Working from home can be a drag sometimes, am I right?
I think a lot of us who came up working in corporate offices, probably dreamed about the days we could work from home. In this fantasy, working from home includes leisurely naps, walks outside, casual food preparation, and breaks to refresh and replenish your brain from all the hard work you’re doing.
But in practice, working from home often includes an array of distractions that you wouldn’t have to face if you were working in an environment with other people similarly motivated to accomplish work tasks. The biggest thing that I didn’t expect to challenge me while working from home was the isolation.
It turns out I’m the kind of person who does better when I know there are other people nearby doing work as well. Especially if those folks are people I can casually chat with and build a sense of community with. It’s kind of like the fact that I’m more likely to show up for and enjoy a group workout class than I am to work out on my own. I have the self-discipline to do both, I just find it easier to not have to do it alone.
Be that as it may, working from home office is a reality for a lot of people these days, myself included. I’ve been working from my home office for over a decade now, and I’ve learned a few things about keeping myself focused and productive, even when I don’t feel like it.
So whether you’re newly launched an entrepreneurial venture or you’re taking work home because that’s a better fit for your work-life balance, allow me to share some advice along with my favorite tools for making your home office a place where you can be both productive and happy.
My favorite tools for being productive make it easy for my brain to focus on the task at hand and task switch. It’s not at random or because I have 40 tabs open at once that I keep jumping between, but it’s because I’ve already mapped out a logical order and an amount of time that I have set aside to do the things I need and want to do. My home office tools also include ways of silencing external distractions to heighten my focus.
So for me, the three most important tools to maximize your productivity while working from home are as follows: a timer, a list, and a pair of headphones or a door.
It’s really that simple, but let’s break it down.
Tool 1: A “top 3” to-do list
You want to identify a few achievable tasks that you are going to accomplish that day. I recommend three.
Of course your list will probably be longer than that, but it’s okay — just pick the top 3 things you WILL get done that day no matter what, and decide everything else is a bonus.
My favorite way to do this is to make a big list, brain dump-style, then use a highlighter to identify the specific tasks I absolutely will cross off my list that day. (For more on how to create a to-do list with your personal wellness in mind, check out this in-depth blog post on the topic.)
Tool 2: A timer
I like to block my time using the Pomodoro Method — essentially, 25 minutes of work time, followed by a 5-minute break, then another 25 minutes of work time, and another 5-minute break.
My favorite tool for this is Tomato-timer.com. It’s a simple online timer that counts down from 25 minutes and beeps when your time is up.
When I press go and the clock starts ticking, I’m off to the races—and you will be too. Bonus points if your brain can go “time blind” as you devote all your focus to the task at hand; the beeping timer will alert you when it’s time to take a break.
Lately, when I’ve had purely discretionary time at my disposal, I’ve taken this technique a step further by alternating my “tomatoes” (I.e. 25-minute increments) between “fun projects” and “growth projects”.
A fun project might be watching an episode of TV, planning some interior design upgrades, or doing my monthly bookkeeping (I know, I’m a nerd)—basically, anything that I actively WANT to do and feel excited to sit down and knock out.
A growth project might be doing an online yoga class, editing social media posts, or learning potty training techniques (pray for me)—basically, anything I’d rather not do and feel resistance to taking action on.
So far, this on/off process has helped me move past my knee-jerk “no, I don’t WANNA” reaction to tasks I’d otherwise avoid. Just knowing I have something to look forward to gives the oomph I need to ‘adult’ when my son is at daycare and my inner toddler would rather run the show.
If you, too, struggle to boss up when you’re ‘off duty’—whether that’s on the weekend, in the early morning or at night, or while your littles are in daycare or school—give it a try.
Tool 3: A pair of headphones (or a door, or a coffee shop)
My favorite way to ensure I will GSD (get shit done) is to isolate myself from familiar temptations and distractions.
