In the October 2008 issue of Money Magazine, Traci Higgins tells how she expanded her personal chef business.

Traci started off bringing food to clients’ homes and cooking in their kitchens, which is a common way that peronal chefs start out in the business. She spent hours driving all over town and going to multiple grocery stores every day, just to repeat cooking many of the same dishes at different clients’ homes.

To reduce the driving and the repeated effort of making the same dish in different homes, Traci rented a 600-sq-foot kitchen for a six month trial. She cooked a small number of dishes centrally and turned her business into a meal delivery business. The business took off, with revenue over $700,000 in 2007.

I really like how Traci gave herself a trial period for the central kitchen. She decided to try for six months and would re-evaluate the plan.

Today is the start of my first business trip. I’ll be gone the rest of the week, returning home on Saturday.

In training, we were told a few things about business trips:

• Business travel should be cost neutral. All meals and reasonable expenses (i.e., taxis) will be reimbursed. I appreciate this because if it were on my dime, I might walk a mile to the metro station to take the metro into DC to catch a train; since I can expense it, though, I will be more comfortable taking a taxi to the train station.
• Expenses should pass the “red face” test. If my face turns read telling my manager about a business expense, I should just pay for it myself. I guess that means no mani/pedi on the expense account.
• Carry cash, and do not count on management to pay for cabs.

One rule of thumb for carrying cash when traveling is to take $1 for every mile away from home. On this trip, I will be 450 miles from home. $450 seems like a lot of money to carry!

To figure out how much cash to carry, I estimate my expenses:

Taxis: $200-$300
I will be traveling with three other people, so we might take turns paying for cabs. But, I would hate to run short and will budget for paying for all of the taxis myself.

Meals: $70
For the most part, meals can be paid for with a credit card, and I can put the tip on the credit card. If I buy something small or from a street vendor, it may be easier to use cash. If we go out to a bar, I will pay for drinks with cash because I am hesitant to open a tab with a credit card.

Hotels: $0-30

Hotel arrangements have already been made, and the only cash hotel expense I foresee could be tipping.

Everything else that I can think of I can pay for with credit card (and I have a separate credit card for business expenses).

That puts my cash expenses at $300-400, which is not too far off the $450 estimate based on miles-from-home.

This is a cool way to (effectively) earn more: Negotiate to work fewer hours and keep the same pay.

Emma did just this when, once again, she did not get a significant raise at her annual review. Emma works in a small office with a total of four employees. Her boss (the owner) said that though she deserved a raise and could make more money elsewhere, he just did not have the money to pay her more.

Emma was disappointed (again), but a few months later she thought to ask for shorter hours. Now she works 9:30 to 4 instead of 9 to 5. This leaves more time for enjoying life and time for part-time work.

This reminds me of advice I got when applying for jobs – negotiate the total compensation package, not the salary. benefits, and perks could make a so-so job Salary is not the bottom line of a job, things like extensive vacation, a flexible work schedule much more appealing. If the salary cannot budge (think small businesses and non-profits), think about what is more flexible.

I miss the first day of school. I used to love picking out new pens and pencils, selecting an outfit for the first day of school, and, in college, making a schedule before classes start.

Today is another first day, for my first full time job (is 26 too old for for a first job?).

Since my employer sent me a computer bag as a welcoming gift, I did not buy a new backpack. I did pick out my outfits for the first week of work. Building a “business casual” wardrobe was initially more difficult than picking out clothing for school ever was.

I hope my new colleagues like me, and I hope I like them. I hope I learn something interesting today.

Wish me luck!

A friend of mine, who I’ll call Sydney, recently got a raise and a promotion. I asked her how she got it,
especially since she just returned from maternity leave.

Sydney’s job has a lot of flexibility. She is paid by a large grant from a private company, but she does not interact with them on a daily basis. Her predecessors took advantage of this flexibility and worked on personal projects, instead of in the interests of the company.

Coming onto the job, Sydney heard that her predecessors had not actually done the job, and she wondered if the job would be very boring and that is why they had not been involved in the project. That was not the case; she likes what she is doing, and it fits with her long-term career goals.

