10 Tips for Working from Home
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Top 10 Tips for Working From Home
World Services for the Blind is no stranger to working from home. We offer many career training programs online, several employees at WSB work remotely, and many of our students go on to find remote work once they graduate. Working from home can provide tremendous benefits, especially for those who are visually impaired and blind. No commute, fewer work distractions, and a flexible schedule can be a tremendous benefit for those with disabilities. With working remotely becoming huge amidst the news right now, we thought we would share our top 10 tips for working from home.
Have a Routine
Having a routine can be beneficial for anyone, working in an office or working from home. But it can be especially helpful if you work from home. Creating a morning routine can help jumpstart your productivity. Whether that is making a cup of coffee before you sit down at your desk to going to the gym first thing, it’s all about creating a routine that can help set the stage for the rest of your day to be productive.
Get Dressed
Working in your pajamas all day might seem like the biggest perk of working from home but studies show otherwise. Even changing out of your pajama pants into a pair of jeans can help you feel more focused and productive (as tempting as it is to stay in your pajamas all day!). It can help you switch from lounge time to work time.
Make your workspace as accessible as possible
When working from home, you won’t need to worry about the fluorescent lighting of an office or navigating it without ease. With your home, you can design it so that it is easy to navigate around and the light works best for you. Freshome provides some great tips and tricks on working from home (or working for yourself freelance) with a disability.
Find when you’re most productive
If your job allows it, find when you’re most productive to work. Are you more productive first thing in the morning? Start work early. More productive in the evening? Work alter hours to accommodate when you get the most done. working from home can provide the flexibility to get things done when you feel the most productive.
Change up your scenery and experiment with your workspace
Working from home doesn’t have to be just sitting at your house all day, every day. Try working from different settings like a coffee shop or coworking space. Find where you are the most productive whether that is in complete silence, with music on, or at a coffee shop. It’s also important to have a dedicated workspace in your home. It doesn’t need to be a fancy office but a separate desk can help keep your work-life balance. Setting up a workspace can also help in minimizing the distractions in your house.
Keep in contact with your colleagues on a daily basis
One of the most difficult things about working from home is missing the daily interactions with your coworkers, especially if everyone else works in the office. When working from home, it is so important to keep up with your colleagues if they work in the office or not. Schedule a weekly meeting where you can catch each other up or if you need to bounce some ideas off someone. Keep in contact using emails more frequently or chat services like Slack or Microsoft Teams.
Invest in a headset
If you decide to work outside the house, you’ll want to invest in a headset. Headsets help block out the noise for your coworkers if you have to take a call but don’t want to go back to your house to get the work done. Jabra has a wide range of different headsets in a multitude of price ranges.
Set working hours
When working from home it can be really easy to forget about having a work-life balance. You can easily check your email and then continue on working when your day was supposed to end at five! So it is very important to make sure you have set working hours so you don’t overwork yourself. But this also goes the other way around, make sure you stick to your working hours and you aren’t completing house chores when you should be working.
Join a Coworking group
One con of working from home can be the loneliness of working by yourself. But working from home doesn’t have to be lonely! In many major cities, there are coworking groups such as Ladies Work Remote, a coworking group for women in every field. There are plenty of coworking groups on meetup popping up all over the United States. Even if you are sitting with other people in silence working, it can help keep you focused and motivated to get the work done. There are also Coworking spaces that provide after work activities to get to know people in different fields.
Set a timer to make sure you get up from your desk
Working from home can leave you sitting for hours if you aren’t careful. When working in an office it can be a lot easier to find reasons to get up from your desk whether it’s going to lunch or walking to a coworker’s office. But when you’re working by yourself, it can definitely be difficult to remember to take breaks. Set an alarm when you would normally take a break in the office so you remember to take a walk around the block or grab some coffee.