Plunge into Productivity: Navigating the Depths of Remote Work
Besides recruiting in tech and effective employer branding, our team architect Sérgio Godinho is passionate about remote work and forming healthy work habits. In this article, he shares some of his strategies and tips for being productive in a remote setting.
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Envision a vast pool called “Remote Work,” encircled by potential swimmers — Company A, Company B, and so forth. Pre-pandemic, the waters of remote work appeared somewhat inhospitable; a few brave entities dipped their toes in, but most hesitated at the edge. Then, a raging fire of a global, life-altering event compelled companies, whether they knew how to swim or not, to plunge into these unfamiliar waters. With the storm now passed, many have not only adapted but found unexpected benefits in the depths of remote work, opting to continue exploring its expanses even in calmer times.
The surge in remote work has prompted in-depth discussions and research, particularly around its impact on productivity. While ‘productivity’ has become a “fashionable” buzzword at conferences and in articles, I want to focus on practical strategies and tipps aimed at fostering your best self in a remote working environment, be it from the comforts of home, a secluded cabin, or a bustling beach cafe.
To talk about enhancing anything, we should first dive — swimming pool pun definitely not intended — into the concept to get a grasp on what it is exactly. At its core, productivity encapsulates the quality and value emanating from an individual’s work output. This metric is pivotal for companies: the higher the productivity, the greater the likelihood an organization will flourish. In an ideal scenario, businesses and staff operate symbiotically. The notion is that as a company cultivates optimal conditions for its employees to thrive, productivity surges, driving profitability, which in turn provides further resources to invest back into its workforce — a perpetually fruitful cycle.
For those relishing the chance to work beyond traditional office confines, finding ways to mirror the trust and flexibility afforded by companies becomes essential. Join me as we delve into our metaphorical toolkit to uncover strategies designed to pave the way toward enriched remote productivity.
Crafting the New Era Workspace
To optimize your work, laying a robust foundation is pivotal. In the realm of remote work, the dynamics of workplace setup and communication have undergone significant transformations. Maximizing the potential in both is not merely an option, but a necessity — and fortunately, there are straightforward methods to ensure you’re leveraging all available opportunities.
Workplace Setup
Getting the chance to create your own office space is a great power and with great power… No need to finish the sentence, right? Your remote workplace should be envisioned as a personalized work sanctuary, meticulously attuned to all your senses. Starting with touch, prioritize elements like a comfortable chair, an ergonomically-designed table, and maintaining a healthy posture. Working from exotic locations can be tempting, be mindful of the practicalities and potential pitfalls involved — for instance, the inability to speak in a quiet library or the logistical challenges of working from a sandy beach. Coming from a country where there are beaches all over, I’d think twice considering the amount of sand, the needed bright screen and the usual temptations.
It’s important to ensure your workspace is both pleasing and personalized to your tastes, incorporating items that make you happy and motivate you like a photograph of someone you love or the guitar pick your favourite artist gave you when you were 12. Manage noise levels according to your focus needs, whether that’s complete silence or a consistent ambient sound. Keeping a stock of healthy snacks and drinks is crucial to sustain concentration. Remember the old wisdom: “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” or whatever equivalent supports your tastes. Finally, prioritize your eyesight by ensuring adequate lighting.
Clear Communication
The essence of effective communication, particularly in remote work, boils down to eliminating ambiguity: make it as hard as possible for your message to have two meanings. Strive for simplicity, directness, and clarity in your interactions. Take, for instance, directive communication: instead of saying, “Don’t save the files in Folder X,” which prompts the question, “Then where should I save them?”, opt for a clear directive such as “Please save the files in Folder Z.” Simple enough, right?
Moreover, emojis, when when we use them right, can serve as valuable tools in conveying tone — consider the nuanced difference between “The presentation today was awesome 🤩” and “The presentation today was awesome 🙄.” Plus, some simple tips: make sure your camera and microphone are working before the next video call begins to avoid the all-too-familiar “Can you hear/see me?” and, even more crucial, mute yourself when not speaking to prevent unnecessary disturbances or potential embarrassments. When in doubt, opting for the most clear communication path is always the wisest decision.
Optimizing for Focus
Mental schemes, or cognitive structures that guide our behaviors and responses, fundamentally steer our day-to-day actions and decisions. Consider a trip to the supermarket: the sequence of entering, selecting items, checking out, paying, and exiting isn’t something we deeply ponder upon each visit. Imagine wondering “Where should I get in: the main entry or the back door?” or “Should I pay beforehand or after I’ve selected what I want?” every time you visit one. It would be chaos. This intuitive flow of actions is guided by an ingrained mental scheme developed through repeated experiences, thus saving mental energy by bypassing incessant decision-making at every juncture.
