As the world comes to a screeching halt due to the pandemic, there is a growing concern about managing work remotely.
We have approached Work From Home with some basic principles that has helped us not just cope, but conquer the regime. Here are few pointers which anybody can instill in their schedule and see positive results.
1) Treat home as office – If you’re working actively from home, then pretend you’re in office. Get up at the same time as on official days, follow same routine.
2) Dress up Formal – It gives you a feeling of being at work and doesn’t tempt you to laze off on sofa or bed. And when you log-off in the evening, you look forward to change into house clothes.
3) Utilize the extra time in morning – With the time saved on commuting in the morning; spend it on reading news, listening to podcasts or honing your skills.
4) Don’t get comfortable – Working from home can tempt you to lie on bed with laptop perched on your legs. Ditch the lethargy. Use a table-chair. This keeps your back straight, makes you more active and more productive.
5) Increase interactions and conclusions – When there is no real human interaction, let there be virtual interactions. We at Praxis have found to be more productive working on virtual calls and brainstorming. Because these calls are focused on objectives, time-bound, and conclusive in nature. Having multiple calls a day also keeps a tab on productivity and progress, which is especially helpful in the creative field.
6) Use productivity tools – There are so many productivity tools to make life easy. Use task manager apps to help you regulate your tasks (Microsoft’s OneNote, Google’s Keep Notes & GTasks, and Evernote). Utilize apps for managing team’s workload and project management with tools like Asana, Microsoft’s Planner, Trello, Zoho etc. Don’t interact with your teams on WhatsApp, but use professional team collaboration apps like Slack, Microsoft’s Teams, Monday.com etc.
7) Talk about positive news, not positive cases – Try not to share negative news, people are wary of them anyway reading day & night, and it mars the flow of a working day.
8) Take breaks – The official hours tend to dilute when you’re working from home. Take regular breaks for stretching, drinking water, having coffee or fruits.
9) Waste the golden hour – There should be a clear transition from working to getting back home. In the evening, watch the sunset and golden hour, listen to music, explore social media…indulge in wasting time and rewarding yourself for a productive day.
10) Log-off – In the evening, just shut down your system so that there are no further distractions. Log-off, shut off, relax.
