It’s Not Easy To Be Working From Home

If you are not a writer, artist, scientist or otherwise a loner by nature, it’s not easy to be working from home. First of all for most of the people who were too used to the rhythm of office going life, this change of frequency is too much of a disruption to get used to and second of all there was something about that infectious energy of the co-workers or office environment, which used to help many of us in putting our head down and focusing on the task at hand, which we might not have even acknowledged during normal times but can now feel its absence only too starkly. Then there are many of us who are incorrigible procrastinators and can postpone any task till the last moment without the pull of external pressure, even a task as basic as getting out of the bed and get going with our day.

Not that those of us who are lucky enough to still have a job are complaining much but there is a real danger of, at best, not been able to work efficiently and, at worst, completely losing our mind. Those of you who are too touchy-feely and fond of the company of people most likely run a far greater risk of later than the former. Now I am sure most of you extroverts will eventually find various ways to cope with this, such as video calls through Zoom with your co-workers to give you some semblance of people around you, long phone calls with your friends to get some comfort in the physicality of voice and maybe an evening time 3 D movie or a video game to immerse in some kind of outside world but many of you both extroverts, as well as introverts, will find it quite surprising how easy it is to maintain the productivity at home if we follow a basic discipline.

When it comes to maintaining the efficiency of work as high as that in the office while working from home than perhaps we are in luck as enough people seem to vouch for the following simple method:

• Keep your work area separate from the living area. Definitely don’t make your bedroom also a workroom.
• Try to get up at the same time as you used to do when you were going to the office.
• There is something about the professional work attire which gets us into the right frame of mind to work. So dress up as if nothing has changed.
• If you are a boss then ask your team to follow the above steps too.
• While you enter your room and take up your work station for the day, don’t forget to shut the door of the room behind to let your family know that you are not to be disturbed.
• Now get on the Zoom and take a roll call of all your team members. Run a quick meeting like a stand-up meeting of agile scrum masters.
• Don’t forget to run a similar meeting towards the end of the working hrs too.

It doesn’t matter how many so-called “self-starters”, “proactive” and “energetic” people you have in your team, in this time they all will need an assurance of having a captain at the helm. Many of your colleagues may grumble over the school like discipline of the above but believe me, some of them will thank you profusely later on for helping them in getting all that work done. Personally, I think no other manner of work is as productive as working from home especially when you add up all those hours gained by avoiding the commute. But then I have the advantage of being an introvert.