Working From Home - A Practical Guide
During this time, many of us will find ourselves working from home, whether we go to school or work a job, it has become one thing that unites us all. Because of this transition to more home-based working, I am sure that a lot of us have gained more time in our schedule and probably increased our hours spent sleeping, both of which are good things, however, I am also sure we have encountered many downsides during this quarantine, specifically in terms of our productivity and perhaps our health status.
Since the quarantine seems to be staying with us for a while, how can we best make use of our time during it and turn it into actual productive output? While you can view this quarantine as a disaster and blame it for all of your problems, you can also shift your focus and start viewing this quarantine - this valuable piece of time - as a chance for you to grow and improve as a person. It is up to you as to which road you take.
10 TIPS FOR EFFECTIVE WORKING FROM HOME
SEPARATE WORK AND LEISURE TIME
Now that most of us are working from home, it is very easy for us to spent the whole day doing work-related things, without leaving any time for our hobbies, leisure time and time spent socializing. Without physical shifts in locations and strict schedules, our work and personal lives blur and blend together into one, whereas as a result, we can easily fall out of balance with our work.
To fix this issue, there are a couple of solutions you could implement
First, try following your previous work/ school schedule at home, which will create a clear and defined time boundary between the time where you focus on work-related things and personal time. If for example, your usual workday previously finished at 3 pm, you can do the same thing at home where you will aim at finishing all of your work-related tasks by 3 pm, leaving the rest of the day to do as you wish.
Secondly, try structuring and splitting your time in a way that will work best for you, allowing you to make time for both your work and personal life. If you have the chance and would rather spend some extra time in the morning in bed getting sufficient sleep, then accommodate that into your routine. If you need additional breaks from work in between or like to spend time outside, then make that a priority and build your schedule around that.
Now that you are at home, you have much more freedom in terms of your schedule and when you want to do things. Use this opportunity to your advantage, to try and find the best balance between your work matters and personal endeavors.
HAVING YOUR OWN PRODUCTIVE WORKSPACE
In the case that we used to commute to school/ work to a different location, we were used to having a space and a desk for where we performed our work. It is best to also implement this practice in your own home, where you should dedicate a space or a tabletop for where you will do the majority of your sitting down work.
Having a separate space for working is crucial because upon entering that space it creates an immedite shift in your mindset, allowing you to get into a "work zone" much faster than without having a designated space for working.
On this topic, we also have to make sure that our working space is optimized for productivity, where we want to try and reduce distractions as much as possible, so that we can complete our work not only faster but which much fewer interruptions in the process. You can read more about dealing with distractions and how to create a clean working environment in this post: Avoiding Distractions Like A Boss.
CREATE ROUTINES THAT WORK FOR YOU
Transitioning to a home-based working style can lead to a loss of your previous routines, as you begin to lose the previously mentioned divide between work and personal time.
With more control over our schedule and how we choose to spend our time, we can design our time in a way that will work best for us. This is done by installing simple yet effective daily routines for us to follow, which simplifies our life and makes sure we are still finding balance in our everyday.
I suggest integrating a simple morning and evening routine, that is up to you to design and fill up with activities that you feel will do you best at that moment.
A lot of people like to have their mornings be "their" time for doing personal projects and self-care, while other people prefer to get straight to work upon getting up.
If your focus levels are better in the afternoon or evening, then use that to your advantage and structure your routine so that you do some of your work during that time.
If you like to do some sort of movement in the morning, then that’s great, design your time so that you can fit in an exercise routine that energies you and keeps your fitness levels up
Everyone here will have a different routine since we all live different lives with different obligations, but the key here is that routines allow us to make the best use of our time by considering both our internal and external state, which ultimately allows us to reach a greater balance with the work we perfrom.
Routines are not meant to restrict you or limit your potential. Keep them flexible and simple, but also realize that not everything will always go accordingly to plan, so be prepared to adapt.
Design your time in a way that will allow you to get the most out of your time.
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PUT NEW EXTRA TIME TO GOOD USE
Since starting to work from home, you have probably noticed that you have much more time available on your hands, which is likely due to having no commuting time or unnecessary breaks that were too long and were not a good use of your time.
So now comes the question: What will you do with all this extra time? how will you use it?
Perhaps you already know and are already doing things to fill it up, but for a second reconsider the question and really think about what you would like to use that time for. While it is easy to use up that additional time doing unnecessary work and simply procrastinating, that is not the point here.
Below is a list of ideas of how you can spend this additional time:
Improve or learn a new skill
Start a new passion project
Implement a new habit
Join an online community is something that you are interested in
Set new goals for yourself and achieve them
Treat working from home as a rare opportunity to spend your time doing things that will give your life more purpose and more intentionality. The opportunity of quarantine is something that happens at most once in a lifetime, so do not take this extra time for granted; use it well because if you do, amazing things await for you.
