Working from home: Fixing your workspace to improve efficiency and wellness
GREEN BAY (WLUK) -- For two years, Jamie Matczak of Green Bay has worked from home as an Education Consultant for the Wisconsin Valley Library Service. In that time, she has discovered what works and doesn't work as a remote employee. She shared her tips and tricks and advice with Rachel Manek on Good Day Wisconsin.
1) Don't eat at your computer/work area. This reduces temptation for mindless snacking/eating, and is more sanitary.
2) Have optional daily staff check-ins, for co-workers to check in. We started doing this at our work place. Working from home is either working for you, or you could be struggling and missing your co-workers. Keep those connections going.
3) Get dressed or put some effort in physical appearance. You’ll feel better when you shower, brush your teeth, and stay in your routine.
4) Movement: You likely aren’t getting as much movement in. (Not walking down the hallway to talk to someone, getting a document from the printer, walking to a restroom, etc), so you need to find ways to get movement in your day. Ideas: Do push-ups against your counter top as you as waiting for food/beverages to heat up. Set a timer: every 30 minutes, do 60 seconds of jumping jacks, lunges, chair squats, etc. If your office is on another level, do some extra sets of stairs.
5) Have a dedicated work space, but now start to vary it. You aren’t going to meetings or around other co-workers, so your office space at home might start to feel dull. Go sit outside for a bit if it’s nice outside, take your laptop into a different room for an hour. Add some fresh flowers to your desk or photos of family, like you would at your office.
6) Keep taking breaks and full lunch breaks. You need them for your mental sanity. Before WFH, I never took lunch breaks. Now, I take them every day, and I find myself more productive and focused during the day.
7) Have ‘plans’: You aren’t rushing off from work to pick up your kids or go to a baseball game or piano lessons, but that doesn’t mean you should keep working.
8) Make adjustments. Having a fixed schedule is helpful but realize what works best at certain times, for you and your family. Talk to your supervisor about flex time if you need to take longer breaks during the work day for your kids. Also, I learned in the last few weeks that uploading vids to YouTube after 3 pm takes forever. Are kids gaming? ARe more people online? Now I do those tasks right away in the morning.
9) Be mindful of scheduling too many online meetings in a week. They take just as much, if not more, effort than F2F meetings. Feel free to not always use your webcam, or use the phone to talk to people. It can be exhausting to constantly be looking at several “faces” on a screen.
These are tools/sites that Jamie uses for staying productive while working from home:
Slack: Communication platform, https://slack.com/
Trello: Organizational tool, https://trello.com/en-US
Noisli: Used sounds to help you keep your focus and increase, https://www.noisli.com/
TomatoTimer: Online site based on the Pomodoro Technique for time management. https://tomato-timer.com/
Freedom: Website blocker, https://freedom.to/
