Want To Stay Productive While Working From Home?
Learn How To Structure Your Day
I started the The Modern Professional because I’m interested in squeezing the most of out every day, and I wanted to share those tips with others.
The tagline I chose for TMP is “Be More Than Your 9–5”, as I have long been interested in the fact that as a society we have started to evolve past a standard working day for various reasons (freelancing, second jobs, etc).
As the world continues to react to COVID-19, people’s regular 9–5 working structures and habits have been thrown out the window.
Of course, work and career are secondary to the health and safety of everyone around us, but if you’re fortunate enough to be able to work from home during what is sure to be a very tumultuous time, you’ll need to adapt and learn to structure your day in order to stay productive.
Implement A Structure
Now that you’re working from home, it’s up to you to keep yourself on task.
Following the steps below will help you to structure your day in a way that works best for you.
1. Use Your Calendar
Your calendar is going to be your most useful resource while working from home.
You’ll likely still need to participate in meetings (via video) so these will be scheduled in as normal, but otherwise you can use your calendar to schedule in tasks that need to be completed daily/weekly/monthly so that you always have something to refer to.
Remember, you don’t have a coworker sitting next to you to gently remind you of things and keep you accountable.
2. Schedule Your Work In Blocks
Following on from the previous point, you can utilise your calendar to create blocks of work.
There are a couple ways you can block out your time:
- By individual task (good for big projects)
- By groups of similar activities (all creative work, all administrative work)
- By time (time sensitive/consuming tasks at the start of the day)
You can also colour code these blocks in order to organise them better.
3. Don’t Skip Lunch
You’re entitled to a lunch break when working from the office, and this doesn’t change now that you’re working from home.
It’s very easy to lose track of time when working in a new environment, so make sure that you schedule in a lunch break every day.
This doesn’t have to be at the exact same time each day of course, but it’s important to take a break and walk away from your computer/tools for a while.
4. Remove Distractions
It’s extremely easy to get distracted at home, so removing distractions where possible is important.
Turn your phone on silent, or turn it off completely. If you need it for your job, then consider turning off all app notifications so you only get calls.
If you have a desk or office at home, clear away or hide anything in this area that isn’t essential to your daily tasks. The less there is to catch your eye, the less chance of you getting distracted.
5. Wear Headphones
Obviously not all distractions can be removed.
Stuck at home with kids? Yeah, they’ll probably need to stay.
If possible, put on a pair of headphones and crank up the music to block out any noises from the rest of the household, or even those coming from outside.
6. Ditch The 9–5
Now that you’re working from home, you might not need to stick to your normal working hours.
If you find that you’re more productive starting an hour earlier — or later — then you may have the flexibility to adjust your start and finish times during these current circumstances.
