Your Guide to Working from Home this Fall

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, many companies have adopted fully remote or hybrid working schedules for their employees. If you’re on the work-from-home list, congrats! You’ll have much more time to spend with your family or take care of errands. But working from home can also be tricky, especially if you haven’t done it before.

Today, let’s break down a few strategies you can use to work from home this fall without missing deadlines or losing your sanity!

Set Up a Dedicated Work Space

First and foremost, set up a dedicated working space inside your home. The last thing you want to do is work in your bedroom, which will only confuse your brain and make it harder to concentrate. You should set up a work-from-home space in a place like a home office, an unused bedroom, or even the kitchen table.

Whatever you choose, make sure your dedicated workspace is known and understood by everyone in the house. If you have kids, have a sign put up to let them know that they should not disturb you while you are “on the clock”. The only way to succeed while working from home is to take working from home as seriously as you do working from the office!

Remove Distractions

You can further improve your work-from-home space if you remove distractions in your immediate environment. Turn off the TV, put your mobile phone in another room, and hide your video game controller so you aren’t tempted to waste time while you should be working on a project for your boss.

Removing distractions is much more effective than summoning the willpower to refuse temptations every time they arise. 

Pick Up Computer Reading Glasses

When you work from home, you’ll spend a lot of time in front of a computer screen. That’s not a bad thing in and of itself, but it does mean you’ll be more likely to experience eyestrain.

To that end, you should pick up computer glasses, which reduce the blue light your eyes receive from computer screens or smartphone devices. This provides two major benefits:

• It reduces how hard your eyes have to work to absorb information
• It makes it easier for you to fall asleep at night if you have to work well into the evening

Computer glasses are must-haves for stay-at-home workers. They’re the best tools to keep your eyes healthy well into your older years, plus can reduce any headaches you might otherwise experience from eyestrain. 

Wear the Right Clothes

When you work from home, you have to dress for the part you play at your company, even though no one can see you or what you wear. Many new stay-at-home workers make the mistake of trying to get work done in their pajamas. Unfortunately, all this does is train your brain to stay in “relaxation mode” instead of “time to work mode”!

That said, you don’t have to get dressed in a full business suit when you work from home. But it’s still a good idea to put on some pants and be presentable when working at a home office. As a general rule of thumb, if you can’t wear your clothes to the grocery store, they’re not appropriate for working from home, either.

Men’s graphic hoodies, women’s yoga pants, and plenty of other casual options are excellent compromise clothing choices if you want to keep things casual while working from home, but also want to kick your brain into gear when it’s time to put your nose to the grindstone. Pair your choice of shirt and legwear with comfy socks, like Comrad Socks, and you’ll feel both relaxed and ready to work in your home office.

Wear comfortable, functional clothing when working from home and you’ll find your productivity rise in no time.

Learn the Ins and Outs of Remote Work Tools

Working from home oftentimes means learning much more about online marketing and online tools than ever before. For example, a Google Ads Agency can help you figure out how to post effective online ads for your brand, as well as provide guidance for your online marketing efforts if you are new in this arena.

This is just one example of the kinds of tools you may need to learn to use as a stay-at-home worker. Get familiar with tools like Slack, Zoom, Skype, and other videoconferencing software as well. By engaging with these apps’ tutorials, you’ll be ready for your first remote meeting with your coworkers and supervisors, plus avoid accidentally embarrassing yourself trying to use remote work tech for the first time!

Take Regular Breaks

Working from home can be fun, but it can also be dreary and bad for your mental health. It’s a good idea to take regular breaks while working from home just like you would while working in an office. Every hour or so, stand up for a couple of minutes and look around.

Then, every couple of hours, take at least 15 minutes to get a drink, walk around outside, or do something else. Taking a break revitalizes and refreshes your brain, plus prevents you from getting overwhelmed or feeling bored for too long. Plus, looking away from your computer screen for a few minutes every hour can further prevent eyestrain and help you avoid nasty headaches.

Practice the Pomodoro Technique

The Pomodoro Technique is a fantastic way to maximize your productivity at your home office. In a nutshell, you set a timer and work for a half hour, then take a five-minute break. After three of those half-hour, five-minute cycles, you take a longer break of 15 to 20 minutes. Repeat this until your workday is done!

It’s a phenomenal way to get your brain in gear and force yourself to work. Since your work comes in bursts rather than long bouts of concentration, you may find it easier to maintain than other working schedules. Plus, it bakes in the above-mentioned breaks so you don’t overwork yourself at your home office by accident.