PLAN OUT YOUR DAY IN ADVANCE
Planning your day in advance is a great way to use some of your extra time you may have in the mornings or evenings, as this will allow you to be even more intentional with how you spend your time and also allow you to spend less time procrastinating.
An additional benefit is that you are regualrly reviewing what needs to still be done in the upcoming days, making your up to date with your work and as a result, even more in control of your schedule.
When planning out your day, you want to keep in mind to not plan it out too much and make it a schedule that is too restrictive for your own good. Also make sure to be realistic in how much work you set yourself and the time limits, as otherwise, it can lead to more work being postponed than getting done.
Here are some ideas for how you can plan out your day. Write down:
What you want to accomplish that day (Work and personal tasks)
Roughly how long you will spend on each task/ activity
A couple of ways how you will keep focused and away from distractions
In what ways will you include time for self-care
BE MINDFUL OF THE CONTENT YOU CONSUME
This is a crucial point that is not only applicable in these times of quarantine but in general all aspects of your life. Each day, whether you realize it or not, you are exposed to information incoming from different sources (TV, radio, social media, news, magazines, etc.), which you end up consuming as content. This content can be positive in nature or like most of the time it can also be negative, full of dissatisfaction, and complaining. When we choose to consume content that carries with it negative energy, we also end up reflecting that negative energy out to the world.
The key takeaway here is to keep in mind the kinds of media and content you are viewing and consuming because all of us consume content in some ways. Curate your content feed so that you limit negative energy and instead fill it with content that inspires you and fills you with positivity. This is especially linked with social media, where you have a certain degree of control in terms of what gets recommend on your feed pages, so designing that space for positive thoughts, leaving no room for unnecessary negativity.
The media that we view has a greater impact on our mental health than we might initially think, but it is true that what every information you absorb, you also start believing in and reflecting that energy to the world around you.
DO NOT NEGLECT SELF CARE
Self-care is something that must definitely not be neglected in your life because if it is, it leads to a decline in both your mental and physical well being. Try fitting at least some self-care time each day, or if that is hard to fit into your schedule, try and dedicate a self-care day such as Saturday or Sunday.
The point of self-care time is time that is spent doing things you like and preferably things that relax you and take care of your health.
Some examples may be:
Taking extra time to sleep or to take a nap
Relaxing with a shower or bath
Listening to music you enjoy
Unwinding with a favorite activity such as reading, watching a movie, or playing some video games
Cooking or baking something for yourself or others
Taking time to go out on fresh air
Getting in exercise or time for stretching
Putting more care into your skin, hair, nails, or any other external feature
EXERCISING
During a time of quarantine and working from home, it is very easy for us to completely neglect our exercise routine and habits, especially since any nearby sport/ fitness centers and parks are closed down now. However, this is not an excuse for you to completely abandon your exercise routine, because once again now that we work from home, we have more time to spare, which should theoretically make it more likely for us to include some movement in our everyday.
We all have different ways that we enjoy moving in, some of us prefer high-intensity team sports while others prefer more calmer and lower impact exercises that are more individually orientated. Both are fine, it just depends on which is your style.
Being physically active brings so many benefits to us, making it one of the sigle best uses of your time, which is exactly why I am such a big advocate for fitting at least 30 minutes of movement into your day. If you are able to perfrom exercises out on fresh air of good quality then that is even better, as good quality fresh air beats indoor air in all aspects.
If you are unsure of how to implement exercise into your routine, give the following ideas a go:
Speed walking or walking uphill in your local area
Light running, jogging or high intensity running
Using online workout videos for working out inside the house
Performing stretching exercises inside or outside
Making use of public parks, gardens, forests, running tracks, stairs or any other feature that may challenge you physically
Try out online yoga guided exercise tutorials
Get a skipping rope and challenge yourself with difficult jumps
Spend a day out hiking or walking longer trails in nature (You can also bring a bike here if that’s an option for you)
TAKING BREAKS
On the other hand of the spectrum, if we spend our whole days just working, we can also end up burning out or just exhausting ourselves which is obviously not something we should be striving for.
One of the best ways that you can prevent this is by taking regular breaks in your work, which creates a clear division between "work" time and "leisure" time. You can easily do this by setting a timer during which time you will work and a timer for taking a short break.
Stepping back from your work doesn’t only prevent you from overworking yourself, but it also gives you a more objective overview of your work, allowing you to spot any mistakes and notice ways in which you can improve your work. In this way, it also encourages you to think of new ideas, making it in the long term an even more worthwhile process.
KEEPING SOCIALLY CONNECTED
Although during quarantine social distancing is advised, it should not mean that our social life completely disappears as nowadays more than ever we have access to a whole spectrum of online social platforms, each of which servers their own function. Some specialize in texting ad messaging, while others are more focused on video calls or group talks.
Humans are by nature social animals, so use the socializing software you have on hand to stay connected and in touch with people, both your friends and important people from your school or workplace.
This is also a great way to still be able to obtain feedback for your work, which is vital for making sure you are headed in the right direction and for identifying areas for improvement.
