The Work-From-Home Revolution has swept the world. Whereas the Industrial Revolution occurred over a generation, the shift to remote work occured over a period of months. Despite the suddenness of the shift, we are still in the early stages of the revolution. Since the pandemic, the number of Americans working completely from home has doubled, or even tripled.
At the peak of the pandemic in May 2020, 52% of Americans reported working from home, and 18% said they sometimes worked at home. As such, many people are still struggling with finding ways to be productive working from home. Creating the perfect home working environment is important for your productivity and for your ability to balance work and life.
Many people do not have dedicated work spaces. They work from their couch, the kitchen, the bedroom, or the garden. Their office is wherever they happen to be that day when they decide to work.
This hurts you in two ways: firstly, your brain needs environmental cues for it to be able to enter your most productive state of mind.
Secondly, treating certain spaces as work spaces, makes it difficult for you to separate your work life from your home life. When you enter your dedicated workspace, you and everyone in the home knows that you are going to work. But when you don’t have a dedicated workspace, your mind too easily slips out of “work mode”, and the people you live with find it too easy to forget you are “at work” and disturb you. It also affects your life outside of work. For instance, if you work from the bedroom, your brain begins to associate it with work, making it harder to sleep.
Not everyone can afford to have a big office at home, but you should at least have a dedicated workspace that is solely for work. It could just be a space in the garden, your garage, a storage container converted into an office, or spare room.
You have to invest in your workspace and in creating the right conditions for your success. Get ergonomic furniture, such as a desk, and office chair, and the right lighting for your workspace. Invest in the right technology for your productivity.
Make sure you regularly service and maintain your heating and air conditioning with Platinum Comfort Solutions, so that the air quality is kept high and the temperature is at a suitable level for productivity. You need to invest in your workspace so you work in a safe, healthy and organized space.
Investing in your workspace is an investment in your productivity that will pay off with a higher income. In a world where your job does not have to be in the same place as where you live, you have the freedom to live anywhere, but employers also have the freedom to hire from anywhere. You are now, whether you realize it or not, competing in a global marketplace. Invest to stay ahead.
Working from home does not mean that you should neglect issues of workplace health and safety, or that you should allow your workspace to become untidy. Treat your dedicated home workspace with the respect that you would a traditional workspace.
That means that you should always ensure that your workspace is kept very neat and tidy, and is cleaned frequently. This will keep your brain in a “work” mode whenever you get into your dedicated workspace.
Ensure that your office and its furniture adhere to office health and safety guidelines. If you have a desk, tidy it up at the end of the day. If there is any trash that needs taking out, do so before you leave your office. Make sure that your office has the same standards that it would have if you had a boss checking it everyday. The more respect you give to your workspace and the work that you do, the more productive you will be, and the safer you will be.
One of the pleasures of working from home is that it is immediately less stressful than working from the office, because you can work with freedom, you don’t have to tolerate a co-worker’s annoying habits, and you don’t have to conform to office dress codes and other things like that.
This is a good thing and can help you be more productive. Think about what makes you most productive and lean into that. Incorporate those practices and those things into your workspace and work routine. For instance, if you need to walk to think clearly, then incorporate regular work into your work routine.
If you need the lights at a certain level of brightness, then adjust the lights. If you need music playing in the background, well then, get music playing in the background. If you need the heating and air conditioning to be at a certain level, then adjust your settings. You have the freedom to create the perfect conditions for you to be productive, so use it.
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