You may be reading this article with a view to starting your own home based business. It maybe something you have been thinking about for sometime and haven’t taken any steps yet to make your ambition a reality. Today I’m not going to take you through the steps of how to start your own business, (you can find all the information you need in my earlier articles); but I am going to help you through the decision making process, by giving you 3 very good reasons why you should take action now and start getting things into motion.THE WORLDWIDE ECONOMYI imagine no one is in any doubt as to the severity of the global downturn. Yes, it probably started as a consequence of the greed and questionable business tactics of the world’s banking institutions, but the impact or fall-out has seen no boundaries. Thousands of businesses have shut down for ever. More people than ever we could have imagined, have lost their jobs and their plight is made all the worse because of the lack of availability of new jobs. Without jobs, people’s spending power diminishes. Without consumers, more businesses will be forced to close and render even more people jobless and dependent on state benefits.I appreciate I haven’t created a very rosy picture. The fact is, I believe in facing reality head on. No matter what politicians are telling us, things are going to remain extremely tough for at least a generation to come. So why have I started on such a gloomy note? Well, as someone once said to me, “If you don’t know where you are, how do you know where you are going?” It’s a simple bit of prose, but when you stop to think about it, it has deep significance for everyone.So where are we now? That’s simple to answer. We are in a position where we can no longer rely on traditional forms of income such as paid employment. i.e. jobs. But, and this is important, is this not the perfect time to start taking control of our own lives. After all, we have already learned the hard way, that we cannot trust bankers or politicians. In my 53 years, I cannot think of a more appropriate time than right now, to start a home based business.If you have been thinking about “taking the leap” for some time, I believe you should stop thinking, start planning and take positive action right now.AMBITIONYou may be one of the very fortunate ones who are in a work environment where your drive and ambition is not restricted in any way. Every day provides you with a new challenge for you to rise to. You have the drive, desire and opportunity to really go-for-it and fulfill your true potential. If this is you right now, you are very fortunate. Most people are not in this situation however and crave the opportunity to really make something of their working lives.Ambition is a truly great personal asset. The question is how you are going to fulfill it? From my own experience, the answer is to start something of your own. Whether you are trained in childcare, secretarial work, law, marketing, writing and publishing or simply want to turn the skills you do have into a business; seize the opportunity. Your natural ambition and drive will see you through the start-up process as will your determination and effort. Once you get going, no one or anything can halt your progress. You can be as creative as you like; as ambitious as you want to be and best of all, nothing can stop your dreams turning into reality, except you. You become the master of your own destiny. The world and what is happening in it, is no longer your focus; your business is your priority and no one can take it away from you.START LIVING I don’t want to pretend that it will not take great effort and commitment to get your home based business up and running, because it will. But I guess you already know that. Yes, you will find obstacles along the way and you will encounter unforeseen problems which you just have to deal with. You will probably even have to change track along the way, based on your initial experiences.I have to tell you though, it is well worth your time and effort. Once you get your business up and running, the adrenalin rush is huge and your raise in self esteem knows no boundaries. You’ve always had this overriding thought in your head that if you just had the opportunity, you could be successful. When you realise that you are on your way to becoming successful, you also realise that you are capable of matching your ambition. At this point, you know your life no longer has any boundaries or restrictions placed upon it. You also realise that as you become even better at managing your business, you get more of the most precious commodity in the world – time. No, not big houses, flashy boats or cars, but precious time to spend with those who mean the most to you.You cannot buy time, you can only create it. The heading above says, start living. The most valuable fruit of your endeavours is time and when you have time, you can start living, not just existing.

Home based business proprietors must be constantly thinking about ways to improve the efficiency of their business ventures. If you have some standardized, documented, flexible business goals and operational procedures, it is not difficult for you to achieve high levels of efficiency in your home based business.In the absence of clear guidelines and operational procedures, your employees or team members will do things differently and your business will be unorganized with your work being done on an ad hoc basis. Your business will run much more efficiently if you simply put in place a standardize set of operational procedures. This is best done prior to actually putting your business in operation.At the same time remember to use caution in not making your procedures to elaborate and specific, otherwise, you risk having your employees and team members take shortcuts to minimize their work. Shortcuts if planned and dovetailed into a standard operational plan could increase efficiency, however, shortcuts which are simply put into action on an ad hoc basis generally only serves the interests of the individual employee and may actually sabotage the team efforts causing serious problems within the company.This article is intended to help you to develop some suitable and easy to use procedures that may enhance the overall efficiency of your home based business.Understanding:It is imperative that successful businesses follow a set of standardized rules and policies. Setting up these rules can be accomplished by analyzing each and every aspect of your business very closely. Primarily you will need to have a clear understanding of the job function of each team member including yourself before developing your rules and operational procedures.Productivity is critical to the success of your business. To achieve productivity requires team work to insure a smooth start to finish accomplishment of the entire project. To maintain efficiency and to maintain good employee relations, you will need to implement a feedback system so that team members can identify operational problems and get credit for their input. A happy work force will increase the efficiency of the business ten fold compared to an unhappy disgruntled work force. Careful study and attention to daily operations will help you to identify problem areas and will allow you to fine-tune the procedures in a timely fashion thereby enhancing the efficiency of your business enterprise.Allow Team Member Input:People are individuals and as such, they generally work at their own pace and style. For efficiency sake, you should allow individuals to seek their own level of involvement within the business environment as long as it achieves the overall company goals. You should allow a certain amount of flexibility and variation within the job function. You should not try to control every aspect of your employees and team members’ work by imposing strict supervision if it is not absolutely necessary.If you allow your team and employees to primarily work at their own pace, within reasonable limits, they will enjoy their work more and will make positive contributions towards increasing the efficiency of your home based business.Assessing Your Efficiency:Your personal efficiency is also critical to the successful operation of your business. You should make optimum use of every minute of your workday. Review your work style from time to time and see if there is any scope for improvement. Seek out specialized supervisory training to improve your managerial skills. Attend trade shows to learn new techniques to dovetail into your business. Seek out feedback from your customers to get their perspective so that you can take corrective measures whenever required.Being Systematic:It pays to be systematic in your work place. To run your business smoothly you need to maintain a good filing system so that you will be able to locate specific documents without wasting time. That way you will be able to conduct your work without delays. To improve efficiency you can also delegate some work to other team members. Doing so will not only increase efficiency, it will also improve their moral by showing that you trust them to perform above their job levels. Your trust in your team will instill confidence in them.Efficiency generally means getting your product from start to finish and delivered to your customer in a timely manner while maintaining high quality and generating customer loyalty and repeat business. Constant monitoring of your entire start to finish operation will enable you to cross-check and rule out the possibility of errors and inefficiencies in your home based business.