Introducing Mickey Hadick:
Mickey makes his living as a Business Analyst in the insurance industry, and has spent his career with information technology. If you’d like to learn from his mistakes, visit MickeyHadick.com where he blogs and tells stories in his spare time.
I am a recent convert to Dropbox, a cloud service for synchronizing the contents of computer folders. It’s clever beauty resides in it’s ability to notice that a file has been added, updated, or deleted and immediately makes the change on the server’s copy of your file folders.
It’s magic happens when you install Dropbox on any, and all, computers that you use. Dropbox copies the changes from the server back to those other computers. A common scenario is you have a netbook computer you keep in a briefcase, a laptop in the dining room, and one or more desktops scattered around the house. The kids may already take turns on the better desktop computer so that they can keep up with their friends online, so you need to wait until later in the evening before you can access that machine to design and print an invitation. However, thanks to Dropbox, you can compose some of the content on your netbook during the day and later revise the text and begin to layout the design on your laptop in the dining room after dinner. The work begun on the netbook is automatically pushed to the laptop once the Dropbox software connects to the cloud. Those updates will then get pushed to the desktop machine when it is your turn to use it, where you can finalize the invitation. Continue reading…
One of our readers, Tom, asked:
“Can anyone recommend a legitimate home based business that you can actually live on?”
MY ANSWER:
Hi Tom,
Technology is making it easier every day for a lot of people to work from home. Personally, I run a graphic design business. 10 years ago we had an office in San Diego, clients in San Diego and employees from San Diego. Now, with broadband Internet so widely available we closed the office, have clients all over the country and designers from Baltimore to Buenos Aires.
The easiest way is to create a business where you work with your brain, not your hands. It’s much easier to be home based or even mobile. However, there are a lot of people who have created product based businesses that outsource production and fulfillment.
Finally, don’t get stuck thinking you need to pick ONE business to support yourself. While I make the majority of our income from my design business, I also make money doing photography, Mac consulting, some investments and of course Family Hack. I really enjoy the variety too. It makes life interesting and I’m always learning new things.
Of course, technology doesn’t always have to play a part. Last year, a friend of mine lost his SysAdmin job. Instead of looking for another job, he and his wife decided to make a change. They moved to a less expensive house about 30 minutes outside of town. It sits on several acres that they’ve turned into a “farmette”. They grow their own produce, and raise chickens (and eggs) for sale at the farmers markets. They also opened a dance studio nearby that teaches kids and adults. You can see more info at Sweet Dog Farm and Dance Barn.
Good Luck,
Michael
Tom replied with:
Hi Michael,
Thanks for the response. Although I’m still employed with a solid company I’m looking for ways to transition to a home based business. As a first timer I have found it difficult to work through the legitimate vs sites that just want you to fund something that may or may not work.
Once again, thanks for the response.
Regards,
Tom
MY FOLLOW UP REPLY:
Hi Tom,
I agree. The filtering is tough. There is so much get rich BS in the work at home industry. You might want to read Tim Ferriss’ The 4-Hour Workweek
. There is a fair amount of hyperbole, but also some good info on how to set up businesses that are scalable and less location based. Don’t let the title put you off, It’s just for marketing. The book isn’t about getting lazy. It’s about working smart.
Another idea is to start a business that can use your “solid company” as a first client/customer. I did that when I first started. I worked in a corporate art department. I left only after I knew they would be my first client. It was essentially the same job. The only difference was I did it from home, they weren’t locked in to paying me and I invoiced instead of getting a paycheck. In return I got the freedom and over the next couple of years added new clients.
Being inside the company gives you great access to seeing what they might need. If you can find a way to fill that need you can create a new business for yourself with very little risk. You essentially have a deal before you leap.
Good Luck,
Michael
Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Editors Note: This is the second in an ongoing series of interviews with homeschooling families. Our first interview with Jen McKinnon is here. We hope you enjoy their stories as much as we did and if you are a homeschooling family interested in being profiled, please contact us.
Our second interview is with Tara Wagner from TheOrganicSister.com. She and her husband Justin unschool their 10 year old son Zeb. Continue reading…
Hannah and I recently did a guest lecture at the University of Virginia. In this 10 minute excerpt, I swear a little, make fun of Bono, and probably piss off small retail shop owners. Deal with it. It’s the truth.
TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
Best types of business for a mobile lifestyle? Products are better than services. I tend to do a whole bunch of service businesses, but products are better than services, because a product you make it once and sell it a bunch of times and every time it makes money. A service? You or somebody you hire, which a lot of times is the case in my case, has to actually be there.
So, as much as you may think that being a rock star or a movie star might be a really great life. When U2 showed up down here and put on their little tootie fruity show? Bono had to show up and sing. When you pay your money and go and see U2. Four guys had to fly in from Ireland, put on their little shiny pants and get up there and flop around, but every time they sell a CD they don’t have to do that. It’s a very different model, products versus a service.
The internet is better than physical. If you’re going to sell something, sell it on the internet. Don’t sell it physically. Physically you have to show up and stand around. Physical retail establishments blow my mind. The idea that you have to show up every day at a place kills your mobility right away — you’ve got to open the door at 9:30 and close it at 9:30 (or whatever) and the whole time you’re just standing around just in case someone might want to buy a latte. Just in case. Two hours in the middle of the day, no one comes in? Guess what? You’re still standing there, or somebody you hire is still standing there. It’s just bad for mobility to have some sort of physical storefront or any kind of place that you physically have to go.
Continue reading…
Editors Note: We’re (not) back to school at the Family Hack house, and the nuts and bolts of a DIY education have been on our minds. As we mentioned in another of our homeschool pieces, there is no better guidance for a homeschool family than the tales of those who have “been there, done that”.
In that spirit, we’ve asked some homeschooling families a series of questions about how they homeschool, what challenges they face, how homeschooling fits with family life overall, etc. We hope you enjoy their stories as much as we did!
This is an ongoing series — if you are a homeschooling family interested in being profiled, please contact us.
Our first interview is with our always-inspiring friend Jennifer McKinnon from www.jenthemom.com. She and her husband Chuck homeschool four beautiful children…
Continue reading…
I was going to write a post on how to survive working at home, then somebody did it for me. Kudos to “A List Apart”. Good stuff y’all.
I’ve washed our car once in the last 3 years. It didn’t make any difference so I stopped. It turns out, we stumbled upon the holy grail of all car paint colors…”dirt”. Ok, technically, it’s called “Sahara Sand” but that’s just some marketing weasel’s name for “dirt”.
We owned the car for about a year when I began feeling guilty that I hadn’t washed it. I took it to the nearest car wash, spent $10.00 and an hour getting it cleaned up and no one noticed…not even me.
The lesson here is I bought a dirt colored car and accidentally found out it NEVER needs to be washed. It always looks the same…pretty good.
Granted, it’s not the sexiest beast on the road. But, I want to dry hump it every time I think of the time and money it has saved me. Now, I just squeegee the windows when I fill it up with gas. That’s it…I’m done.
We recently had the opportunity to talk with Dan Clements about his terrific new book, “Escape 101: Sabbaticals Made Simple
” It’s an inspiring and practical guide to taking a career break without losing your money or your mind. Here’s our interview with Dan.
Family Hack: Some jobs seem easier to “escape” from than others. What jobs would you choose to put in your Top 10 for easy escapism?
Dan Clements: I honestly don’t believe that it’s about the job – it’s about the mindset of the person doing the job that determines how easy it is to get away.
That being said, there are some jobs that lend themselves to portability, or to periodic downtimes:
Jobs with structured extended leave programs
Teachers
Career jobs at a companies with established sabbatical programs
Jobs with global demand
Doctors
Nurses
Portable work
Writing
Design
Programming
Any other web-based freelancing
Jobs with a defined end
Temp work
Contract work
There are many others, but these are the ones that always strike me as the easiest. A lot of these are easy because they let you take your work with you. Many people will prefer the idea of taking a complete break from work, but the trend towards mobile work lifestyles is definitely worth considering as an alternative way to escape.
Continue reading…
As 2007 comes to a close, we’re going to partake in some shameless self-promotion and award some of last year’s posts a “best of 2007″ designation. This may seem silly but it means a lot to the winning posts. They get a spiffy T-Shirt, a case of cheap beer and bragging rights at the next blog post convention. Plus, chicks dig it. Continue reading…
Commencement speeches suck. Then, there is 
