When folks ask what I do for a living, especially people that I haven't met before, and I say 'I work from home in a business that I helped start-I'm a real basement-turned-into-an-office entrepreneur', many times they respond with 'Wow, I wish I didn't work for anyone but myself!. Well...nothing is further from the truth.
We all work for someone, multiple someones.
Today as I write I'm looking through the lists of things I need to get to today. They are all client driven. When clients hire your business-if you're the main relationship manager for your business as I am, they are buying YOU-then you always feel that pressure of reporting to, satisfying, cajoling, negotiating with them. There are reports to send to my colleagues to keep them in the loop as to what our client's expectations are, what is needed from them to make the things happen that must happen to make things run. So I report to them as well.
Entrepreneurship, small business ownership is many things but easy is not one of them. Everyone works for someone...especially an entrepreneur.
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
My Teleworking Story
I was all ready to write a post on anyone of multiple ideas when Viv let me know my Q & A with her was being published. I thought I'd share that here. More on this later...
Enjoy!
http://www.telesaur.com/blog/2012/11/14/jeanne-eury-basement-corner-office/
Enjoy!
http://www.telesaur.com/blog/2012/11/14/jeanne-eury-basement-corner-office/
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
The Name Game
I have three 'names' associated with my three lives.The first one is my maiden name and the name that I use in my business and on all of my legal forms. It was returned to me via the divorce document and I immediately set about to change my driver's license, utilities, and business cards. I have had my real name back for 9 years now during which time I bought a home and started a business. I like the name I was born with and intend to keep it...for most things.
The second name I have is my former married name. Even though the judge gave me my real name back (a situation I found a bit odd-that as a woman I had to be allowed to have my old name back) my children's friends still called me 'Mrs. Smith' because that's my name when I enrolled my children into that school and being polite parochial school children, they defaulted to that name anyway. It is awkward even now for my adult children to introduce me as anything other than 'This is my mom' so I still am called 'Mrs. Smith' a few times a month.
Lastly I have my new married name. I have been newly remarried for 2 1/2 years and did not change my real name to my husband's name when I remarried. He couldn't have cared less. Us having the same last name makes us no more or less married or committed to one another. I do however call myself by that new last name when I'm calling utility companies (he was here before I moved in) or home repair people who need constant referrals to 'my husband' so I don't feel like I'm as likely to be scammed.
I've pondered this name business for a while now. The tradition of changing a woman's name to match her husband's has been in America since it's inception. Some countries apparently have the husband take the wife's name or hyphenate the names for the children. When I was married the first time in my very early twenties, changing my name was exciting and made me feel very married and attached. After my divorce, taking my own name back really gave me a sense of identity and accomplishment. Now if I had it to do all over again (I know, famous words) I would have kept my name all along and demanded that my children have hyphenated last names, or at least my maiden name as their middle names. Names are so important. They are a label of your life. Even if it wasn't a terrible hassle to change licenses, passports, social security cards, credit cards, etc I wouldn't do it and now I probably wouldn't have been attracted to a man in the first place who had such a possessive view of the whole thing.
I like MY name and I'm keeping it. I've worked hard to establish a professional identity with it as well as a personal comfort level with who I am and my name represents that. Have most of you changed your name? Will you?
The second name I have is my former married name. Even though the judge gave me my real name back (a situation I found a bit odd-that as a woman I had to be allowed to have my old name back) my children's friends still called me 'Mrs. Smith' because that's my name when I enrolled my children into that school and being polite parochial school children, they defaulted to that name anyway. It is awkward even now for my adult children to introduce me as anything other than 'This is my mom' so I still am called 'Mrs. Smith' a few times a month.
Lastly I have my new married name. I have been newly remarried for 2 1/2 years and did not change my real name to my husband's name when I remarried. He couldn't have cared less. Us having the same last name makes us no more or less married or committed to one another. I do however call myself by that new last name when I'm calling utility companies (he was here before I moved in) or home repair people who need constant referrals to 'my husband' so I don't feel like I'm as likely to be scammed.
I've pondered this name business for a while now. The tradition of changing a woman's name to match her husband's has been in America since it's inception. Some countries apparently have the husband take the wife's name or hyphenate the names for the children. When I was married the first time in my very early twenties, changing my name was exciting and made me feel very married and attached. After my divorce, taking my own name back really gave me a sense of identity and accomplishment. Now if I had it to do all over again (I know, famous words) I would have kept my name all along and demanded that my children have hyphenated last names, or at least my maiden name as their middle names. Names are so important. They are a label of your life. Even if it wasn't a terrible hassle to change licenses, passports, social security cards, credit cards, etc I wouldn't do it and now I probably wouldn't have been attracted to a man in the first place who had such a possessive view of the whole thing.
I like MY name and I'm keeping it. I've worked hard to establish a professional identity with it as well as a personal comfort level with who I am and my name represents that. Have most of you changed your name? Will you?
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