This article is provided by Jason Dirkham
It doesn’t matter whether you are a working from home veteran or whether flexible working has been thrust upon you because of the coronavirus pandemic, it can be a blessing or a curse. The thought of working on your laptop in front of the TV may be the stuff of dreams but it can soon turn into a nightmare. The office camaraderie is now non-existent, there’s no lunch break to speak of and the structure that you once relied on has been removed from your working life. You have to go it alone and ensure that your working from home foray doesn’t turn into something isolating and anxiety-inducing.
Working from home is a newer, more modern business model that many bosses have been forced to embrace whether they like it or not. Employees across the globe have seemingly been sent home from their office overnight. This has meant ensuring that the WiFi connection is secure and reliable, that there is a space to create some sort of home office, and that you can have enough willpower to get up in the morning. Working from home sounds like a dream, but it can be so much more difficult to manage to create a great work-home life balance. Take a look at these sure fire ways to work from home without feeling so isolated.
Structure
It is crucial that you maintain as much routine as you can throughout your working day. If you were used to getting up at 6:30 in the morning before having a shower, eating breakfast, having some time with the kids, and then venturing to work, you need to try and keep this structure. While you might not have the commute to factor in, you can gain back this extra time, rather than spending it sleeping in bed.
Your routine and ability to maintain it will have a positive impact on your mental health and will help you to achieve a positive work-home life balance. Getting up after 10:00 and remaining in your pajamas will result in a lack of productivity. You need to have your shower and get into your smart casual clothes. While getting suited and booted might be a tad over the top, your boss or your clients aren’t going to want to see you in your scruffs when you deliver an important presentation over a Zoom call.
The structure you maintain will ensure that you can separate your work life from your home life. The kids will notice that you are at home more but you need to define the boundaries so they know that they can’t launch into your office while you are chatting to a client.
Work-Home Life Balance
Creating a positive home-work life balance is vital if you are to maintain some sense of normality at home. Try to create some sort of home office space within the home that is separate from everywhere else. A study or spare bedroom is ideal for this. Here, you can have a desk, a chair, some storage, and natural light to help give you some structure to your working environment. You might be called upon to take part in Zoom, Teams or Skype calls with colleagues and clients. Don’t log in from your sofa and instead maintain some semblance of professionalism. A home office will give you the impetus to remain productive.
Many employees panic when they are told to work from home. They feel like they may be being monitored a little more closely to ensure that they are doing the work asked of them. This added pressure can lead to feelings of anxiety and stress. If your employer has embraced working from home reluctantly, you need to show them that you have what it takes to make flexible working a viable business model. Covid-19 is bringing with it a whole host of new necessities and remote working is one of them. While many employers were keen to welcome this form of working eventually, coronavirus has merely brought this forward.
Self Employed
If you have been working from home for years and you aren’t quite sure what all the fuss is about, you can still reconsider your remote working experience. Learning from the world around us is crucial if we are to adapt our business models and become more efficient and productive. Being self employed is life affirming. Being in control of your own professional destiny means that you can decide your own daily structure, working hours, and the clients that you take on.
To make your day-to-day working life easier, you need to embrace the software and gizmos that will enable you to spend more time working rather than processing the tedious admin. As a self employed individual, you need to be the marketing guru, the financial whizz, the advertising bod, the social media manager, and the head honcho. Rather than spending hours generating paperwork, consider embracing an invoice template tool to make your working days so much easier. Rather than manually creating invoices for your clients, a free invoice generator will make your outfit look so much more professional and bring a consistent approach to your documentation.
If you have staff that you employ who are also working from home, consider a payroll tool, to help you account for every pension contribution and tax obligation without you having to slave over a calculator for three days every month. Bringing this efficiency to your remote working experience will empower you to spend more time being productive in more pressing areas of your business. During these surreal days, this will most likely be time spent ensuring that your cash flow remains buoyant, financial planning, and social media management.
Communication
When you are working from home, you can feel isolated. You no longer have that office colleague to share some banter with and you may feel concerned that your social circle is diminishing. With the added pressure of having to stay at home and not hug family and friends, the inability to grasp the joy out of your workplace environment can be more difficult to bear. Think about ways you can stay in touch with your friends from work. Set up a messenger chat and maintain contact via Zoom and Teams. Managers across industries are now choosing to conduct their Monday morning briefings across Zoom rather than sending out an email. This video function enables you to see your office colleagues. The more personal and visual approach to a meeting allows your remote working experience to become less surreal and abstract.Many bosses are also empowering their workforce to set up virtual meetings that are more social rather than professional. If you can’t go for drinks after work on a Friday anymore, your boss may set up a virtual Zoom pub quiz every Friday to give you a break from the stresses of working from home and the monotony of your four walls.
Procrastination
The temptation of procrastination can be too much at times. When we have been working from home for weeks on end and we have become very adept at resisting the allure of the television, we can slip. The kids may be having a whale of a time in their playroom and you want to join in. Perhaps you can hear your other half watching the latest episode of a Netflix box set that you have been enjoying. Or maybe, you simply want to scroll mindlessly through Facebook for a few hours. Don’t do it. It’s a slippery slope. Procrastination can lead to feelings of worthlessness and can make us question our achievements and skillset.
Don’t allow yourself to take an elaborate three hour lunch break to create Masterchef quality gastronomic meals. Instead, bring some structure to your day by giving yourself time away from your desk. Have some Twitter time for fifteen minutes as part of your day. Make time to go out every couple of hours to head to the park and enjoy soaking up the rays of the sunshine. Being outside can help your circadian rhythm to rejuvenate and you may find your stress levels decreasing.
Don’t assume that you need to work for eight hours a day straight without any breaks. Your employer doesn’t expect this and you wouldn’t be so tough on yourself when in the office. You need to keep your working mentality in place when you make the transition to working from home. Try to maintain some sense of normality in your working day and allow the procrastination temptations to pass you by.
Working from home can be a great experience. However, it can also take some getting used to. While thrust upon us, we have had no choice in having to work with barking dogs and screaming kids around us. Follow this guide and implement some of these sure fire ways to prevent you from feeling isolated, to boost your confidence, and to help you feel comfortable when working from home. As time shifts and the Covid-19 pandemic eases, a new normal will emerge that we can all become used to and thrive in.