This principle, applied judiciously, can be a useful tool in enhancing focus and optimizing work habits. The key is to craft patterns of predictable actions, enabling your brain to anticipate and settle into “focus blocks,” thereby streamlining your workday and enhancing productivity.
The “Timeboxing” Technique
An actionable approach to architecting your workday around mental schemes is to employ calendar blocking, where you allocate specific time slots for distinct tasks or ‘areas of focus.’ By delineating your calendar into focus blocks, you not only allocate intentional time for every key area of your job but also drastically mitigate the risks of unintentional task-switching or multitasking. Contrary to the ostensibly impressive ability to juggle multiple tasks simultaneously, the true heroism in productivity lies in dedicating undivided attention to a singular task at a time. This focused approach not only elevates the quality of your output but also often allows for more expedient completion, thereby saving time for subsequent tasks.
Mitigating Multitasking, or Delineating “Work” and “Life”
Equally crucial is minimizing the potential for multitasking between work and non-work activities, especially in a home environment where personal life is perpetually adjacent to your workspace. Ensure those sharing your space are aware of your work schedule and respect its boundaries. An untimely interruption, such as someone tuning in to a sitcom show on TV during your focus block, might offer some welcome amusement but can wreak havoc on your productivity and ability to complete tasks.
Embracing Breaks
Lastly, let’s address breaks — an imperative, yet often overlooked, aspect of sustainable productivity. Consider a long drive: wouldn’t you stop — at least once — along the way? Periodic breaks for refreshment, rest, and leg stretches are intrinsic to the journey. Similarly, incorporating breaks into your workday is vital to maintain sustained levels of focus and prevent burnout. Intermittent pauses — recommended every 90 minutes of intensive work — facilitate mental rejuvenation and may unexpectedly sprout solutions to work challenges that seemed insurmountable moments before. Everyone has a similar story to “I was blocked on something and, after a five-minute stroll with my dog, the solution just appeared in my head”. You might be a break away from the next step.
The caveat: use breaks judiciously, ensuring they serve as true pauses for refreshment and not veer into the territory of procrastination.
Your “Other” Life
The aphorism that we should work to live, not live to work, underscores a pivotal truth often eclipsed in the hustle of professional endeavors. Genuine productivity extends beyond the confines of our work lives into our personal realms, converging into the widely celebrated, yet often elusive, concept of “work-life balance.”
For most, cultivating unambiguous boundaries is a necessity, not a luxury. The allure of “I’m close anyway” or “It’s just a 5 minutes” needs to be consciously resisted to preserve personal time. The Right to Disconnect Law, enacted by the Portuguese government, exemplifies a commendable initiative in safeguarding this principle, prohibiting employers from reaching out to employees post-work hours unless in cases of critical urgency.
Allocating time for sports and physical activities in your free schedule is not merely a recommendation but a necessity. While the assertion that engaging in sports enhances health might appear as self-evident as stating “water is wet,” its reiteration is crucial owing to the proactive effort required to weave it into our typically hectic post-work schedules. Sports serve as conduits for stress alleviation, promoting restful sleep, and fostering physical health. Although saying something like “doing sports makes you healthier” might seem like “water is wet”, it is always important to reinforce it as it requires an active effort to include it in our always busy after-work routines. Generally, embracing hobbies should mean more than carrying out routine chores (unless chores are your passion, though I advise you explore other interests…). Having hobbies is fundamental, as it keeps you motivated, creates an opportunity to acquire new skills, and helps promote a sense of self-worth in various areas of life.
Wrap-up
Obviously, this is the kind of topic that even an entire encyclopedia couldn’t fully cover, so excuse the superficiality. I hope, though, that it has served as an appetizer for further diving into the topic, as you continue to juggle video calls, virtual team-building events, and the occasional surprise cameo by your co-worker’s overly enthusiastic pet.
Good takeaways from this article would be: Strategically leveraging mental schemes to optimize focus, consciously thinking about your surroundings, employing focused task blocks, minimizing multitasking, and judiciously incorporating breaks collectively forge a robust strategy for enhancing your productivity in a remote setting.
In the end, remember: the possibility of working outside the boundaries of a traditional office is a gift. Let’s make the best out of it.
