It’s the million-dollar question facing all parents – how best to balance work and family commitments. While there’s no silver bullet, self-employment is an often-overlooked option, yet one that can provide flexibility when you need it most. Not everyone starting up in business has ambitions to take over the world either. For some people, like me, the aim of the game is just to have a bit more control over their own little universe. Laura White previously worked for a big PR firm but decided to set up her own business to give her more flexibility after her daughter was born It’s okay if you don’t have a burning desire to make a million or employ a staff of hundreds – an ambition to provide for your family in a way that makes you happy is just as impressive.
I made the switch to self-employment (notice I didn’t say leap because it was more of a shuffle) after the birth of my daughter Nina. Nina was a much longed-for baby. A baby we weren’t sure we’d be lucky enough to have and I was determined to find a way to spend as much time as possible at home with her. RELATED ARTICLES Previous 1 Next Can you really walk your way to wealth? Sweatcoin founders… Cocktails, country fairs and fund manager fight clubs: How… Investment firms should use International Women’s Day to…
Baby on board: The eight best cars for new parents thanks to… Share this article Share My life before baby was centred on the PR job I loved at a big, city centre communications agency but I felt the hours and commitments were no longer compatible with my new role as mam (read mum if you’re not in my native North East)! I was on maternity leave when I started getting offers of freelance work and I surprised myself by how 2 start a business much I wanted to give it a go. Although I was loving my time with my daughter, work was still really important to me and pretty fundamental to helping keep a roof over my family’s head.
Self-employment seemed to be a smart way of getting a balance of the two. Laura White made the switch to self-employment after the birth of Nina My only goal at first was to ‘buy’ myself out of employment to avoid having to rely on formal childcare. I figured that every day I could spend at home with Nina was a bonus. I went from week to week at first. Before I knew it, months had passed and then years – November 2018 marked my tenth year in business.
Interestingly, many of my clients have been involved in encouraging entrepreneurship and my own experience has been invaluable when communicating their work. That’s especially true of the work that I have done with Transmit Start-Ups – the UK’s leading provider of Government-backed Start Up Loans. Transmit has backed more than 4,000 new businesses with £40.