Most of us in the corporate and business world have experienced short periods of WFH (Working from home). In my case, the triggers for this included snow storms (when I was living in New York), waiting for the cable guy to come and hook me up, expecting an urgent delivery, or I just wasn’t feeling well.

At the time of writing (March 2020), a lot of people are being forced by circumstance to WFH for a considerable period of time.

In this article, I want to explore the mindset shift that helped me become more productive when working from home, and come to actually prefer it. The focus here is to actually transition to your home office being your preferred place to work, instead of your office. This isn’t directly trying to sell you on the benefits of WFH of itself (*ahem – no commute*), rather how to make it your preferred productivity space.

A caveat for this advice – there aren’t children marauding through my house, thwarting the most well-laid WFH plans!

WHY I AVOIDED WFH WHERE POSSIBLE

For years, I did whatever I could to avoid WFHing, for a variety of factors. Hunching over a laptop screen for hours isn’t comfortable, although that’s often the life of a hot desker / consultant anyway. Not having a space in my apartment to actually work meant that the dining table was commandeered as the make-shift desk. Getting hold of everybody became more challenging, including having to hunt through contact lists for mobile phone numbers, or wait for them to be online.

The underlying reason that WFH felt uncomfortable, and not overly productive – it felt temporary. The shift in routine and work space was always temporary, and that in a day or two, I’d be back in my regular space with the usual set of things around me. Why try change when I knew it wouldn’t last?

CHANGE IN MINDSHIFT TO WFH

In the last couple of years of my time in the corporate world, I accidentally established a working environment at home. Not for work purposes (initially); I wanted to be able to edit photos in Adobe Lightroom, and other tasks that were better suited for a proper screen.

It turned out to actually mimic the setup I had in the office, and with reasonable Internet access, I couldn’t really tell the difference. And therein lay the secret: my home environment, at least from a tech standpoint, was just as good as the office.

To do this, I carved out a space in my modest apartment that could accommodate a desk and chair, around 2m x 2m. I did this by moving the sofa closer towards the TV, creating a split-up of the living area. This allowed for a basic L-shape desk (a cheapie option from Amazon) and an “office” chair that wouldn’t induce back spasms after 45 minutes.

EFFECTIVE WFH ROUTINES / RULES

Unfortunately, your home has many demons that must be slayed in order to get things done:

• Fridge
• TV
• Bed
• Apart from video calls, nobody knows what you’re wearing
• Nobody watching you endlessly scrolling through your phone

Let’s step through each of these with some demon-slaying tips.

Fridge

Let’s throw in the temptation to cook extravagant meals too, because the challenge is the same. Add in the pantry or food cupboard, and it becomes a deadly trap within five steps of where you are sitting.

One way to best help to keep this in check are to simply not buy the tempting food in the first place. This could mean that you have to walk / drive to buy said food or snacks each time you want it. The inertia alone should hold off most snack cravings.

The second thing to do is to have fixed meal times, and put them on your calendar. Psychologically, this assures you that you have allowed for lunch (and dinner, the end of the day). So even if you want that seven course banquet, keep it to the 45 minutes you allocated for lunch, including prep time!

Television

A few suggestions that can help by increasing the effort required to watch TV:

1. Make the TV watching area difficult to use, such as piling objects on the sofa / draped over the TV.
2. Add a parental control lock, so that you have to put the code in each time you want to watch something.
3. Add a sleep timer for 30 / 60 minutes to naturally break up the watching.
4. Actually schedule in time in your calendar for TV watching, so you don’t miss out!

Bed (and bedroom)

To maintain healthy sleep quality, your bedroom should only be used for sleeping. To promote good sleep, hygiene, and productivity, here are some quick tips:

1. Keep the same morning routine, starting with getting up at the same time each day.
2. Avoid the temptation to work in bed, as you want your brain to only associate the bed with sleep.
3. Change out of your pyjamas / bed wear as you would if you were heading out.

What you wear when you WFH

To start with, don’t stay in your pyjamas or dressing gown all day, no matter how tempting. There is a school of thought that advocates for dressing as though you’re going to work.

This doesn’t make sense to me, as it undermines one of the benefits of not having to go into an office – no need for the office wardrobe. So long as you are wearing fresh clothes, what you have on at home makes very little difference to anybody.

If you need the psychological distinction of “work clothes”, you can wear specific comfortable clothes during work hours. The key is to remain comfortable.

Phone scrolling

In your home, nobody can see you scroll.

If the temptation to check social media for non-work reasons, or absently browse is strong, here are some tips:

• Move your phone to another part of the room where you can still hear it, just not easily access it.
• Remove apps from your phone that can be distracting, and force yourself to us desktop-based variants.
• Switch off WiFi and data on your phone, which still allows incoming calls.
• Put some time in your calendar to actually indulge your scrolling as part of your day.

