Photo by Devon Janse van Rensburg on Unsplash

Four essential habits I’ve learned working from home

For many, the outbreak of COVID-19 has meant shifting from working in an office around a lot of people to working from home. For us at Pronghorn Software, our main place of work is our home, so this hasn’t been much of a transition. Instead, it’s something we have become accustomed to and implemented strategies to stay motivated. Here are a few:

Have a routine

It’s very easy to fall into a pattern of waking up later, being less prepared, and conducting less personal hygiene when nobody has (gets) to see you. Ours looks like this:

1. Wake up sometime between 5:30 and 6:30
2. Drink water
3. A bit of light exercise (sit-ups, pushups, etc)
4. Coffee and reading until my son wakes up
5. Make lunch for my son and get him ready
6. Shower, brush teeth, shave, etc.
7. Take son into nanny-share or begin work

Yours may look completely different. The most important thing is having it, and remaining consistent with it.

Keep your space clean

I can’t stress this enough. When your space is clean, you can focus on the most important part of your workday, instead of focusing on the household responsibility of cleaning. Some time ago I read a book called “Work Clean” that focused on cooking specifically, but the principle applies anywhere else as well. When you have space to plan in your physical space and space to be creative in your physical space, the result is a feeling of preparedness and increased focus.

Focus on client communication

When someone is over your shoulder in an open office layout, keeping on task (or at least appearing to be on task) is easy to do. One way I approach keeping on task is keeping in touch with clients often, and committing to specific work. This helps with accountability and communication with clients. While often setting specific deadlines can become overwhelming if done with too many projects, communicating objectives and goals frequently with clients, employees, and bosses shows them you’re working in the right direction.

Stop working at the end of the day

There’s a lot that can come up in the day that might derail priorities, and it can be easy to continue working on what you missed simply because the space you are in is now your living space as well. Having a hard stop allows you to be there for your family, be a responsible user of your home, and be able to prepare properly for the next day.