Working from home is no longer a new normal; it is now, effectively, a straight-up norm. Remote and hybrid working arrangements are a standardised part of modern working life, as a direct result of the Covid pandemic – and of the concrete proof that remote working is a viable practice. Tired attack lines about productivity and ‘office culture’ are largely put to bed, in service of a professional landscape that gives us more time and freedom in our lives.
Now that working from home has become a normal part of people’s working lives, we can be a little honest about one of those attack lines: staying productive while working at home can actually be a bit challenging. But it’s not difficult to reign in your attention span. All you need to do is balance comfort and structure; with a base understanding of the factors that influence your workday, you can make strides toward creating an at-home setup that works for you professionally.
How to Structure Your Workday
Fundamentally, productivity is about structure. Without an honest, earnest approach to structuring your workday, you will not be able to create repeatable results from a productivity perspective. It’s only through establishing a routine that you can start to build out your productivity skillset.
This means figuring out and making concrete your start times, break times and lunch time – and, where possible, your general day-to-day responsibilities. The last one isn’t easy in a dynamic work environment, but attempting this is good enough – even if just to know which task to tackle first.
Setting Up Your Workspace
As much as productivity is a mentality-based issue, there are still some practical aspects to creating a productive at-home working space. It is effective to create an office area that’s functionally cut off from the rest of your home, allowing you to compartmentalise work and leisure. There’s also the matter of the ‘tools of the trade’; is the broadband in your area strong enough to support video conferencing and cloud collaboration, alongside other home internet traffic?
The environment around you matters just as much as technology, though. Things like lighting, ergonomics and workspace tidiness all play a role. Even small adjustments, such as moving your desk towards a window for some juice-giving natural light, or decluttering for a more harmonious desk experience, can all make a noticeable difference.
Building Habits That Keep Your Workday Productive
Ultimately, productivity is a game won with habits. Building habits into your daily work routine – habits that will stick – is crucial to creating repeatable results. Everyone has a ‘best time’ for productivity; figuring out when during the day you feel most productive can be a powerful asset, as you can schedule your most demanding tasks for that sweet-spot window. Over time, combing a decent work space with a structured routine will turn working from home from a challenge into something that actually feels more manageable.
