The outbreak of the coronavirus forced millions of Americans across the country to work from home in 2020. While some may have found the experience constricting, many others discovered the unique convenience of working remotely. Once the pandemic subsided, many employers elected to shift their work protocols entirely, placing an emphasis on working from home.
Working from home, however, can be a conundrum for some. Though it can be enticing, there are obvious setbacks to sustained productivity. Between the delicious snacks in your kitchen, television inches away, and a nap that sounds perfect during lunchtime, you can easily cultivate negative that inhibit the completion of your daily work obligations.
Instead of falling into these bad habits, we constructed a list of healthy habits that you can follow when you’re working from home. These tips will not only keep you healthy but also more productive when you’re working.
1. Have a Separate Office Space
Working from your couch might seem like the ultimate luxurious goal, but it can turn into a bad habit fast. Designate a space in your house that is solely dedicated to working. Don’t bring work materials to your bed because then you can start overworking or underworking. Find a functional space that allows you the freedom only to do what task is ahead of you.
2. Move Around A Lot
When working from home, it might be effortless to get lost in your work, and the next thing you know, it’s time to log off. Set the alarm and make a healthy habit of getting up and out of your chair; moving around every hour. This could be to stretch, walk around, or pet the dog. Make sure that you also get outside every day. You can spend your lunch break walking your dog or move your office outside for an hour and get a little sunshine. Whatever you decide to do, remember that movement and exercise are essential for you.
3. Try to Keep Your Regular Schedule
If you’re new to the home/work life, try to keep your regular schedule. Wake up at the same time and do the same routine that you would do before heading out the door to the office. This can include eating your breakfast and reading the news, getting your morning workout in, or packing your lunch. Whatever it is, stick to it because it will help you keep your normal schedule and help you not fall into some unhealthy habits. This includes eating lunch at your usual lunchtime and away from work and taking regular breaks.
4. Set Limits
Working from home can cause you to fall more into your work than you mean to easily. You need to set a healthy work-life balance and stick to it. Yes, sometimes we have to do a little overtime, but that doesn’t mean every day or spending a Saturday doing work because we can. Track your hours and keep yourself accountable.
5. Keep Healthy Food On Hand
It might seem easy to stock up on chips and unhealthy foods but make a conscious decision to fill your kitchen with food that’s healthy and good for you. Fresh fruit, whole grains, and delicious meals can all help you keep healthy work from home diet and help prevent you from eating all your snacks in one day.
6. Dress as if You’re Going to the Office
Sure, working in your pajamas might seem like the ultimate goal, but try to get dressed as if you’re going to the office. If your office has a specific dress attire that is more formal, sure you can be a little lax but try to change into something that you can be seen in public with. You never know when a random meeting might occur, and you want to be presentable even from home.
7. “Do Not Disturb”
We’ve already noted the necessity of delineating an isolated space in your home where you can comfortably complete your work. To accentuate your privacy further, it isn’t an altogether poor idea to hang a “do not disturb” sign outside of your home-office. The primary impediment to working from home are the host of distractions that impair work quality and work expediency. In a commercial office, surrounded by your colleagues and supervisor; it is far easier to remain accountable. At home, it is therefore wise to impose similar accountability measures of your own.
8. Avoid Working Before Bedtime
Partitioning personal time and work time is another challenge of working remotely. Our environmental surroundings shape how we leverage our time, which is why a prescribed office space was traditionally viewed as seminal to an organization’s vitality. Working from home, however, offers the opportunity to haphazardly conflate a singular environment towards a multitude of different operations. One way of marginally countering this is to avoid working before sleep. Sleep is fundamental to personal health and work performance and comingling it with work too often can be detrimental in myriad ways.
9. Leverage Personal Errands To Create Breaks
While temptations abound at home, one also carries the risk of compensating for one’s absence at the office by investing too overdramatically in their work at home. This is needless, which is another reason to adhere to your traditional work schedule as fastidiously as possible. Indeed, one of the most subtle deficiencies of working remotely is the casual access to colleagues one would typically possess in an office space, the opportunities one could harness for fruitful social interaction. The vacuum of social opportunities that exists in a remote space can catalyze a lingering sense of isolation and monotony.
Therefore, prioritize attending to prosaic personal errands intermittently throughout the day. Wield them as a method of briefly departing the house, stretching your legs, or even socializing with members of your community. If you’re not too eager to leave your home, instead alot time for household chores, personal inventories, or relaxing endeavors like meditation.
10. Remain Objective-Oriented
Conscientiousness can be among the first casualties when working from home. Whatever you leveraged as a methodology for completing your work in the office, modify it to accommodate your new environment. Above all else, remain objective-oriented. Whatever that consists of – establishing a prioritized to-do list; a daily overview of ongoing projects; a morning review of scheduled meetings with clients, colleagues, or supervisors – implement it while working remotely. Your work environment may be now, but your mindset need not shift too drastically.
For additional information on work productivity, reference the following articles: