Work from home? 14 ways to be more productive.

Here’s what I love about working from home.

• When you work from home, you can start as early as you like, finish as late as you like, and take a long break in the middle if you enjoy lunching like a European. All while wearing your most comfortable clothes.
• You don’t have the hassle of the daily commute.
• Nor do you have to deal with workmates, office politics, endless interruptions and pointless meetings.
• You can put a laundry on during the day, have a soup bubbling on the stove, and eat cheaply and well without having to carry plastic containers of salad around.
• And because of all the time you save, you should finish earlier, too.

Here’s what I hate about working from home.

• The shame of answering the door at 3pm with your hair unbrushed, and your PJs still on.
• You can go days without going outside, and you are overjoyed when you have to travel to meetings, because it means you can listen to podcasts or music in the car, or read on the train.
• You often feel isolated, and at the same time are constantly interrupted by friends, family – as well as parcel deliveries for the whole street.
• It’s easy to do the washing up, put a laundry on, make a soup.. and lose the day.
• But that’s OK, because you can work all night instead, while everyone else has a social life. Or sleeps.

I’ve worked from home, on and off, for years.

Before, during and after the pandemic.

I was the mum on the laptop in the coffee shop, frantically writing while my baby son – finally! – slept in his buggy beside me. Later, I’d be upstairs at 11pm, working, while the rest of the family watched TV, then went to bed.

This is fine in an emergency, or when you’re on deadline. But when you are always on deadline, and life feels like a permanent emergency, you’re heading for burn-out.

I’ve been there, got the T-shirt. (Shapeless, slightly grey, but very comfortable for knocking round the house in, since you ask.)

Here’s what I’ve learned.

1. Get dressed in the morning.

Really. It matters. You feel better. Which means you work better. And you don’t have to quickly pull on a respectable top to answer the door or take a Zoom meeting.

2. Get outside, every day.

Being out in the fresh air wakes you up. Moving gets your mind working. Even on a cold, rainy day.

If you already start your day with a run, the gym or a swim, bravo! If this sounds like torture, you might still want to try going out for a quick walk before you sit down to work.

Not a morning person? Then go after lunch. But make sure you get outside and move at some point in your working day. You’ll get more done.

A walk can also be a great way to focus on a specific work problem, or to just clear your mind and let a solution pop up.

3. Keep regular work hours.

Start work at a set time, and finish at a set time whenever possible. Make rules in advance about how far you are willing to go over that. I have a finish time of 6pm, a final cut-off point of 9pm if I’ve had to work on for exceptional reasons. If it still isn’t done by then, I’ll set the alarm and start early.

Often, something I’d been struggling to write the night before comes together in minutes after I’ve slept on it. Martyrs are never attractive, and all-nighters rarely as productive as we believe.

4. Don’t do chores when at work.

If you want to put a laundry on, do it before you start work, in your lunch break, or when you’ve finished. It might seem petty to ban little tasks that take minutes. But the minutes add up – and they also take up bandwidth.

5. Set firm boundaries.

If your friends and family wouldn’t call you at the office, then they shouldn’t call you at home during your designated work hours. Or drop in for a visit. Ask you to meet them for coffee. And message you, expecting a speedy reply.

If you share your home with other people, agree on rules for work time. If my study door is shut, I’m working. My family will only open that door if it’s for something so urgent, they would have called me about it if I was out at work elsewhere.

I have a client who shares a house with two other people who also work from home. On work days, they wear headphones and ignore each other until their morning coffee break, then lunch. Even then, if the headphones stay on, it means they’re thinking, and not available for social chat.

As for deliveries, if the neighbours all use you as a drop-off point, put a notice on your door. ‘I work from home. No deliveries between the hours of [your core working time] unless it is for this address, please. Any other time, we’re happy to take in parcels for neighbours.’

6. Choose your own priorities.

Don’t let your email, Slack, Discord or other communication channels dictate your schedule. Have strict times to check your in-box for anything urgent. And one or two set times a day when you deal with it all. Don’t let it become a constant distraction, and don’t constantly check it (or reply) after your working day is done.

Reduce the clutter in your in-box. by unsubscribing to anything that isn’t essential, and consider creating separate addresses for work and personal email.

If clients have got used to you being available 24/7, just set an autoresponder, explaining that in the interests of efficiency, you are now responding to emails only at – say – 3pm, so they can expect a reply by 4pm. Give important clients a number to call you on, but make it clear that this is only for emergencies.

