBA, it at least *looks* professional, and that's what counts.

OFFICE ADDRESS

The next problem you have with Potential Client is that you don't want your home address to give you away.

What do you think looks more professional in Potential Client's eyes: 123 Cherryblossom Way, Apt. 103, Suburbia or 123 Major Blvd, Level 37, Big City?

The answer is a serviced office. These don't have to cost a lot of money if you use them pretty much as a post office but they CAN give your business all big-city prestige your potential client is looking for. You can also use a post office box for this purpose but many a Potential Client will be on to you in a flash. They didn't just fall off turnip truck, you know. (Right.)

An additional advantage is that you can use your serviced office to meet with Potential Client. After all, last thing you want is to have him coming to your REAL office. Heaven forbid! Most serviced offices will make meeting rooms available for a flat fee.

TELEPHONES

This is probably trickiest part of all. How do you know it's safe to answer phone in your home office even though sounds of your young children playing just outside your office door will be heard by caller? You simply don't.

There is a simple way of dealing with this. Only give your home office number to existing clients. They already know you are professional and competent and should therefore have no issue with fact that you work from home.

For anyone else, give out number of an answering service that will answer call in your business name and can tell callers that you're in a meeting with another client and take a message. Your serviced office will offer this service as well. You can then return call at a time when you know tell-tale background noise won't give you away.