Top 5 Work-From-Home Tips to Boost Productivity and Maintain Well-Being
Working from home can be great, but it also might feel a bit weird and difficult at times. This is especially true when you continue working from home for an extended period of time.
Luckily, there are solutions to most of the issues you face and feel while working from home. They probably will not work like magic, but they will still help ensure that you’re successful—both at getting your work done and at maintaining your mental well-being.
1. Designate a Workspace
This might seem like an obvious tip, but that does not make it any less important.
If you’re used to going into an office each day, the separation between work and home is physical, and you want to try to recreate that as much as possible with a designated workspace at home. You may scoff at the idea of a separate room for a home office if you live in a small apartment, but a workspace doesn’t have to be its own room—it could be just a corner of a table for you. It should simply feel as separate from the rest of your home as possible.
Entering your workspace will help you switch to a work mood at the beginning of the day and get down to work. On the flip side, leaving your workspace will also help you turn “off” at the end of the day and fully disengage. That’s why it is also vital not to spread yourself across your home. While it might seem nice to be able to move from desk to couch to bed, if you let your laptop creep into your downtime space, it makes it harder to keep your work separate from your home life.
2. Establish a Check-In, Check-Out Habit
Along with physical separation between your workspace and the rest of your house, make sure you have virtual limits on your time. You should be clear about when you’re working and when you’re not.
The Myers-Briggs Company found that 28% of workers said they find it difficult to mentally switch off from their jobs because of access to work emails and smartphones. Our lives are now constantly bombarded and interrupted by emails, texts, and phone calls. Therefore, it’s important to switch off in the evening and get into the habit of checking out.
You can accomplish this easily with the Wellwork app—use the check-in function every time you start work and check out every time you finish or take a long break, such as having a proper lunch. By doing this regularly, you will help your brain efficiently switch between two modes—work and rest—which will make you more productive during work time and more relaxed during rest time.
3. Create a "Getting Started" Routine
Is there something in your morning routine that indicates you are about to start your workday?
Consider doing something small and mindful every day with the purpose of getting into a work mood. It might be making a cup of coffee and taking the time to actually savor it before you start looking at your to-do list. It might be returning home after a jog or listening to a short podcast. It might be getting dressed (wearing pajamas is a perk for some, but a bad strategy for others).
Whatever you choose, try doing it every day before work. Treat this routine as 100% your time—instead of thinking about the day ahead or the chores you need to do on the weekend, focus on the present moment and your actual feelings as much as possible.
4. Make To-Do Lists and Set Goals
Studies find that setting goals and writing to-do items daily is one of the most powerful ways to have a clear focus for the day, feel better in the evening, and accomplish your long-term dreams.
According to research by Edward Locke and Gary Latham (1990), goals not only affect behavior and job performance, but they also help mobilize energy, leading to higher effort overall. Increased effort results in greater persistence. Goals also help motivate us to develop strategies that enable us to perform at the required level.
You can use Wellwork to set goals and create to-dos for the day. Write a title, choose a topic such as "Work," "Personal Development," "Well-being," or "Other." Then, set a level of complexity that you anticipate for the item and start accomplishing your goals one by one!
Also, use these three tips for better goal setting:
Add 3-4 things that you want to achieve or activities that will make you proud of yourself by the end of the day, like finishing a report or eating a healthy meal for lunch. This will help you avoid spreading your attention on unnecessary things, make you more productive, and let you enjoy your day more.
In addition to limiting the number of goals, limit the scale as well. The feeling of achievement in a small but important goal will naturally give you more mental space and motivation to achieve bigger things later.
When you complete even a small task that brings you closer to achieving your goal, do not just move on to the next thing. Instead, pause for a brief moment, praise yourself, and reflect on how good it feels to cross off a task—and how good it will feel to cross off the next one.
5. Discover Your High-Productivity Periods
Working more hours does not guarantee getting more things done. Every person is most productive at different times of the day. For example, some individuals are morning people and are most focused during the early hours. For others, their most productive time in the workday is the evening. In any case, try discovering when you are most productive and build your work schedule around your peak productivity periods.
To do this, you can try keeping a journal where you realistically reflect on how productive you felt during different times of the day. If you accomplished 2 out of 3 of your daily goals before 12 PM but then took a nap around 2 PM, you might be a morning person, and it would make sense to get up early and get things done. In contrast, if you struggled in the morning and only started completing your goals after lunch, you should use late hours to be productive and use mornings for meetings or slow planning of your day.
Now it is time to put these work-from-home tips into practice, streamline your routine, and increase your productivity with Wellwork!
