Day In The Life Of A Remote Worker
What’s it actually like to work remotely…permanently?
There are lots of ideas and misconceptions about remote workers: people sitting in their pajamas, not having showered for days, increasingly losing their ability to communicate with humans.
Let me be honest with you: that is not at all what remote work is like! There are definitely pajama days and days when I crave more human connection, but in general the beauty of remote work is that you get to design your ideal work schedule, environment, and life really. That means everything is in your control. So here’s an idea of what an idealized remote worker day is like, and what a more realistic day is like for me.
Some context: I have worked remotely for 10 years, live in a city, and am a mother to an almost three year old. The team I manage is distributed, and I care deeply about maintaining a healthy lifestyle. I’m trying to be brutally honest here about work and life, because I’m sick of content only showing the ideal without portraying the actual.
An Ideal Day… Like What You’d Read In A Magazine About Me
6 AM
I naturally awake with the sun and begin my day by setting an intention. Without getting out of bed, I jot down a few bullet points in my gratitude journal. Sauntering quietly out, I find my meditation pillow and sit for 20–30 minutes, doing the latest Calm app meditation.
Feeling inspired, I jump onto my Peloton and do a 30 minute Matt Wilpers killer ride, followed by an ab workout from Emma Lovewell (she really is the best for abs).
After my workout, I take a hot shower follow by a copious beauty regimen. Today I’m wearing a power suit, have beautifully blown out my hair, and am wearing my signature fierce red lipstick.
7 AM
My son wakes up and quietly calls for me. My husband is getting ready for work as well, and we have some family time getting ready for the day. We lovingly read books and have breakfast all together, just like in the movies. My husband leaves for his morning commute downtown. My son begins his own day filled with activities, learning, and playdates with his nanny.
8 AM
I begin my workday by checking my calendar. Since I’m a manager, most of my day is usually spent in meetings, but today I’m surprised to find I have a morning of meeting free time with which I can get to that campaign analysis from last quarter.
10 AM
Coffee. Since I haven’t left my house yet today, I go for a stroll to a local coffeeshop and banter with the owner. We talk about small business marketing and I tell him about Trello. Intrigued, he tells me he’ll check it out. Then he teaches me some Turkish…which I will remember.
10:30 AM
The rest of the morning, I’ll work from the coffeeshop since I don’t have meetings.
12:30 PM
At lunch, I walk home and meet my son who is also home for lunch. He tells me about his gymnastics class and we have a lovely lunch together.
1 PM
The rest of the day is spent in meetings. I use Zoom for video calls and have the highest speed internet in my home, so it feels similar to being in an actual office. I take most meetings from my office, which is on the second floor of our home. It’s an immaculately organized space, filled with succulents and inspiring quotes.
Most of the day, I have an infuser sending eucalyptus smelling air into my office to keep me energized and grounded.
4 PM- 5PM
My workday ends. I take my son to the park if the weather is nice, or we walk to the train to meet his dad.
An Actual Day In My Life As A Remote Worker
5:30 AM
My son is screaming “Mama! Papa! I’m awake!” He’s usually a great sleeper, but he’s still recovering from holiday travel. I roll over in bed and put my pillow over my head. In my half sleep, I think through what I’m going to say at a leadership meeting later in the day. I also run through all the chores my husband and I have to do. Oh yes, the refrigerator repair guy is coming after work.
6:45 AM
My husband gets my son while I attempt to actually wake up. I think about all of my plans to wake up earlier and meditate and do yoga and laugh at myself. My gratitude journal sits dusty and neglected on my nightstand. “Another day, my friend,” I tell it.
I take allergy medicine, eye drops, and stretch out my aching hips. Man, getting old sucks. There is an expression in Russian: “Getting old is not happiness.” I think to myself, it sounds so much better in Russian because it rhymes. I make a mental note to write a blog post about this.
7:30 AM
Miraculously everyone is dressed and fed. My husband leaves for work. My son starts his day of activities, learning and playdates with his nanny.
8 AM
I sit down to work, trying to figure out if/when I can work out today. “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” I think. My Slack is bursting with messages, my inbox is fairly empty. Relying on digital tools outside of email means while your inbox is never crazy, you still have many other tools to check to see what people need from you. I can barely see my desk because it’s so messy.
The diffuser sits dusty in the corner. I haven’t figured out how to use it. Isn’t eucalyptus good for you or something? I make a mental note to write a blog post about this.
10 AM
It’s my fourth meeting of the day. Taking meetings remotely means you don’t need to switch conference rooms or walk up three floors to get water. I’m using my standing desk which is also a treadmill, but I haven’t been able to use the treadmill part in months because I’m mostly in meetings and it’s super awkward to be walking in a remote video meeting.
I make a mental note to ask my direct reports if they mind if I walk during our 1:1s. Getting to 10,000 steps daily is difficult unless you’re disciplined (and I’m not).
Today I’m wearing my favorite leggings and a comfy sweater. I have put on some makeup to look presentable in all of my meetings.
12 PM
I hear a screaming toddler downstairs so I know my son is home for lunch. I sneak downstairs to give him a big hug and ask him how gymnastics was. I take my lunch upstairs and thank myself for working remotely so I get a chance to see my son even for a minute during the day.
Just because I’m remote doesn’t mean I do things like laundry or other household chores because I’m extremely busy during the day. In a managerial role at a tech company, I’m just as busy as I would be in an office. In fact, I think I’m more busy because I can fit more meetings into my day and get more done without all the distractions.
I remind myself to take lunch more frequently, but today I can’t.
4 PM
I cut my workday day off at 4 PM (my team tends to work EST hours as our main office is in New York). If I don’t have discipline about this, I could work well into the evening…something that is very easy for remote workers to do if they’re not mindful.
I go downstairs and see my son is having his afternoon snack. Soon his dad comes home and we go to the park to play.
After he goes to bed, I will check in with work to see if I’m needed for anything. Working across timezones means my working hours may be different from others’, especially those not on my team.
So What Do You Think?
Realistically, there are many different kinds of days. Some days, I try to cowork with other remote workers. Some days, I am traveling and in other offices. And then there are those miraculous days where somehow I can get everything done and sneak in that yoga, meditation and exercise.
But that doesn’t happen too often. Amirite other working moms?
