16 Pro tips on how to work from home
In the past, a lot of people fantasized about working from the comfort of their own home, dodging a commute and instead, catching up on their sleep, family time or gym time. Today’s reality is that very quickly in the wake of stay-at-home orders, many Americans find themselves working from home, sometimes for the first time. Many of these people are finding that working remotely is a double-edged sword. On the positive side, you get to stay home and avoid traffic, but on the flip side, they are finding that it is more difficult to focus on actually working than expected.
Whether it’s your children, who are also at home with you, a pile of laundry that seems more appealing than your work’s to-do list, or a desire to take quick break that turns into a one hour social media check in, being productive at home takes extra effort and focus. On top of this, in a time of social distancing, the isolation can quickly become a downer for those used to getting their social fix at work. How to adapt to working from home? Start with the basics
- Eat some breakfast to get your body and mind going first thing
- Brush your teeth, take a shower and put on some pants
- Sit up straight & smile, even for phone calls – people can hear these in your voice
But how else can you stay focused on the job and mentally healthy while working remotely? Great question! Here are 16 pro tips from work-from-home veterans.
Four Habit Tips
1. Plan out what you'll be working on ahead of time
Have a Plan - When working alone, you should keep a more structured daily schedule than usual. With less interaction with other people influencing the time and structure of our day. additional effort will be needed to keep things moving, so structure is critical to success. Also, remember not only to structure your work, but also your breaks and other responsibilities, like taking a walk or feeding your kids or pets.
Daily Recap - At the end of each day, take 10 minutes to review what you’ve accomplished. Did you get everything done that you planned? If you’re way off, take a minute to figure out why, and adapt for tomorrow.
- Did you just plan too much? If so, plan less for tomorrow. Productivity when working from home may differ from office time productivity.
- Did you get distracted? Identify how can you avoid this tomorrow.
Plan the next work day - Plan tomorrow’s work at the end of the previous day so you can get started right away tomorrow. Spending time in the beginning of the day figuring out what accomplish takes time away from actually doing those things, and creates a less focused mindset in which you will be tempted change your schedule on the fly. It's important to let your agenda change if you need it to, but it's equally as important to commit to an agenda that outlines every assignment before you begin. Solidifying your schedule the day before makes it feel more official when you wake up the next day to get started on it.
2. Structure your day like you would in the office
When working from home, you’re responsible to your manager, but throughout the day, you're your own personal manager. Without things like an in-person meeting schedule to break up your day, you can be quick to lose focus or burn out. To stay on schedule, segment what you'll do and when over the course of each day. Use an online calendar to create personal events and reminders that remind you when to shift gears and start on new tasks.
3. Prepare your meals the night before
When you're in your own home all day, it can be tempting to spend time preparing a really nice breakfast and lunch for yourself, prepping and cooking included. Don't use precious minutes making your food the day of work -- make it the night before. Preparing food ahead of time ensures you actually use your meal times to eat, and that you aren't performing non-work tasks, spending time & energy better used on work.
4. Start and end your work day with a routine
Begin each work day with a routine - After showering, eating breakfast, & putting on clothes, start your day with the same task each day – reviewing your plan for the day, created the night before. Maybe you will need to catch up on email and verify if your priorities have shifted or if you plan needs a tweak, or maybe you can get started executing right away. Either way, start each work day the same way. It’s sets a mental precendent that you will find increases your focus, and provides the energy to get started immediately.
End each workday with a routine - In addition to starting your day with a routine, create a habit that signals the close of the workday. After you’ve spent your 10 minutes planning the next day, it’s time to be done for the day. Sign off on a business messaging app, check your social media accounts, go for an evening dog walk, or do some yoga. Something as simple as shutting down your computer and turning on a favorite podcast will work. Whatever you choose, do it consistently to mark the end of working hours and to provide yourself with a mental shift to help you achieve work-life balance in your home.
Four Attitude Tips
1. Pretend like you are going into the office
The mental association you make between work and an office can make you more productive, and there's no reason that feeling should be lost when telecommuting. When working from home, do all the things you'd do to prepare for an office role: Set your alarm, get hooked up with coffee, and wear nice clothes. Even when you’re just on a phone (not video) call, sit up straight and smile. People can hear both of these things in your voice, and they will help you keep focused & positive.
2. Take clear breaks
It can be so easy to get distracted as a remote worker that you end up missing breaks altogether. Don't let the guilt of working in the building you sleep in prevent you from taking your due time to relax. Breaks in the work day help you be more focused when you get back to work.
Rather than just jumping on YouTube and watching some comfort clips, though, use your breaks to get away from your desk. Go for a walk outside or spend time with others who might also be in the house with you.
3. Remember everyone works differently - be kind & help others
Managers and coworkers should remember that not every employee actually wants to work from home, and that this rapid shift to a new normal of working from home is very stressful for some, especially those not familiar with the technology that they are expected to use. As companies increasingly mandate that many employees must work from home during the coronavirus outbreak, it’s key to communicate as much as possible and help employees struggling with the change.
When management forces people to work at home, this adds another layer of stress. Giving employees as much information as possible and helping them adapt their work to a remote working model helps to ease the burden caused by the disruption. Help out coworkers that are less experienced with the technology, don’t get frustrated with them. Take this as an opportunity to connect with your coworker, build that team attitude, and help them get familiar & comfortable with how your business is leveraging technology solutions to enable remote teamwork.
