Contents
How to work efficiently at home? How to manage telework? Here are 8 helpful tips during this time of confinement.
With the coronavirus pandemic and the need to mobilize to limit the spread, you will most certainly be forced to work from home. For many, teleworking is likely to be a novelty and it will, therefore, be necessary to develop new habits.
Above all, rest assured, telework is good for productivity in general. Most studies have shown that employees who work from homework better, longer, and that they do not really lose efficiency. However, there are certain challenges that need to be overcome: how to do the meetings? How to communicate internally? How to coordinate?
What are the strategies to stay efficient and focused on telework? How do you make sure you stay productive and don’t lose your focus? Here are 8 tips on how to adopt productive habits and routines to work effectively at home.
1 – Telework: create routines in the morning and in the evening
Having a routine is the key to successfully working properly from home. Indeed, when one is teleworking, the boundaries between private life and work become blurred. In the morning, there is no longer any time lost in transport, but there is therefore no longer any time between the morning at home and the time when you start to work. Hence the need to establish “rituals”.
Try to start work at the same time each day if you can and also plan breaks – this will help you stay consistent and focused. If you plan to go shopping, and if it is possible, perhaps you can place it in the morning before starting to work, so as to establish a break. Same thing in the evening: if you can, go for a walk after work. With the looming confinement, this may not be possible, but you can establish a routine for this break: some stretching, meditation.
The idea is simply to create moments that mark the start and end of work, so as not to feel constantly overwhelmed by the impression of being at the office all the time.
2 – Make sure your family or roommates understand that you work from home
If you share your home with your parents, children, or roommates, let them know that you are working, that you need to focus, and sometimes you will have meetings that you cannot interrupt.
Establishing a line between working time and leisure is a challenge for you and your loved ones – but it is necessary. While you are working, you cannot be interrupted every 10 minutes by a child who needs to be looked after.
It is, therefore, necessary to be clear and establish a timetable, clearly define the periods when you must be concentrated and those when you can be interrupted for a few moments. For this, it is important to define a dedicated workspace.
3 – Have a dedicated workspace at home for working
When possible, ideally be in a room where you can isolate yourself, close the door, and thus avoid being distracted. If it’s not possible, the best you can do is to have a space that looks like a desk: a table with a chair, for example. If possible, you should avoid spending the whole day working on a sofa that is not well seated.
It will also give you an appropriate place to make video calls with your colleagues. And if you have your own room, you will avoid noise. In addition, with a dedicated space, you will be able to have what you need around you: be it your laptop, your mouse, your headphones, your notebooks… A saving of time in your day since you will not have not to look for them. You can also take advice from interior designers to set a dedicated workspace at home.
4 – How to work effectively at home? Pay attention to your clothes
Obviously, one of the advantages of teleworking is that one is not obliged to undergo the sometimes somewhat heavy dress code of companies. However, you must avoid falling into the trap of wanting to stay in your pajamas all day. Admittedly, it’s comfortable, but again, it doesn’t really help to get into the spirit of having “work” and “personal” moments. When you are going to stay many days in a row in telework, it is all the more important to mark the separations between these moments.
For your colleagues who may call you on video, it’s also more pleasant to see you dressed properly. And it will also help to create this trusting relationship essential to teleworking between you and your managers.
5 – Pay attention to your posture while working from home
In the office, with the progression of CSR, issues of well-being at work, and ergonomics, there is often a well-suited workstation. The screens are larger, we have an ad hoc chair, we can adjust everything to be at the right height. At home, all that disappears (unless you are lucky enough to have a really suitable space).
At home, there is, therefore, a real challenge to maintain good posture. Staying slumped all day on a sofa, your back completely curled up, it’s the perfect recipe for ending up with a bad backache the next day. Remember the rules: have your back straight, your neck straight, your eyes aligned with your screen, your shoulders aligned with your body and your elbows close to 90 °.
Do your best with what you have and keep good posture. It is best, of course, to have a desk with a chair and an extra screen to keep your head high, but if this is not possible, at least try to keep the posture correct as much as can possible.
6 – Work at home: don’t forget light and exercise
Even if it may be complicated in the event of confinement, do not forget to go out and take some sun to increase your energy and vitamin D levels. A trip to the supermarket can be the opportunity to walk a few moments. Remember to respect the safety instructions linked to the epidemic each time you go out, however: social distancing, hand washing, droplet protection.
At the same time, it is important to continue exercising. Indeed, in teleworking, you no longer make the trips you did on foot (take the metro, get to your work). It is therefore important to exercise regularly: do some squats, pushups, sheathing exercises from time to time. It is also important to practice stretching so as not to leave your body inactive during the day in bad postures.
Finally, my final piece of advice, psychological: try to take advantage of the advantages of the situation. Admittedly, it is not simple and that promises galleys. But at the same time, this experience will allow us to experience new ways of working, to realize that telework can be a viable solution.
In addition to reducing travel times, this will allow us to spend a little more time with our loved ones, to rebalance our professional and private lives, to refocus. We must, therefore, remain positive and try to make the best of this crisis, even if it will not be easy.
Author Bio
Digvijay Rajdaan is Marketing Manager at Design By Lavassa and has served as the Head of Conversion Marketing at Planet Web Solution. He’s an expert in inbound marketing and lead generation.