CREATING A PRODUCTIVE WFH SETUP

Dedicated space

In an ideal world, having a dedicated room for an office means closing the door at the end of each day. For most people, this isn’t feasible because real estate is expensive.

Using a section of your living room is going to be the most common choice. Avoid using the bedroom wherever possible, so that this area can be dedicated to sleeping. The idea is to be able to keep your setup in place without the need to tear it down every night for dinner.

Wherever possible, avoid eating in your work space as well. You want your brain to associate this space just with work.

Add in a screen (or two)

Pretty much any screen these days is a step-up from a laptop monitor. To get started, you don’t need a 4K UHD {insert meaningless marketing acronyms here} 55in curved “gaming” monitor. I’m pretty sure that isn’t what you were using in the office anyway!

Get a monitor that isn’t the cheapest on the block (your eyes will thank you) to start with. Worst case, if this monitor turns out not to be ideal, it is likely to be very useful as a second screen.

Multiple screens

There are various published studies that highlight the productivity benefits of multiple screens. With or without scientific backing, my experience definitely affirms that it makes life a lot easier for very little extra space.

My primary monitor sits directly in front of me, and the second monitor at a 45 degree angle on my left. The primary monitor is where I do the majority of work, from photo editing, spreadsheets, writing, browsing, etc. The second monitor displays Microsoft Outlook, WhatsApp desktop, and other chat applications. The idea is that the second monitor is for things that don’t require much attention, and so are kept off to the side.

Where the two screen option really comes into its own is when doing comparisons, referencing, and tasks that require a lot of screen real estate. Once you have your first screen, you can trial the two-screen setup with your laptop monitor as the second screen. Once you uncover these benefits, you won’t go back to one monitor, I assure you!

Keyboard, mouse, and other accessories

Invest in a full-size keyboard, which is invariably more comfortable than your laptop. Similarly for a mouse, look for something that feels comfortable in the hand for extended periods.

Lastly, have all of your charging cables available at your desk. A simple hack is to use sandwich ties or tape to tether the cables to the stand of your computer screen. This avoids the inevitable cable disappearing behind the desk and hunting about for it.

Video call device

Your phone is fantastic for keeping connected with the world, to the point where most of us are lost without our phone. In keeping with the idea of everything being dedicated to productivity, it’s best to have a separate device available for video calls (and audio).

Your laptop webcam and headphones is a good start, although this may mean re-positioning the laptop for each call. Using an existing tablet device (e.g. iPad / Samsung tablet) is perfect, as it can be perched in front of you without blocking the computer screen.

SOCIAL CONTACT

One of the most overlooked aspects of office-based work is the ongoing social contact we have. This includes the strange perception that some have that if you’re in the office, you must be more productive. Here are points to bear in mind to sustain social interactions when there is less physical opportunity.

Show that you are contactable

To make WFH (or long-term remote work) effective, others also need to be able to change their thinking. For those of us who are otherwise used to getting on with the job, the need to dedicate time to showing others that you’re available feels completely unnecessary. It can often feel artificial, however it’s typically a short term necessary evil.

Make a point of regularly chatting with people on work-based instant messengers, such as Slack, Teams, or Skype for Business, or whatever IM tool your company uses. This can be as simple as the “Hey, how’s the weather outside for you?”, “Are we still on for the 4pm call?”, or “How’s it all going? Let me know if there’s anything you need from me?” type messages.

Being proactive to remind people that you’re contactable makes a huge difference. Consider augmenting this with more video calls than usual to make your presence felt. Once everybody gets the message that you’re about, they’ll stop feeling as though it’s an intrusion to reach out to you at home.

Don’t forget social contact

Simple things such as the physical acknowledgement from another human that we are alive helps our mammalian brains. Particularly if you live alone, the only person that you’ll often see each day is the one looking back at you in the mirror. In addition to your usual social engagements outside of work, consider the following ways to keep up social contact:

• Arrange virtual lunches with colleagues and peers.
• Allow, even promote, a few minutes of chit chat at the start of team calls.
• Catch-up with non-work friends during the day time, schedule permitting.
• Consider inviting junior team members to meetings in listen-only mode, providing the opportunity for them to observe you (and others) in action. Don’t forget to continue role-modelling good traits for others.
• If going into the office isn’t feasible, consider using co-working spaces or coffee shops every so often.
• Specific apps and YouTube channels provide “productivity” music, which if nothing else can fill the silence of your environment.

Prioritise social interactions, as it is incredibly easy (and sometimes seductive) to avoid social contact and keep the head down.

SUMMARY

The more you make your work space at home a permanent setup, the easier it will be to embrace the benefits of WFH. The biggest barrier to making this work effectively is attitudes, both your own and others.

If you see your space at home as your new office, in short order, so will everybody else.