Working from home might sound like an easy and convenient way to operate for anyone who goes into the office every day. However, after you’ve been working on a laptop at your kitchen table for a few days, you might begin to think otherwise. There are plenty of distractions and discomforts that you aren’t used to dealing with in the middle of the day when you’re working from home. In addition, working from home breaks down the border between your work and your personal space. Everything from setting goals to purchasing a new standing desk can support you in creating a healthy routine that makes working from home comfortable and efficient.
Get Plenty of Sleep
It might seem like an obvious bit of advice, but improving the quality and quantity of your sleep makes it significantly easier to work from home. If you’re beginning to plan out a new daily routine for the workweek, you’ll want to start here. Getting up at the same time each morning is ideal for working from home and ensures you’ll have time to begin warming up for work after waking up. Waking up too close to the start of the workday or getting only a few hours of sleep has an extended negative effect on your productivity, efficiency, and energy throughout the day, not just in the first few hours.
Set Goals and Check Your Progress
As a part of your before work routine, you might want to consider finding time to set a few goals or intentions for the day. By the end of the day, you might be surprised at how many of these goals you’ve already achieved without thinking about them! Alternatively, you can also use this goals list as a handy checklist to which you can refer back to throughout the day. Make sure all of the objectives you have in mind are measurable in some way so that you can track your progress on a larger scale.
Keep Your Space Clutter-Free
Organizing your desk or workspace is only a hassle when you don’t make it a part of your daily routine. First, begin by assigning everything in your workspace a place to be- give it a home so that it’s out of the way. Then, as a part of your end-of-day routine, collect everything you’ve gone through during the day and return it to this “home” location. You’ll be able to maintain the cleanliness of your space with relative ease.
Make Time to Go For a Walk
During the workday, it’s important to keep your muscles moving and your blood flowing. However, when you’re working from home, you’ll often find that it’s all too easy to stay seated throughout the entire day, without the additional exercise that might be required when you’re working at your desk in the office. To account for this, you might want to consider scheduling time on the calendar for taking a short walk around the block. You might be surprised at the extended health benefits of building this into your workday routine.
Set Up an Ergonomic Workstation
For anyone who’s planning to work from home for an extended period, it’s essential to optimize the ergonomics of your desk. You begin building this workstation by choosing a comfortable chair that directly supports your back, and in particular, your spine. It should be relatively easy to adjust the height and move the chair around your space so that you’re seated too high or too low relative to the height of your desk. You might also want to consider a lumbar-support pillow or chair mat for increasing your overall comfort.
Next, you’ll need to ensure that your desk is raised up to the correct height, where your arms will be perfectly parallel to the ground. You’ll also want to raise or lower the height of your monitor so you aren’t straining your neck. Many individuals who work from home have developed the bad habit of working on a computer monitor that they’re looking down at, rather than directly across to on a flat level. A well-designed keyboard and monitor are also a valuable addition to your workspace, particularly if you’re normally working on a laptop.
Schedule Your Time
To fully organize your day when you’re working from home, the best thing you can do is add everything to your calendar- even if it’s outside your regular working hours. Your calendar is an essential tool in creating a routine you’ll actually stick to and for making sure you’re spending enough time away from your desk and the stress of your job.
When you’re working from home, it’s easy for your work life to blend with your personal life, when there should instead be a healthy barrier between the two. When you’re working in the office, this barrier time is your commute. At home, this type of barrier doesn’t naturally exist, so you’ll need to create it with the aid of your calendar. When your schedule says it’s time to stop working, you’ll be able to walk away from what you’re working on without an issue.
Consider a Standing Desk
A standing desk is a fantastic home workplace solution that makes it easier to manage your health throughout the day and prevent yourself from sitting for too long. The best standing desks are easy to adjust to your height and shift downwards, so you can still use this space as a traditional seated desk. Working just a few hours each day in a standing position is incredibly beneficial for improving blood flow and nervous system health. You’ll need to pick up a floor mat to accompany your standing desk so that you’re not hurting your knees, ankles, or feet while you’re standing and working simultaneously.
Tune Out the Distractions
When you’re working from home, the most important thing you can do for your productivity and work efficiency is to find a space where you won’t be interrupted or distracted. The space that you’re planning to use as a workstation should only be in use during work hours and should make it easier to tune out from everything else that’s going on at home. Removing the distractions from your workspace, whatever they might be, is the surest way to make working from home an easy and comfortable solution.
