1. Find a spot

Try to find yourself a dedicated and comfortable spot to work that you can associate with your job and leave when you’re off the clock. It is very important to have a place which you only use to work.

“It definitely helps if you have a dedicated space for working from home,” says remote worker Matt Haughey, creator of the long-running community weblog MetaFilter, and writer for Slack. “I started doing this kind of work sitting at a desk in the middle of my living room of a small San Francisco apartment 20 years ago, and it was a pain to stay on task and not get interrupted.”

Since then, Haughey has set up a dedicated home office where he can close the door and shut out distractions. And leave the place when she finishes and stop working. 

2. Set up methods for collaboration

You might find it easier to be productive without co-workers constantly buzzing in your ear. But social interactions can alleviate feelings of isolation and loneliness. Durham University’s Dr. Thuy-vy Nguyen, who studies the effects of solitude, thinks the psychological effects of working remotely for extended periods is often overlooked or ignored, despite it being an essential factor in our mental well-being and team bonding.

That´s why specialists recommend to be in touch with coworks, by daily video calls. 

Working from home might seem like a solo experience, but it usually still involves interacting with others, whether it’s meeting with your team, getting assignments, making decisions, or giving and receiving feedback. So it’s important to set up methods for collaboration while you work remotely.

Use technology like Skype, Slack and Zoom, especially when problems arise. Specialists say this will minimise misinterpretations and prevent time-wasting chains of emails that devour your day.

3. Have a plan

When working alone, you should keep a more structured daily schedule than usual. You should include multiple breaks throughout the day.
Routine and structure are crucial to making the quarantine period tolerable, and that starts with your sleep. Resist the urge to hit the snooze button. In what was described as the largest sleep study ever conducted, researchers at Canada’s Western University found that oversleeping can dampen your cognitive function just like sleep deprivation can.

4. Find ways to connect with your team

Harvard Business School’s Prithwiraj “Raj” Choudhury, who studies remote work and the relationships between geography and productivity, found an interesting solution to boosting camaraderie among remote workers: pizza parties. While researching remote work habits at the U.S. Patent Office — which implemented a more robust “work from anywhere” policy in 2011 — Choudhury discovered a manager who hosted weekly lunches via videoconferencing.

“She would order the exact same pizza to be delivered at the same time so the team would have that bonding experience and still feel like a team,” says Choudhury. “This is the future of work, so we cannot just keep doing stuff in the old familiar ways, we have to create new processes.”

5. Try and get outside at least once a day

If you’re not stuck in self-isolation, try to get outside at least once a day. Go for a walk, get some fresh air, and sunshine. If you are in isolation, go out to your garden or walk up and down your driveway or go out onto your balcony and enjoy fresh air.

With workforces around the world working from home, Coronavirus is having a profound impact on the way we work. It has demonstrated that to make a good job you don´t need to be in the same place. In the same way you can hire employees not being in the same place.
How? Roots EOR can make it happen. More info