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Entreprenutty

by

Andrea Giambrone

President,

Think Shop Advertising & Communications

Home based business?  Better limber up!  I’ve discovered that “Jack (or Jill) Be Nimble” is great advice to anyone considering working from home.  Those of us who’ve done it come to discover that nimbleness is as vital to succeeding as talent and determination.

When you work from a home office, you learn to answer phones, work the printer, as well as copy and fax machines, do your own filing, invoicing, shredding and hoisting.

Here you are, your own microcosmic corporation (regardless of whether you’re incorporated, an LLC or a DBA).  Every so often, you remember exactly what you’re in business for.  This usually occurs somewhere between re-starting the modem and realizing that the fax machine is jammed.

Contrary to what you may think, I am not suggesting that you avoid having a home-based business.  The statistics are in our favor!

• According to IDC, a top research firm, there are approximately 35 million home office households in the U.S.
• Entrepreneur magazine estimates that home-based businesses generate (hold onto your hat or visor) $427 billion.  They apparently forgot to include people like me who generate, oh, a zillion zeroes less than that.
• Income earned by Home Business owners is estimated between $63,000 to over $1 million (yet again, I must’ve been out when they called.)

I, on the other hand, have a sneaking suspicion that what’s really risen is the number of chiropractic and orthopedic visits for us home basers. Here’s where the limber part separates the men from the boys, the women from the girls, the aches from the pains.  As colleagues who also have home offices and I have agreed, many is the day when we’re on our hands and knees, crawling, extending and convoluting in what I call the “Techno Twist.”  You won’t see it on Dancing With the Stars. You’ll only see it on Dancing with Home-Based Business People.

It goes like this:  your computer freezes; you remember your tech guy (the one who is never available when you need him) telling you to unplug everything. Here’s where the crawl part starts.  All the plugs and wires, modems and jacks are somewhere under your desk or behind shelves.  You crouch, like so, turn your neck into a newly-unnatural position to find the plugs and un-do the cables, and - if you’re me under my desk - you hit your head on its underside as you re-emerge.

Do you think it’s any accident that my medicine cabinet now carries more ligament creams than Walgreen’s?

Here’s the way a friend described her own recent Human Pretzel-ing to me:  “Suddenly, I couldn't get my computer to turn on.  I went crazy and finally reached AppleCare. They walked me through it, instructing me to re-start it by putting my fingers on four different keys at the same time.  I’m not sure Liberace had a finger span like this.  Now my hand hurts...”

Lest you think the Techno Twist is purely computer and internet-related, let me twist the record back to 1973. During the Watergate investigation, President Nixon’s secretary, Rosemary Woods, was asked to replicate the position she took which - according to her testimony - caused her to erase a crucial 18-minutes from an Oval Office tape.  She demonstrated it.  There she was, seated at her desk, reaching far back over her left shoulder for a telephone as her foot simultaneously applied pressure to the pedal controlling the transcription machine.  Huh????

The resulting backward over-the-shoulder acrobatic twist was the picture heard round the world. 

Frankly, I’m no longer sure it didn’t happen precisely the way she said.  Just yesterday, I found myself in that very same position.

Oops, have to go.  The chiropractor can see me now.

 Andrea Giambrone (jam-bro-nee) started her own business, Think Shop, in 1998.  Her forte is Outstanding Branding: creating those strategies and positions and creative work that help companies grow.  She’s done this for a host of companies:  from her work for The Gas Company ( “Glad to be of Service”) to the memorable Price Pfister Pfaucet campaign (The Pfabulous Pfaucet with the Pfunny Name).  Her clients include a roster of big and not-so-big companies from National University to Shakey’s Pizza to Canon Insurance and Jessica Nailcare.

She can be reached at 310-556-0940, and at andrea@thinkshopla.com

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