This might be one of the easiest ways to impress a new boss — take over a job that your predecessor did poorly. The flip side is to find out what your predecessor did well and be sure to keep up the same quality of work.

Grindhopping: Building a Rewarding Career Without Paying Your Dues by Laura Vanderkam

Students at top universities frequently take high-paying entry-level jobs, and they are not passionate about their day-to-day work. Maybe in 5-10 years of “paying your dues,” those who stick it out will get their hands dirty with the fun and interesting work.

Instead of building a career the standard way, Vanderkam says to hop over the grind and build your career around your passions. Her main point to identify your passion and get someone to pay you for doing it. She writes great case studies of young people who do what they love in spite of opposition from family and big risks from starting a new business. She gives useful suggestions (”always be your own boss” and “think projects, not jobs”) and insight into common concerns (how to get health insurance). She gives advice on how to get by financially in the early years of a new business (the words “ramen noodles” are used a lot).

One of the most interesting parts of the book is about advanced degrees and the use of adjuncts in higher education. Vanderkam says not to pursue an advanced degree unless it is necessary (i.e., M.D. and J.D.). An adjunct is hired by a university to teach one or a few classes at a time. It is a temporary position with no formal guarantee of work from semester to semester.

Universities boast of the high percentage (some even boast 100%) of classes taught by faculty, but the truth is that lots of universities hire a lot of adjuncts (REFERENCE). To someone on the academic job market (a lot of the people I know), this is bad news. It is cheaper for a university to hire adjuncts than create another tenure-track position. Some might call it as outsourcing within the United States. What Vanderkam says, though, is that this is good news for everyone without a Ph. D. Ever wanted to teach at a university but did not want to spend 5 to 10+ years in school earning what might qualify you for food stamps? You might be able to teach as an adjunct.

I interpret her advice more about business school than a research based graduate program. Without a Ph. D. in biology, it is difficult to get lab space to run experiments about your passion, such as finding a vaccine for HIV. During the two years it would take to complete business school, though, you could start your own business and learn hands-on from its failures and successes.

I left Grindhopping feeling a little disappointed because I do not have just one passion. My passions include personal finance, reading, practicing yoga, and math. Now I am reading Marci Alboher’s One Person/Multiple Careers: A New Model for Work/Life Success to learn what it means to be a “slash.”

Note: I considered a “thumps up, thumbs down” rating system for book reviews. This would never work because I would give 95% of the books a thumbs up. I am too nice.

This summer, a friend of mine, who I will call Jenny, needed to make some extra money to cover her tuition in the fall. Inspired by a class she took on goal setting, Jenny set the specific goal of how much she wanted to earn in the summer. Her job offer though, was less than she had hoped for and would not be enough to cover her upcoming education expenses.

Jenny called her supervisor and said that she had hoped to earn $2,000 more over the summer. Her supervisor responded positively and later came back offering even more than Jenny had asked for.

When you are considering short-term employment, figure out how much you need to make, but do not necessarily rule out positions that pay less. It may be possible to negotiate a higher salary, especially if the extra money is for educational expenses.

Bigger is better … at least when it comes to monitors.

Studies have shown that people are more productive when using larger monitors or two monitors at once, especially at tasks that keep multiple windows open (read about this in the NYT and WSJ)

Just last week I visited a friend at her office, and she showed off her new second monitor. Since she builds webpages, her boss got her another monitor so that she can work faster.

If you are looking for a new workstation set-up, two medium-size monitors might be cheaper than one larger monitor.

I write these posts on a 17″ MacBook Pro. It is a lot easier to write with this laptop than on my old 13″ iBook. I can keep a Wordpress tab open in one Firefox window and in another window my list of ideas for posts in Google Docs.

How is your workspace set up? Have you tried dual monitors?

Where I worked the past few summers, there is a “summer wage cap” determining the maximum amount a person can be paid during July and August. Last summer I was making less than this cap, so I asked for and received the difference ($2,800) with no hassle.

If there is a maximum amount you can possibly be paid, ask for the maximum.

I told several colleagues about this, and, as far as I know, everyone who asked for the full summer wages got the increased wages approved immediately.