Working from home: love it or hate it, it’s here to stay, so let’s make it work

I had never been one for working from home before the lockdown, claiming that my job wasn’t really do-able from home (I can now safely say that’s not the case). But now that I’ve been forced to, I’m quite enjoying working from home and I hope that in some capacity it will stick. Here are some of the things that I’ve found useful for making it work (excuse the pun).

Start work ready for the day 

 Before I start work, no matter what time, I always make sure I’ve showered, got into a suitable outfit (in some cases just nice lounge wear) and tidied my room and made the bed. This way I start work with the feeling of everything being in order, even if ten minutes into the working day, it really isn’t.

 Plus, if an impromptu video call is arranged I am not spending it questioning my own appearance instead of listening to my colleagues.

Eat lunch away from your laptop

I try to do this even when at the office (I’m not a very coordinated eater so it’s for the best). But I think it’s even more important at the moment when we are taking less breaks to go out and fetch lunch or coffee, or walk across the office to go to the loo or to meetings.

I have found that working an 8-hour day from home can seem like quite a shift, so it’s important to put in little bits of enjoyment throughout the day. For me, lunch is definitely one of the highlights.

 

Image: Sven Brandsma

Be comfortable with silence on calls

 My job requires me to frequently present ideas to groups of people, often I haven’t met these people before or have an already established professional relationship. Whilst in ‘real life’ I still get silences when people aren’t engaged, when sitting face-to-face with someone it’s much easier to understand if they are just digesting the information, or if they think I’m talking rubbish. 

I’ve found these silences much more common on calls, possibly due to people being wary of talking over others or because it’s also easier to hide distraction with other things. So I’ve learned to be comfortable with the silence and carry on with my presenting undeterred. When you really do need some input, just ask for it as for reasons above, people might be less likely to volunteer it.

Have healthy snacks in the house

 I’m a big snacker and think I’ve trained my body to need to eat every few hours. But given that I am only a few metres from my chocolate stash and a Nutella jar at any given time, I’ve found it important to have some healthy snacks in the vicinity for that 4pm hunger pang.

Plus, if you’ve also got addicted to a cult-like online exercise regime like myself (see Barry’s Bootcamp free 30 mins classes on Instagram), you may actually have increased your high intensity exercise, and be more hungry. My favourite current snack bars are Vive – they run great promotions on their Instagram, and Rxbar – which are often discounted in Sainsbury’s.

Manage your energy throughout the day

This tends to vary for me depending on how tired I am and what day of the week it is, but I find myself facing a reduction in my focus and energy levels by the afternoon, which can really easily be solved by taking a quick walk around my neighbourhood.

It’s definitely hard to take these breaks when on back-to-back calls and trying to squeeze work in in-between. I’ve now got no shame in leaving a call 5 mins early to make a cup of tea or get some quick sunshine in before the next. I’ve also been known to fake getting deliveries, so I guess whatever works for you.

I would imagine we’ll continue to adapt to this whole working from home set-up the longer it goes on and we’ll have all developed have new rituals like we did when we were office based. But for the meantime, this is what has helped me through relatively intense video-call dense work days (which I feel fortunate to have) in the short term.

Words by Olivia Samuels