home office – user's Blog!

Working from home can be a little tedious, and it’s too easy to let distractions take the place of work. The start of a new year is the perfect time to take a look around and see what you can change to ramp up your productivity.

Let’s take a look at 3 key areas most people can stand to improve.

Spruce up Your Environment

Start with your office space. Is your chair comfortable? If it’s time for a new chair, get one. Find an ergonomic model with great lumbar support. Simple comfort makes a huge difference in your ability to concentrate.
Throw out all the stuff you’re hoarding. Be brutal, who really needs paper? Scan all your old records to the cloud and store the paper copies in the attic if you must. Anywhere but sucking up real estate in your workspace. Once you’ve cleared the clutter, rearrange your area so everything you need is close at hand.
Spruce up with some colorful art, flowers, or living plants. Decor doesn’t have to be expensive to be awesome.
Improve your air quality. Plants are a great choice. They’re cheery and help clean your indoor air of pollutants and allergens. If you can breathe better, you can work better.
Create ambient noise. If TV and music are too distracting, try working to the sound of rain. Ambient noise – some soothing sound in the background that doesn’t command your attention – will normalize other distracting sounds, like your neighbors doing yard work or school buses coming and going.
Get out of the house. Once in a while, take your laptop or smartphone and find a change of scenery. Take precautions when using public Wi-Fi, but get out there. Spend a few hours a week somewhere there’s scenery, greenery, and really good coffee.

Tighten up Your Routine

Get enough sleep. When you work from home, unplugging can be a real challenge. When you’re scheduling your time, set an end time…and keep it. Make sure you get the quality sleep you need to perform your best.
Set deadlines and keep them. You may not have to turn work in on a schedule, but putting things off can result in poor work habits, low productivity, and loss of income. Self-imposed deadlines are not as effective as external deadlines, but they do help control procrastination.
Tie your project milestones to your goals or budget. Make a realistic projection with an end goal. A concrete idea of how much work needs to be accomplished to meet a financial or professional goal will help you stay on track.
Break each project into steps. No matter how small your business, Insightly’s project management feature can help you manage your time and your tasks.

Harness a Psychological Edge

Get up, get dressed, get going. Some people need a psychological push to get their head in the game. Start the morning the same way you would if you’re going to an office. Have a shower, coffee, breakfast, and get dressed for work. Even if your work outfit is a clean pair of flannel jammies and fuzzy socks.
Have a morning meeting. If you work alone, enlist a friend to be an accountability partner. Discuss your schedules and what you plan to accomplish today. Check in at regular intervals to see how it’s going. Accountability is a powerful motivator. No one wants to report in that they are off-schedule, even if it’s just to a friend.
Take breaks. The positive effect of breaks was first noted by Lithuanian psychologist Bluma Ziegarnik in 1927. Many studies have been conducted since, and the conclusion is solid. Regular breaks results in higher productivity. The popular Pomodoro Method calls for 25 minutes of work followed by a 5 – 15 minute break, but other research suggests that 90 minutes of intense work followed by a 15 minute break is optimal. Figure out what timing works best for you, and make sure you grab some down time.
You’re a multitasking superstar, able to juggle multiple tasks at the same time! You’re switching between scheduling a meeting, talking to a client on the phone, writing a blog post, answering emails, and checking your web analytics. Unfortunately, science says you’re doing it all badly…but you feel good about it. Be more productive by doing one thing at a time.

We all get stuck in a rut now and then, and need to shake things up, jumpstart our productivity, and realign our goals. Whenever you feel like you’re spinning your wheels, it’s time to find new ways to get back on track.

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a variety of verticals. Learn about Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

For decades, going into the office for the typical 9-to-5 defined productivity. Nowadays, perfectly legitimate and successful businesses function without any ties to brick and mortar. Still, small business owners can feel they’re losing touch with the outside world, and work-from-homers can feel disconnected from their teammates and out of the loop. How can professionals with no office to go in to stay ahead of the game? Here are some key things you can do right now to stay organized, productive, inspired, and in control without setting up shop in cubicle land.

Carve out some space

While not everyone needs a physical office (and while we know entrepreneurs love their freedom and flexibility), it’s still essential to have some sort of dedicated working space and schedule (more on this soon). Without these two things in place, you’re more likely to work wildly inconsistent hours or never stop working at all. Neither are good for your productivity and can seriously damage your health.

Choose a spot that’s tidy, comfortable and away from distractions. No, it can’t be your bed. Make sure you only perform work-related tasks there. No personal phone calls, online shopping or meal times. It could be a TV dinner table that gets folded back up at day’s end. If it gives you access to everything necessary to be productive, it’s your space.

When you walk into the kitchen, you probably think about food. When you walk past a bathroom, you “remember” you’ve been holding it three hours. Your dedicated work space will be no different. Whenever you enter your work area, which is where your work magic will happen, your mind will know it’s show time.

Set your hours (and don’t play yourself)

A dedicated work space can help keep your work-life balance in check, and having a generally consistent schedule, too, will help prevent burnout and–if your industry allows for flex scheduling–lets you work during times when you function best.

Whether you’re a night owl or early bird, walk the dogs at 11 a.m. or take the kids to soccer practice by 4 p.m., having the flexibility to create the perfect schedule and tailor it to your life an increase your productivity overall. Take advantage of that! If you know you don’t mentally get going until 10 a.m., don’t start your day at 8 a.m. and waste two hours producing sub-par work and feeling miserable every morning.

A fairly consistent schedule also lets your team and your customers know what they can expect from you and when.

Get a headset and participate

Feeling out of the loop because you haven’t checked in for a while or are missing out on sometimes-valuable office conversations can be unsettling. Prevent this by getting connected and staying visible. Call into those meetings and don’t be afraid to set a couple up yourself as status updates for your team. Check in, touch base, and remind people you’re alive. Use CRM that connects you via laptop or phone and gives you access to all the info you need without chaining you to your “office network.” You’ll also have contact management features that are customizable and more fleshed out than your average office directory. Instead of using speakerphone, get a headset. You’ll be able take notes or get work done because you’ll have both your hands free.

Find your village

Being an entrepreneur, small business owner or remote worker can get a little lonely sometimes. It’s easier than ever to connect with people virtually, but we still need basic in-person interaction.

This is where your village comes in. Your village is made up of people who relate to what you do, offer an ear or advice when needed, and help you keep your skills sharp. They also use your industry’s lingo and understand your puns (so you can stop telling the bagger at the grocery store your hilarious programmer jokes and wondering why he doesn’t get them).

Find a meetup group in your area and go have some fun. You can also try office sharing, if available in your area. It’s a great way to meet like-minded, ambitious people who are also living the office-less life. Both these casual networking encounters can sprout new working relationships or customer referrals. You’ll wonder why you haven’t tried it sooner.

Not going into an office every day doesn’t mean you can’t stay a step ahead of the rest. You get to be part of the non-traditional work force and you’re not chained to a desk, so you’ve got room to make moves, experiment and customize as you see fit. Make sure you’re putting all that freedom to work so you can mold and shape it into something that works its absolute best for you.

At Insightly, we offer a CRM used by small and mid-sized businesses from a variety of verticals. Learn about Insightly’s features and plans on our pricing page or sign up for a free trial.

Tag: home office

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