In my case, that means physically distancing myself from the couch, the TV, the sink with its unwashed dishes, and the living room with its toy-strewn floor. If I have easy access to any of these things, I will clean, organize, straighten, and binge, in that order, and then I’ll fall down the entertainment hole until I basically merge with the cushions and become a TikTok-scrolling, eyes-glazing lump.
Physical space is the most effective tool BY FAR to resist the couch-merge urge.
Oftentimes, I like to leave the house and work from a coffee shop if I can. In fact, I force myself to walk from my son’s daycare to a workspace downtown so that I’m physically stranded with my laptop. And it never fails—by the time I get seated, review my list, and click “start” on my timer, I knock out at least two hours of work without fail.
Now, I realize there are plenty of times when physically leaving your space is not an option. Maybe the kids are in bed, maybe it’s raining, maybe you feel like hot garbage and just can’t be bothered to put on pants. In any of these cases, I will avail myself of my home office, which handily includes a door I can shut and a desk I can sit at where my attention is solely focused on the work in front of me.
Failing this—if, for example, you don’t have a door on your home office, or you just can’t access a solo space for some reason—you can pop in a pair of headphones and play some chilled-out music while you work. If stuff with lyrics spins you out, YouTube and Spotify have tons of great low-fi options for ambient sounds designed to heighten focus and help your brain relax.
Submerging yourself in an audio cloud while you hop to the task at hand allows you to create a sensory division between you and the outside world. You’ll get lost in the sound, which allows you to get lost in your work, and that audio barrier shuts out distractions almost as effectively as a door.
Bonus Tools: Nix your notifications
If you want to be truly hardcore about productivity, you need to silence all notifications and eliminate the temptation of “taking just a quick break” with social media.
There are a few ways to do this, all of which I employ when times are truly desperate. Here they are, listed in levels of intensity:
1. Silence your email notifications. This should be a no-brainer. Why anyone gets a visual and audio alert every time they get an email is beyond me. Don’t you check your email on your phone every hour at least (if not way more than that)? Why do you need to know the instant someone sends you a request? Is anything on fire?
2. Disconnect your phone from your laptop or computer. If you get a pop-up every time someone sends you a text, phone call, or FaceTime request, shut that shit down. I guarantee your phone is within arms’ reach 99% of the time, and if it’s not, you are going to check it soon anyway. There is no reason your visual field and mental concentration need to be completely derailed just because the group thread is blowing up with memes.
3. Silence your texts. You don’t need to hear an audio alert every time you get a text. My philosophy is, if something is so urgent it can’t wait 25 minutes before I check with my eyeballs, someone will call me.
4. Delete open tabs. Listen, I’m not going to be a narc about your open tabs. At the moment, I have 12 tabs open (as well as 3 programs running on my computer). I’m living my best ADHD life. Howeverrrrrr, if I feel very distractible today, I would close all of these except one. If you’re truly worried about forgetting something that you are currently “remembering” by holding open in a tab, add it to your brain-dump list (see Tool #1 above).
5. Block social media feeds on your computer. Chrome has a fabulous extension called News Feed Eradicator. This allows you to select the social media channels where you waste the most time (YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Reddit, etc.) and make them impossible to access from your computer.
6. Delete your social media apps. That’s right—get on your phone and physically remove the apps where you waste the most time. And don’t just hide them from the home screen; delete them completely, so you have to think twice before downloading them again. Sometimes, the thought of simply logging into a program is enough of an annoying barrier to prevent you from auto-scrolling.
7. Silence your ringer. Okay, if you have kids or a high-needs partner, you may feel an aversion to this. Choose what works for you, obviously, but again, consider whether you can afford to wait for one tomato (25 minutes) before checking your phone. Chances are, you can.
So there you have it! Three of my favorite tools (with 7 bonus tools—you’re welcome) to maximize your productivity while working from your home office.
Do you have any favorite hacks or tools that boost your productivity? I’d love to hear about them.
If you struggle with time management in general, I can help with that. Contact me through my website and tell me more about your current challenges. I’ll reply via email and we can set up a call to discuss how personalized coaching can help you reclaim your calendar and start spending that most precious resource, your time, where it matters most to you.
