When you're working remotely, you should take the initiative to connect with your coworkers personally, either face-to-face outside of work time, or even just in the first five minutes of a conference call.
One benefit of working in office is that you have the opportunity to brush shoulders with higher ups and people who can offer learning opportunities, social connection, and even jobs.
Family is also a big distraction, as they might assume that since you're home you can do extra chores and take care of the kids, but it's important to remind them that you're still on the clock.
In an office, it's easier to establish personal connections with coworkers over coffee breaks, lunches, meetings, or even chats in the elevator, and these actually contribute to your teamwork.
Save your harder tasks for your most productive periods, and allocate the easier wins for slower points of the day. It'll keep you motivated!
Just as you maintain a working routine, create some sort of routine to mark your entry into personal hours. It can be as simple as going for a walk!
If your home office is not working for you, that doesn't mean you've failed remote working! Take it a step further and get out of the house to a place with Wi-Fi.
Try to get outside of your home office once a week to meet a client, get a networking coffee, or visit an industry conference. Don't stop meeting new people!
Without a routine of some sort, it can be harder for you to get started, so get out of your pajamas, take a shower, or go for a walk around the block or to the nearest café.
When you're working from home, it can be difficult to put work aside when it's sitting in your living room. But this can ultimately slow you down if you don't give yourself time to recharge.
Without a standard office environment, you have to create structure for yourself to stay motivated, which can be anything from scheduling check-ins to establishing what tasks you'll do and when.
It could be an entire room or just a corner, but make sure it's fitted with the tools and technology you need, as well as a comfortable seat. This space will be a cue to your family about when they shouldn't distract you.
(Photo by Melvin Thambi)
As more and more companies are allowing their employees to work remotely, click through this gallery to learn how to best make use of the opportunity, and you’ll find that these skills are highly transferable!
Essential tips to becoming an effective remote worker
To stay productive and balance work and personal life, you need to set rules
LIFESTYLE Work
While you might imagine working from your bed in your pajamas with music playing and food cooking can only be easy, working remotely has a whole other roster of obstacles set apart from commuting to work, time-wasting activities in the office, and having a dress code. It actually requires you to strengthen specific skills and establish certain rules if you want to keep up productivity and properly separate work from personal life.
As more and more companies are allowing their employees to work remotely, click through this gallery to learn how to best make use of the opportunity, and you’ll find that these skills are highly transferable!