With the spread of COVID-19, your company may be shifting you to work from home to contain the pandemic.
The unfortunate thing here is that you may be used to going to commute to work every day; but now you are challenged to work along with the temptations of your living space.
When you are thinking of working from home, you will find photos that tell fascinating stories about how it feels like to work from home. You might envision working with a laptop on the beach or at the top of the mountain.
In other words, a home office might sound like a luxury in theory.
But, in reality, working from home is certainly no vacation, and being productive is easier said than done: Work time may cover your personal life or the opposite.
Don’t let this fact let you down. It is a new challenge for a lot of us. This is why we have gathered ten working from home tips to help you cope with this new state of work:
Table of Contents
1. Get Dressed
While working from home, it is good to establish an everyday morning routine. First things first, get dressed.
Why?
Because working undressed will not help you discern rest time from work time. Also staying in your pajamas all day won’t make you feel responsible for your daily tasks.
Another essential step is to do what pleases you in the morning (maybe some physical exercise inside or outside, a prayer, a healthy breakfast, some time with your partner, go to the nearest coffee shop, etc).
While you don’t necessarily need to do all those things, you’ll instantly feel so much better and awake to take on the day.
2. Are you an early bird, a third bird or a night owl?
But, from morning to evening, your motivation will naturally ebb and flow throughout the day. Why not make your own schedule and stick with it?
When you’re working from home full-time, it’s all the more important to know when your energy is at the lowest and plan your schedule around it.
For example, the majority of employees might work well in the mornings while some of them are more productive in the nights. What time of the day is the most productive for you? It is up to you to choose when you get your work done.
Capitalize on your most productive periods, to save your more complicated tasks. When done with the most urgent tasks, it is the right time to go for the minor tasks.
Image Credits: https://www.leaneast.com/when-scientific-secrets
3. Stick to your Plan of Working Hours
Working all day for your company may give you at the beginning a sense of real success and that you are giving real value to your employers. However, being all day long in front of your laptop for a long period of time will finally have adverse effects.
Everyone needs to have personal time during their day. If you feel yourself extending working time to your evenings, something you wouldn’t normally do, tell yourself it’s time to put work away, recharge, and start tomorrow with a fresh mind.
Communicate your working hours with your collaborators at work and let them know which hours you are available. If you live with other people, determining the working hours is even essential.
Hold yourself accountable, but also recognize when enough is enough.
You can use time-tracking software like Toggl to track your time and don’t push yourself to the limits.
Source
4. Set Up a Home Office
Living room, kitchen, garden or bedroom? Where is the best room in the house to work from home? That depends on what kind of house you have.
If you have a beautiful space outside home (a little garden or balcony)- for some- this is the ideal place to work in the mornings.
However, if you don’t have one or you don’t like working outside, having a separate room-which you have turned into an office- is the best thing to do.
A separate “work room” will help you get easier in the working mood and continue to be focused on your job.
On the other hand, moving around in the house with your laptop-I know you may also do this sometimes- won’t help your productivity. So, you’d better resist the temptation of working in your kitchen or living room (unless you don’t have another option).
In your working room make sure you have put some effort to transform according to your style into a home office with all the essentials within your reach:
- A strong internet connection
- A pair of headphones
- Maybe dual monitors
- A comfortable chair
- A sound system for background music
Doing your best to keep a clean desk is important. Clean your work area and declutter your space from unnecessary items. Instead keep only those that brighten your day.
5. Limit Distractions
Turning a separate part of your house into an office will also help you limit distractions from your family members.
Limiting distractions is key. In your office you can avoid distractions from children and housework and you can hone in on your own tasks.
However, you need to set ground rules with your children-if you have any- anyway. Communicate to them your necessity to work and explain to them why they need to respect the hours that you work, be calm and capable of preparing their own meal sometimes.
If you lure in everything that your children demand, you will find out that your productivity suffers.
Apart from family members, there are also many other temptations, chatting on social media, for example.
To limit distractions while you are browsing on your laptop, use tools like StayFocusd. StayFocusd is a software that helps you limit the amount of time that you spend on Facebook, Youtube, LinkedIn, etc.
6. Use Software to boost Productivity
There are many tools out there that help companies work remotely productively. Some concern task management and others team communication.
The best thing about such tools is that they often have an app which you can install in your phone to have instant communication on-the-go.
Some of those tools, for example, are:
- Slack, a powerful tool that will help you manage work messages and phone calls
- Productivity apps like Trello, Brain.fm, Asana or Monday.com
- LearnWorlds for online training
- Visme for presentations and infographics
- Video conferencing/calling tools like Skype, GetVoip, and Zoom
These days you are not together with your colleagues it is essential you make often video calls and maintain your relationship with them.
7. Move Around in the house
Another obstacle in working from home is the fatigue that comes along with many on-laptop working hours.
Too many hours in front of the screen will likely drop your creativity rather than boost it. What’s the best way to deal with that?
The answer is short breaks. Taking 10-minute breaks every 1-2 hours to have a snack, drink some water, stretch or just walk inside your home is necessary if you don’t want to get frequent headaches, weight gain and back pains.
Even more importantly, breaks help us clear our mind and focus and restart where we were left of.
This gives us the opportunity of fresh ideas and entirely new perspectives in our task.
So don’t hesitate to take a short break every now and then because you worry you will lose time.
On the opposite. Not taking breaks, is what will deteriorate your performance at work.
8. Create a to-do list and fight the urge to multitask
When you have decided on your working hours make sure that you surely stick with it and that housework and other in-home activities won’t occupy valuable working time.
What will help you stick with a productive program is to have each morning a to-do list on a paper on the side of your computer screen.
Managing tasks in the right order (from the most difficult and important ones to the most effortless) is what will keep you motivated in staying in your office.
While writing your to-do list make sure that you don’t expect to accomplish finishing a whole project; make sure that you are scheduling that day’s program. The more you reach reality, the more satisfaction you will feel in the end.
9. Track Your Accomplishments
In remote work, employers many times become anxious about how their employees are performing. This is something that has to do with the nature of remote work itself (the employer can’t interact with you in person) and not with your contribution to the company.
So, to make things easier for your boss and also for yourself, I suggest that you keep track of every important task you accomplish each day.
With such a document you have always got proof of what you have done each single day of the month/year; and imagine the amount of satisfaction you will feel having all your accomplishments tracked.
10. Start your own business online
While working remotely, you have an excellent opportunity to find ways and learn how to make a steady income stream by working online.
There are dozens of opportunities to make money online and maybe use this as a side income along with your official job or even as your primary source of revenue.
To make money online and start a small business, you need to build a strong presence on social media and start a blog to gain a broad audience. After you have gained a certain amount of subscribers, you can then begin to sell digital products and monetize your audience.
Another fancy way to make money online is to start an online school using a well-trusted LMS and start selling beautiful online courses or memberships.
No matter how you choose to make money online, the key to it is to…
- Insist on building a robust social presence and
- Create and own great content and stick with delivering constant value out there.
Now Over to You
Turning your home into your office is always tricky; It can be super hard to keep a work-life balance when they are both happening in the same place.
Especially if you are one of those who like to commute to work, telecommuting might seem to you very frustrating in the beginning.
By following the tips and tricks we provide here, you will bypass these perks and difficulties of working remotely.
Then, you will be able to take advantage of all benefits included while working from home and establish perfect well-being!
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