Also: It is not compulsory to answer a phone, just because it rings. Screen if you can, and return calls at set times in the day.

At the end of the working day, I choose the three things I really want or need to get done the following day. So that I’m not always fire-fighting, I try to ensure that one of these is important, but not urgent.

The next morning, I simply start with these rather than being ruled by emails that arrive overnight or what I ‘feel’ like doing. And because I’m always working on one thing that furthers more long-term goals, there’s a satisfying sense of moving forward, rather than just running hard to stay still.

7. Beware the siren call of social media.

If I’m working on social media, I set strict limits using a timer. I try not to scroll though my personal feeds. I know lots of people do this while they’re at work, but you have a very strict boss. Yourself.

You may also find you can work in a more focussed way, and end up with a shorter working day as a result. Once your work hours are over, scroll to your heart’s content. (Though you might also find it doesn’t feel so urgent after all, and find more enjoyable things to do.)

8. Your timer is your friend.

Well, it’s my friend. It keeps me focussed and on point. I tend to work in blocks of 45 minutes, then take a five-minute break before going again. But for jobs I really hate, I’ll often just set the timer for 15 minutes and get stuck in. You can do anything for 15 minutes!

9. Get connected.

It is easy to get isolated, working from home. (You start thinking that your timer is your friend, for instance.)

Try taking your laptop or some reading to a coffee shop sometimes, just to be around people. Form a mastermind group, go networking, join a trade organisation, or arrange regular meet-ups with people who do similar work to you so that you can talk shop.

You can even find virtual workmates. I’m a regular at the London Writers Salon Writers’ Hour. We meet on Zoom, and writer together in silence for 50 minutes with a bit of chat to start and end.

It’s inspiring seeing other writers in different parts of the world, sitting at their desks, sipping drinks and staring pensively at their screens. But mainly, it keeps me accountable. If you don’t show up at 8am, you don’t get in.

I’m also in a business group that has a regular ‘implementation day’. Same deal: we log in, say what we’re planning to get done, then just get on with it, checking in with updates at set times throughout the day. With a support person also on hand to help with any niggling tech issues, it tends to be one of my most productive days of the month.

10. Design your workspace.

Make it as inviting as possible. Light a candle. Buy fresh flowers. Play music, if that works for you.

And all those images of people working on the sofa or cross-legged on the bed? It hurts your back. Get a decent work chair: second-hand is fine.

11. Take regular breaks.

Have a drink. Move about. Play some music you love, and dance like no one is looking (because they’re not). Then get right back to the job at hand.

12. Build a support team.

If you’re self-employed, think about delegating tasks you hate doing, or don’t do well. A virtual assistant with tech knowledge can often take just a few hours to do a one-off task that would take you days to learn and implement, for instance.

Once you have money coming in, try saving a percentage of each cheque for building your team. A good cleaner, book-keeper, and a virtual assistant for a few hours a week can free you up to do more, earn more – and still keep your hours under control.

13. Create bridging rituals.

Create a routine or ritual to start/end the day. I mediate for a few minutes in the morning, check my calendar for appointments and go over my to-do list while playing music.

When I’m done, I play a different soundtrack while clearing my desk, update my to-do list for tomorrow, turn my screen off then leave my study for the day. I try to do online shopping or web browsing for fun on my iPad, elsewhere in the house, so it’s clear that when I sit down at my iMac, I’m there to work.

I’m lucky in that I have a dedicated room to work in. If you’re using the kitchen table or in a corner of your bedroom, just clear your work stuff into a drawer or box once you’re done. Seemingly trivial tricks like sitting on a different side of the table when you eat can help to train your brain to know when this is a work space, and when it is a dining/social space.

14. Enjoy your downtime.

Make time before or after work to read, indulge in absorbing hobbies, to listen to music or podcasts, to go out and exercise, or spend time with friends. You save time on commuting, after all. Use it for activities that nourish you.

You work from home. Make sure it stays that way, and that you don’t end up feeling like you live at the office, working 24/7 and feeling guilty when you stop. Working this way should be about freedom, not making your home into a prison. If you work there, make sure you also play there, relax there, entertain and socialise there.

If that’s not possible, perhaps think about going back into the office, getting a workspace elsewhere – or changing your job entirely.