Real Jobs You Can Do From Home!

I hear a lot of wistfulness when I mention that I work from home.  I did my time in office settings, complete with long commutes, frequent meetings, presentations, and so forth.  Now I still do all those things, save the commute, and in trade I often have extended “business” hours.  I think it is a good tradeoff! I both love what I do, and I love where I do it.

 

So, I thought I would share a couple of real work-from-home careers that you might enjoy as well…

 

 

Customer and Technical Support -  There are some companies that will hire work from home support agents.  These agents usually log into a central ACD (Automatic Call Distributor) and a type of incident tracking software that they record their interactions with you in as a record of actions taken on the call.  These companies may hire workers as either an employee of the company, or as an independent contractor.  As an employee, the companies may pay for things like your computer, phone and internet connection. Typically these positions pay by the hour.  As an independent contractor, you may be required to furnish your own connections and computer system. They may also be paid by the incident, rather than by the hour.

 

 

Search Engine Optimization - There are companies that pay for the way you search the web, and reviewing your results with them.  Then you assist them in adding your key words to their site to bump up their company in search results.  If a company wants to be the first result for anyone looking to buy, build, design or install a pool, that company may employ a search engine optimizer.  The downside to this is the position is that it is usually contractual, and you will be looking for new assignments from different companies when your current assignment ends.

 

 

Wedding/Party/Event Planners - Perhaps you enjoy designing the perfect event for others to enjoy?  This is a career you may be able to do mostly from home.  You will still need to meet with your clients, show them venues, share catalogs or your visions, and likely even be there on the special day to coordinate activities, but you do not necessarily need to have an office job feel to your work.  You can do a lot of planning and sharing by email or phone.  A downside? Expect phone calls outside normal business hours.

 

 

Writing!  What position could be more solitary than a writer?  You could find a great career in freelance writing of articles, sports events, concerts, writing fiction, short stories, children’s books, travel guides, and so on and so forth.  The downside is there are a LOT of wannabe writers in the world.  Getting your feet wet in collaborative writing, editing, or copywriting could be a good start, but working from home might be a percentage of the time rather than all the time.

 

 

Accountants - Especially tax accountants. While the demand is seasonal, some companies farm out their work to home-based tax preparers who bury themselves in a part of the house somewhere around the beginning of the year, and do not see the light of day until after April 15th.  If this sort of hibernation appeals to you, the rewards can be lucrative.  You could use those tax skills later in the year independently to assist people who were audited in a much-reduced pace, and plan a few vacations.

 

IT - Specifically, software engineers, computer scientists, programmers, and system administrators often have work-at-home job postings.  In fact, this is where I fall in.  I administer systems that are quickly moving to “the cloud”, so I can access them anywhere with a broadband internet connection and a good computer.  My company pays for both of those, so the where was up to me.  There is a little travel involved to work on projects or with my team members, but on the whole we are all independently situated and there is no office.

In the comments, feel free to add other careers you think could work from home!