Working from home will be with us for a while
Expert remote workers suggest maintaining normal routines.
Even as some businesses are opening up from the pandemic lockdown, plenty of us will still find ourselves working from home for quite some time.
This new “normal” has lots of folks learning how to deal with isolation while juggling the demands of home, family and work at the same time.
Working from home can pose some challenges. With no commute, it’s easy to hop out of bed five minutes before your official “start time,” and crank up the computer. But smart remote workers know that getting dressed before sitting down to work starts the day off on the right foot.
“I must get up and get dressed,” said Monica Deal of LexisNexis, who is working from her home while homeschooling her two kids. “If I don’t, I am not as productive.”
Expert remote workers advise people to try to maintain normal routines – workout at the same time and start your day as you did when you went to the office. It may be difficult, but set time for breaks and lunch and log off to take that time for yourself. It’s easy to work all day (and all night) when you are home.
And don’t let the former commute become additional work hours. Commit to taking that
“found time,” and investing it in yourself, your family and your mental and physical health.
If you are like Deal and trying to home-school multiple children and maintain a busy work schedule, it’s important to plan. Gina Henke, a writer and editor, has three young girls – one a newborn – and normally works remotely most of the time. But having all her girls home with her has been a game changer.
“Life is different and sometimes it’s hard, but it also brings unexpected blessings,” Henke said. “It is challenging to juggle it all when you work full time and have little kids who need your help. We have added yoga and meditation to our routines to ease the stress a little.”
Many parents can be flexible with their work to meet the needs of their kids. But what about meetings that are set on calendars? Amy Graham, an American Heart Association employee and mother of fifth- and seventh-grade boys, said that making certain her sons know her schedule is vital to ensuring she can take those calls.
“We discuss my meetings times and coordinate with their school schedules every morning,” Graham said. “We also designate times for me to stop working and help them.”
Not everyone has young children at home, but nonetheless have other distractions, like TV shows and home improvement projects. Sandie Geib of Agape for Youth said that she has worked remotely part of the time over the past few years and has learned that consistency is important.
“You have to have some type of structure or binge-watching Netflix can take over very quickly,” Geib said. “I also set up my home office in the kitchen next to the
coffee pot.”
If technology is leaving you befuddled, now is the time to brush up your skills in this increasingly tech-savvy world. Use mobile apps so you can step away from your computer and still take meetings via Skype and Zoom. Using video to connect may be challenging at first, but most people are grateful to have a way to “see” their co-workers after so many weeks of isolation.
Using Outlook and One Drive also helps you send emails and share files. Use a headset or earbuds when you have meetings so you can have your best audio experience and eliminate background noise. And remember to master the mute button. If you are not talking, keep yourself on mute so your own background noise isn’t disruptive. And don’t forget to shut down your computer every night. That’s important because it maximizes your computer’s performance and allows your company to perform any needed updates.
Many companies were already prepared to send their workforces home and COVID-19, according to many experts, could end up causing a permanent shift in the way we do businesses. Many employees will choose to remain at home and some brick-and-mortar offices may shutter to save money. If this ends up being your situation, you will want to be prepared to be as productive as you can once schools are back in session and restaurants, retailers and businesses are open again.
“Not everyone has an office at home,” said Hailley Griffis, co-host of the podcast “MakeWorkWork” and communications lead at Buffer. “It’s OK to work at your dining room table or on you couch but my advice is to try and create some space between the places you are working and the places your are relaxing, even if it feels silly to be on two different sides of the couch.”