4 Key Tips for Working Remotely

Remote work and working from home used to be a dream that only few were lucky enough to call their reality. Recently, though, remote work has skyrocketed in popularity.

The amount of remote workers has increased 173 percent since 2005 with 40 percent more companies offering work from home or flexible remote work options to their employees.

If you’re one of those employees, keep reading. While remote work is usually just as productive and effective as office work, some find it hard to adjust to their new freedom and the change from a corporate environment to their home office.

We’re going over 4 key tips for working remotely that will keep you motivated and excited for each day at the office (aka your house).

1. Have a Defined Workspace

Our first of the best tips for working remotely is to define your workspace. 

Working from home doesn’t necessarily have to mean working from your bed. In fact, it shouldn’t. You should have a distinct private office space that’s defined specifically for your “work” time.

This could be a spare bedroom, a room designated as your home office, a desk in the kitchen, a little living room set up… you get the idea. 

If you do better working around other people, you could invest in a shared office space like a coworking office or you could head to the local library, your favorite coffee shop, or another spot outside of the house that is your designated “office.”

1. Don’t Forget to Take Breaks (...and Don’t Take Too Many!)

Working from home can greatly skew your sense of time. Instead of your classic indicators that an office environment has (lunch time, scheduled breaks, etc), working from home means you’re going to need to manage that time yourself.

It can be easy to get into a groove and forget to take a breather. It’s also much easier to get distracted and take way more breaks than usual.

Try to schedule out your day and plan certain break times throughout the day to keep yourself on track. Because you’re making your own schedule, you can schedule these breaks when they best work for you. 

1. Work as Close to a “Normal” Schedule as Possible

Speaking of your schedule, try to keep it as close to a normal schedule as possible. This means working M-F during standard working hours.

Why?

Well, first of all, this will make you available and accessible to other people in the company or business when they’ll likely need to set up meetings, communicate on certain tasks, etc. 

This will also keep you from over or underworking yourself. Take holidays off when businesses get holidays off. Take weekends off instead of making yourself work more throughout the weekend. Keep to an 8-hour workday to avoid that overwork or underwork we mentioned earlier.

Of course, if you wanted to work from home to sleep in a bit later, that’s fine to adjust your schedule accordingly. But keeping as close to a standard schedule as you can will help you stay on track and will put you in the best possible position to succeed with work at home.

1. Get Dressed!

“Do you want to work in your pajamas?” That’s a tagline we’ve seen a million times with jobs that advertise remote work. While some days it’s nice to keep on your comfy PJs and get to work, we don’t recommend it.

Much like sticking to a normal schedule, getting dressed in actual clothes (yes, including shoes) can help put your brain into “work mode” vs “relax mode.” This will help you get focused on your work and will tell you that the workday has started.

Then, when you change back into comfy home clothes, your brain can switch back to a “home” mindset.

You’ll notice that many of these tips are focused on separating your home and work life even though the location of both is now in the same place. This is healthy: it helps you maintain a sense of separation so you don’t lean too far into home and work at the wrong time.