Women Entrepreneurs of Nueva Ecija: A Study on Reasons, Benefits, and Challenges of Work from Home

Abstract

Women entrepreneurs all around the world are making a difference by contributing countless ideas as well as a significant amount of energy and resources to their communities.This study focused on the reasons why women entrepreneurs work from home. This research also described the benefits of working from home for female entrepreneurs. Furthermore, this study addressed the challenges that women entrepreneurs face when working from home. The method of research used in this study is descriptive quantitative method. Purposive sampling was used by the researcher, who distributed survey questionnaires to a total of 58 female entrepreneurs, 25 began working from home as entrepreneurs, and 33 began their businesses from home as a result of the pandemic. Work-from-home women entrepreneurs have reasons, benefits, and challenges. Women entrepreneurs in Nueva Ecija found out that their main reasons working from home were the involvement of their family members, assurance of monitoring and controlling their money specifically their income, and assumption of workspace is readily available at home. They know that they have benefitted working from home because they can focus on customer relations and provide convenience of working space for their business since they will not go out to go to the office. However, there were also challenges as entrepreneurs working from home such as lack of formal training in entrepreneurship, competitions in business, and financial stability.Based on these conclusions, researcher recommends that women entrepreneurs working from home should strengthen the involvement of family members in doing their business because this could be a source of motivation to cope with when challenges would come in. An exclusive workspace should be established at home to sustain the business and home area. Business scheduling and family time are also important to maintain work and life balance. Women entrepreneurs are encouraged to communicate with the local government unit, schools, or even online advertised trainings in entrepreneurship to strengthen their skills on costumer relations and enhance their skills in product development, marketing, and as well as, financial management.