#PINNED: Maintain your productivity at home with these tips

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If you’re among the privileged few who are now working from home, you might be facing problems on maintaining your productivity in the face of so many distractions. The lack of a boss barking orders or encouraging you to finish tasks plus the ambient noise from everywhere is the perfect recipe for not finishing anything while at home.

Let’s be honest, you’re more likely to upload a couple of TikTok videos or visit shrines and battle Guardians in Hyrule than you finishing the report that’s due yesterday.

If this is the first time that you’re working from home, experiencing productivity issues is normal. To help you, we’ve listed tips below to help you maintain your productivity even when working from home.

1. Strictly follow a clear work schedule

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Suffice to say, when you’re working from home, you’re most likely to spend the majority of your time procrastinating. There’s plenty of time, right? And before you know it, the day has passed with you not accomplishing anything. This wouldn’t happen if you have a clear work schedule set up.

If you’re trying to finish a complex task or you have a deadline for a big project, try dividing that task into smaller goals. Then, schedule those goals so that every goal that you finish early, you will have a breather of sorts before you proceed to the next goal. Not only will this system help you finish tasks on time, you will also feel some sort of accomplishment with each goal finished, leaving you motivated for each succeeding goal until you finish the task.

2. Pay attention to your back and posture

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Nothing beats productivity more than actual, physical pain. More specifically, back or neck pains while working. Most of us just don’t happen to have office chairs and desks at home, to cite an example. Using the sofa and the coffee table might seem to be a great idea at first, but you’ll quickly be disabused of this notion once back, neck, and shoulder pains surface.

According to Dr. Eric Robertson of the American Physical Therapy Association, if you don’t really have a choice on what chair to use when working from home, you can try the following to at least alleviate the discomfort on your back:

• Change your posture often, just don’t stay on one position for too long.
• You can put your feet up, every once in a while, no one at home would mind.
• Put your laptop on an elevated surface, with the top of the monitor should be just below eye level.
• You can also put a small and thin pillow under your seat to make an ordinary chair more comfortable.
• To avoid back pains, you can put a rolled towel on the back of your pelvis while sitting.
• Take breaks. Walk around the house of do some stretching.

While these steps won’t really beat having a nice, ergonomic office chair, it’s the most you can do now, considering the circumstances. 

3. Procrastinate responsibly

Photo by Kon Karampelas on Unsplash

This is something that you will undoubtedly encounter every time you have tasks to accomplish, whether you’re at home or at the office – procrastination. There’s simple no way of escaping this dilemma, a five-minute breather from work can become five hours of mindlessly scrolling on the Internet. This will be even more apparent now when you’re at home, with no boss breathing down your neck every five minutes.

Thing is, you can’t help but to procrastinate. Let’s be real here. You can’t really stop doing this, but you can do something to use that procrastination to be even more productive. This is where the Pomodoro Technique comes into play. Developed by Francesco Cirillo, a professor and bestselling author, the Pomodoro Technique involves dividing your tasks into 25-minute chunks and then placing 5 or 10-minute break time between them.

To properly employ the Pomodoro Technique, be sure to list all of your possible tasks or break down large tasks into smaller chunks. Then, be sure that you are allocating enough time for each task, if not, you’re just setting yourself up for failure or for turning in subpar work just to cover the 25-minute mark. After each task, perhaps you can reward yourself and your followers with an utterly absurd video of you dancing to some jig or dubbing?

4. Separation from work is a must

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At the end of the work day, turn off your laptop and walk away from your work desk. Like what you do when you leave the office every end of the work day, minus the soul-tiring commute. Also, don’t bother opening work emails or responding beyond office hours. Watch the latest episode of a TV series you’re following, watch a movie recommended by a friend, play your favorite Nintendo Switch game, or even find the time to read a book.

The important thing is that you should give your body and mind time to relax, to let loose. This way, once you face your laptop again the next morning or have a video call with your team, you’re all recharged and ready to be productive again.