Improving Work from Home Efficiency
We all know that no matter how glorious Working from Home is portrayed, there are some difficult aspects to it as well. You may find yourself in a rut or running around the house in your pajamas doing 4 tasks at once like a crazy person all day.
1. Have a dedicated space for all your work materials.
This can look like a drawer in the kitchen, a shelf in a closet or a private office space for your work from home set up. Whichever works best for you and your space is the right choice for you. Something simple like the picture above could be a great set up if you’re limited on space.
You’ll find that having all your things in one place helps you in more than one way. There is no more searching for items while working, breaking up your productivity. It will also make your pick up time that much shorter and make it less likely to lose important items such as pens and sticky notes!
Check out our current Work at Home Opportunities here!
2. Have a morning routine to set your day up for success.
Don’t take me the wrong way. I am not a morning person at all, but I agree with this 100%. My most productive days happen when I follow my “morning routine” instead of hitting snooze once, or twice.
Your routine doesn’t have to be extensive either, just whatever you need to feel ready for the day. Some of those things might be getting ready for the day, having some coffee, checking notifications and emails from overnight, or getting your body moving with some exercise.
This one should be simple and not overthought. Make a short list of your morning needs and then put them into the most efficient order!
3. Time blocking your schedule to optimize completing work & home tasks.
Be careful in making sure you don’t underestimate the time of your tasks, a little extra time is always better than not enough.
Time blocking can help you work from home more efficiently in many ways. The top 4 I could find were that it promotes focused deep work, it also discourages multitasking, is a tool to help combat perfectionism and procrastination, and
in the end helps you follow through on your goals.
Time blocking is a productivity method used to help schedule multiple tasks. Each block is dedicated to a certain task and you give each block an estimated time of how long it takes you to complete.
4. Make sure friends & family know you mean business.
Aka boundaries. A line or dividing mark. In this case, we’re talking in regards to your work at home efficiency. If you’d like a deeper dive into boundaries, we have a dedicated blog post. You can find it here: WAHWF Boundaries Blog
Give or even post your work schedule to everyone in your house who likes to interrupt, usually it’s your spouse or kids. Explain to them that you are busy and really need to focus on your work so that you can return to them in a certain amount of time.
Remember change can be hard but provide them a solid reason (you need to work) and an ETA of when you’ll be done if they don’t interrupt you. Explain that if they interfere with your workflow it adds on extra time working. With clear instructions and consequences it makes their choice to bother or not bother you an easier decision.
“You’ll never reach perfection because there’s always room for improvement. Yet get along the way to perfection, you’ll learn to get better.”
In conclusion, I could go on and on with tips to tweak your work at home life to make it better. As we believe there is always room to be better and make improvements. The first step to more work from home efficiency is recognizing your problem area(s), finding a solution(s) & implementing them into your life.
Stay tuned for next week’s blog.. See ya!