Child Care Options for Flexible Schedules

You have secured your ideal schedule at work maximizing the amount of time you have available to spend at home with your children. However, you still need reliable child care for those hours spent at work. Unfortunately, flexible schedules can reek havoc on daycare arrangements which often require regular hours and full-time costs, regardless of mom and dad's schedule. Consider the following daycare options with regards to your own flexible schedule:

• Babysitters, Relatives, and Friends: enlisting the periodic services of a local teenager or someone you know can buy you a few extra quiet work hours at a relatively low cost. Such babysitters are paid hourly and can be hired to work a few hours here and there to extend your work day.
• Nanny or Au Pair: usually a young adult with or without a college degree, a nanny or au pair is generally hired to work full-time hours but can provide the flexibility of watching your kids in your own home. As full-time employees, some nannies may require you to also provide benefits including housing in a live-in arrangement.
• Child Care Cooperative: coops involve a group of parents who swap childcare responsibilities. Often involving a network of several families, coops will provide several options for care at varying times. The only cost is an exchange of equal childcare hours at another time.
  
• Family Child Care: in home care provided by a licensed provider can offer flexibility to working parents who work longer hours as in the case of a compressed work week. Since family child care providers work from their own home, a provider can watch your child as one of her own brood without interference into everyday activities.
  
• Child Care Centers: some centers offer part-time rates but usually require regular hours. For example, your child can attend a child care center for preschool only, but the daily class times are rigid, for example 3 hours each morning.
• After School Programs or Summer Camps: activities and camps can keep children occupied for a short few hours, again with a rigid schedule, providing extra hours to get work done.
  

Each of these daycare options may suit varying flexible schedules with mixed success. Finding your ideal daycare to match your ideal work schedule will be a constant exercise in balance and discernment.

To search local child care options visit the Maryland Committee for Children. For a nationwide search of childcare providers visit SitterCity (Don't forget Fido. SitterCity also has pet sitter resources).

The Apple iPhone: Good for telecommuters and home business owners?

Friday evening, the Apple iPhone hit the shelves at Apple and AT&T stores across the United States to a market of salivating consumers and a crush of media. The new phone, part cell phone, part web browser, part iPod, may revolutionize cell phone usage. But could this pricey gadget make the lives of telecommuters and home business owners any easier?

What the iPhone can do

Like the original Macintosh computer, the iPhone makes mobile computing fast and simple with no pull down menus and a one-touch button on every screen returning you to the main menu.

For $20 a month on the AT&T service plan (AT&T exclusively for about 5 years) employees away from the office can enjoy access to email and web browsing with the touch of the screen.

Email and voicemail is easily accessible, both as a list of available messages. No computerized operator prompting you to dial one to listen to messages; you can select which message to hear and which to save for later. Word, Excel, and pdf files sent as email attachments can be viewed on the go giving you instant access to important information.

Users can manage interruptions. If listening to music or viewing video, you can accept a call by simply activating the microphone built into the headphone wire, instantly pausing all other media until the end of the call.

What the iPhone cannot do

The biggest concern from business owners has been the lack of third party support for iPhone applications. Apple will design and release software for the phone only as needed. Third party software will not be adaptable to the phone.

While you can view Word and Excel documents on the go you cannot edit them on the iPhone without using some sort of online document service, such as Google’s Docs and Spreadsheets.

The iPhone interfaces best with a Mac. Business owners using a PC will have more difficulty, although the iPhone is programmed to work with both.

The lack of a keyboard makes much typing difficult. Unlike its Blackberry and Treo counterparts, the iPhone utilizes a touch screen keyboard with word recognition software that takes some getting used to.

The battery life of the new iPhone is adequate for most days away from the office. With 8 hours of talk time and up to 24 hours of audio, the battery will need to be charged every other day or so. However, like other Apple products, when the battery dies after a few years, the consumer cannot replace the battery. The iPhone must be shipped back to Apple for a new battery at a fee to the user.

Is the iPhone for you and your business? Does constant access to the web and the office make it easier for you to work or harder for you to separate yourself from work? The success of Apple’s iPhone will soon tell.

Kid Friendly Offices

We have all experienced the intersection of work and children at one time or another. You may work from a home office that you share with your children everyday, bring your children into work occasionally necessitated by an illness and no back up care, or possibly you have experienced a coworker's children playing in the office next door. But as Penelope Trunk explains in her post, Blending my kids and my career (ugh), sometimes a serious conversation with kids in the office is simply impossible. Having a kid friendly office, whether your child is welcome at work everyday or tolerated occasionally, is a sure way to survive the workday when any random Tuesday (or Wednesday) becomes Take Your Child to Work Day.

1. Inform you boss and coworkers that your children will be at work with you. Do not let your neighbors find out that your children are with you by overhearing your children playing and talking, or worse, your child's misbehavior and your attempts at very quiet discipline.
2. Stock up on some essentials to keep them busy. Bring several coloring books or books of puzzles and games that they can complete on their own. Buy a new quiet toy or two. The best toys are ones that do not restrict them physically; remember it will be hard for little ones to sit still for eight hours. Try an inexpensive game of jacks with a ball that is not too bouncy. Fill your desk drawers with snacks and juice boxes, because full mouths are generally quiet mouths. Include healthy snacks like dried fruit, granola bars, and nuts that will last in your office between visits. Lollipops are great but often leave sticky messes.
3. Foresee any disasters. Keep a pack of baby wipes in your desk to clean up messes quickly. Try not to disrupt your child's eating and sleeping schedule. Nothing is more disruptive than a hungry or overtired toddler.
   
4. Adjust your schedule to accommodate your child's needs. Try to structure your workday around your child's sleep schedule, working at nap time or after bedtime if at all possible. Consider shortening your workday when kids visit. Leave your office to eat lunch together and take an afternoon walk for another change of scenery.

If your child seems irritable, take a short break to spend some time with him or her. A little genuine attention goes a long way toward keeping little ones happy and well behaved in the workplace.

Working at Home...with Kids

One of the many reasons parents request a telecommuting arrangement with their employer is to allow more time spent at home with their children. Telecommuting involves working outside the office one or more days a week and can increase the hours you are available to your children by eliminating a long commute, allowing you to prepare dinner on your lunch break, and making you more available for emergencies during the day, among other advantages. However, working from home should not be a substitute for childcare, especially for young children.

Summertime poses a particular problem for full-time work at home parents of school-aged children faced with up to three months of sharing the home office. In order to maintain productivity while working at home, children need to be self-sufficient or well entertained. Try these tips below to find the appropriate situation for you, your children, and your business.

• Consider scaling back on your work load for the summer by working only part-time on a temporary basis.
• Hire full-time day care or a part-time babysitter.
• Swapping playdates with another stay-at-home parent is a free option that only requires your reciprocation. You can offer to watch the kids in the evenings for a date night or in the morning before you start work for the day.
• When it's just you and your kids, entertain them well. Set up developmentally appropriate activities they can do on their own that will not require too much assistance or clean up. Consider Wendy Piersall's list of 94 Ways to Keep Kids Busy.

Armed with lots of ideas to keep your kids entertained and your work hours productive, you can enjoy the summer months instead of dreading them.