By Jes Egan 

Working from home seems like a great idea in theory. Ever tried it? All of a sudden you look at the clock and it’s 3pm, you’re still in your PJ’s and you’ve not actually done anything that actually classifies as work. Here are a few of my tips to get you started working from home.

Shower

Shower, get dressed and get ready for work. It may be a bonus working from home that you don’t need to make the effort as you’re not leaving the house. Think again: if you take advantage of this it can keep you in the wrong mindset. You want to try and position yourself that you are actually at work. Don’t get me wrong, you don’t need to have your face made up or your good clothes on, but set your day up like you are going into work. Start in your normal routine, shower, get dressed, have breakfast and your morning coffee. Then take a seat and get ready to work.

Sit down

You need a place to work - seems obvious, right? It is, but allocating a specified space for you to sit down and work can help to make you focussed and keep you in the right mindset. While you are in that space, focus on making it where you do your work. If you have a separate office or desk that is great, however not everyone will have this option in the house, so making do with a kitchen table or the couch are often the compromise that needs to be made. If you can try and have one space that you do your work, instead of moving around from seat to seat, this will help you train yourself that when in this space it is work time. You need to be comfortable so pick a seat that you are comfortable in. You don’t want to keep getting up (and getting distracted) but don't get too comfortable, otherwise you may be like me and be tempted to have a little nap on the couch.

Time

Do your best work in the morning? Or not quite a morning person? Part of the bonus of working from home is picking your hours. Ideally if you can set work hours, give yourself a certain amount of time to do what you need to. It can easily be the case that you’ll still be working long after you planned to stop because you haven’t had to leave the ‘office’ to get dinner etc. Having a work / life balance is desired, however this is a difficult balance to find when your work and life are in the same place. I find setting hours that you are going to be doing what you need can help with this as it can make you focus on completing the job and hopefully stop you from getting too distracted.

Lists

Being a huge fan of lists I can’t recommend this more. I write at least one a day. When working from home set yourself a list of tasks to do in the time frame you have set. This can help set a focus for the day and stops you from finding something else to do when you get up to get a coffee. It also stops you from looking at the clock at 6pm then realising that you haven’t really achieved what you wanted throughout the day and wondering where the day went. Put the items that you least want to do at the top of that list, tick them off first so it’s not as tempting to procrastinate. If there is one large task for the day, break it down into smaller tasks in the order that you need to do them and work through them systematically. Tick the items on your list off as you go so you can see how you are progressing.

Minimise the distractions

Distractions can be one of the hardest things to mitigate. Do you know what you get most easily distracted by? If you’re on the computer, is it surfing the internet or email? Close all of your browser windows and only have visible the page / program that you need to work in. Same goes with your phone. Put it just out of reach, so if a call comes through you can hear it but you’re not tempted to pick it up to check Instagram or to send a message. Any other things that easily distract you, try and keep them out of your line of sight or hearing range where you can.

Jes is a ‘practical creative’ and a very busy lady, doing the business in a digital agency, being an artist, a university lecturer, and small business owner who can creatively be found cutting up a storm at paperchap.com. Follow Jes on Instagram and Facebook.