Will your kids follow in your business footsteps?

Did you know that nearly half of the folks who’ve started businesses had a parent who started a small business first? The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation released a report last summer that shows that “parents provide inspiration, financing and they teach you the ropes.”

A detailed article in USA Today highlights a few family-owned businesses that prove that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the entrepreneurial tree. Maybe it’s not too early to introduce your kids into the family business.

USA Today.

Those of us already working naked won’t have to make any work adjustments because of the flu, but for those who commute to work every day and aren’t used to working alongside family members or the kitchen, working from home can be a big adjustment. There are a few ways to make a temporary work from home situation work:

• Designate a specific place for your home office. Don’t locate your home office in a high-traffic area. The kitchen, family room or any other space that attracts your family on a regular basis isn’t ideal for working from home.

• Use a laptop or a desktop with plenty or memory and storage capacity. If you can transfer data between your home office and work computer, you’ll save time and reduce the risk of losing valuable information. If not, keep backups of all your data so you can transfer the information to your desktop at your office.

• Make sure you have a high-speed Internet connection. If your kids like to play online games, they may slow down your connection so you’ll need to work out some type of schedule. A little hint: work trumps computer games every time.

• If your office can’t forward calls to you, consider leaving your cell phone number on your voice mail message. Otherwise, plan on checking your voice mail several times each hour.