4. In this time of social distancing - keep in touch with coworkers
Working from home might help you focus on your work in the short term, but it can also make you feel cut off the larger operation happening in the office. Instant messaging and videoconferencing tools can make it easy to check in with coworkers and remind you how your work is contributing to the big picture.
We’re used to social interaction - it facilitates cooperation and closeness. To help fill the socializing gap while working remotely, find a colleague you can hit up when you’re feeling the need to chat with someone, or buddy-up with a friend who works elsewhere and is going through the same experience. Hopping on a social video call instead of texting or chatting isn’t a bad idea, either.
One undeniable loss is the social, casual "water cooler" conversation that connects us to people — if you're not used to that loss, full-time remote work can feel isolating. To fill the gap, some co-workers are scheduling online social time to have conversations with no agenda. Embrace video calling and webcams so you can see your colleagues. Try an icebreaker over your team chat: What's everyone's favorite TV show right now? What's one good thing that someone read that day?
Four Environment Tips
1. Location, location, location - choose a dedicated work space
Get out of bed, and off the couch. If you can make a dedicated space for working from home, do so – it helps greatly - find yourself a dedicated and comfortable spot to work that you can associate with your job and leave when you’re off the clock. If you cannot, then repurpose an area during work time, and make that you dedicated space during work hours, and let it turn back into social space after work hours are done.
2. Make it harder for yourself to mess around on social media
Social media is designed to make it easy for you to open and browse quickly. At work, this convenience is detrimental to your productivity. To counteract your social networks' ease of use during work hours, on your work computer log out of every account & turn off social media notifications on your phone. There will be plenty of time to catch up on your breaks, or after the work day is done.
3. Communicate expectations with anyone who will be home with you
While you might be working from home, you may still have "company." Make sure any roommates, children, parents, and spouses respect your space during work hours. Just because you're working from home doesn't mean you're available to entertain them.
4. Find a way to keep your pets off of your conference calls
Pets are great companions - especially in this time of social isolation, but they are not part of your work. Spend time with them, but find a way to keep your pet out of your workspace during video & conference calls. Your goal should be for others on your calls to see no pet, hear no pet, and to not hear you speak to a pet. Create a schedule for feeding & spending time with your pet that works for you, your pet, and your work schedue, and find a way to put a door between you and them during times that you’re conferencing with others so that they don’t become a distraction to you or others.
Four Technology Tips
1. Stay current with your tools
Understand which technical solutions should be used for which scenarios. Make sure that you know how to login to each of these, so that you can do so with efficiently. if the technology is new to you, play around with it. Test it out with a coworker or friend to make sure that when the time comes, using this tool is not a distraction for you when communicating with others. Check for and apply updates in times when you do not need that tool, so that if it is unavailable to you for a while, or if things within the software change, that it does not negatively impact your ability to work.
2. Test your tools in YOUR home office
Test things out to make sure that they will work as planned. Don’t wait until the last minute, and don’t assume that everything will always work as expected. If you’re hosting an event, do a dry run. Make sure that all components work for you from the same setup that you will be using to host it. Even if it is a web-based solution, test it out on the same equipment you will be using.
Also, be aware that with the current massive shift to a remote workforce many technology solution companies are struggling to keep up with demand. For the first week of the quarantine, many video conferencing solution providers were recommending that you start your meeting at ten minutes after the hour so that their servers could load balance and handle the volume of people signing in at the top of the hour.
3. Set up a browser specifically for work use
Since many of the solutions provided for the home workforce are web-based, set up a browser that is compatible with your work’s toolsets, and use that browser ONLY for work. Google Chrome and many current browsers allow you to set up different user profiles that have their own bookmarks, password management, and history. Remove all personal bookmarks and shortcuts, and add on your fmost frequently used work shortcuts & booksmarks for easy & efficient access. By keeping you personal use browser and your work use browser separate, you will not inadvertently mess up any settings needed for work, and you will keep your favorite personal time distractions (“Oh, there’s a link to my favorite YouTube channel – I’ve got 5 minutes until my next call – I’ll just hop on for a minute”) at bay.
4. Manage your internet bandwidth
Here’s something you may not have thought much about. Internet access; is yours robust enough at home to allow you to video conference affectively? Many conferences and almost all nonessential work travel are being canceled right now, so people want to use online video conferencing, which requires a good internet connection.
Is your connection fast enough, at its best? If you start experiencing problems while on a video call, try shutting down other programs to lighten the load on your connection. If your connection is really choppy, you can often shut off the video portion of a call and participate with audio only, which may defeat the purpose of seeing your team, but will still allow you to participate in the conversation.
Is your connection fast enough, at its worst? Are other people, like maybe your kids, using theinternet at the same time as your conference call? Set some ground rules about when kids or your partner can't be online because you need to be on a conference call, or stagger your video meetings with your partner or other family members if possible.
While working from home will take some adjustment, following these tips and establishing habits, the right attitude, controlling your environment, and leveraging technology will help you get up and running quickly and you will ramp up your ability to work from home like a champ.
