The coronavirus pandemic situation has more people working from home than ever, for such extended periods, juggling work, kids, household, and on top of it all, the stress of the pandemic.
The situation can quickly go out of hands and you may struggle to find the much needed balance if you do not set some ground rules on how your day should unfold.
Especially, if you are a woman, or a mom, who is working from home in this covid situation, your typical day might look like this.
Wake up, check your emails, make breakfast for the family, if you have young kids, ensure they are fed, attend calls, cook lunch while attending meetings, feed yourself and ensure others are fed, worry that your kids are watching too much tv, help them do homework while answering slack messages, a hundred things vying for your attention, and on top of it all, the burden of not being fully available for either work or family.
These tips might help streamline your day and bring some sanity back into your lives.
Here are the top 6 challenges of working from home during the pandemic and tips to deal with them
1. Blurred boundaries between personal and work life due to lack of transition rituals
The biggest change that comes with working from home is no clear indication of start and end of your work day, unlike the times we used to go to the office.
Back in those days, driving to office indicated start of your work day, and a signal to your brain to turn its focus to work related things and leave everything behind.Similarly, driving back home indicated close of work day, and that helped you to switch gears and unwind.
But that’s not the case now.
If you are not careful and conscious, you may find yourself answering emails as soon as you wake up, login to check something that your colleague asked last night, and before you know it, a quick something takes up your precious morning moments and you are now face-to-face with the mad rush!
Another mistake we do is because we have nowhere to be, we roll out of bed straight to our laptops, often missing our breakfast and the peace of mind to begin our day afresh.
What we need to tackle this is a routine that guides us. And having a routine that works requires some planning and discipline.
A transition routine can be as simple as waking an hour early, grabbing a cup of tea, catching up on news and emails, prepping for breakfast, having a quick bite, followed by a 15-minute stretch before you open your laptop. Doing this everyday makes it a routine.
Tips:
- Have clear cut start and end times for your work to guide most of your days. There will definitely be crazy days that you cannot control, so you let them push you around.
- Wake up at least one hour before you have to start work, freshen up, collect your thoughts, give your body a stretch, make a to-do-list and set the tone for the day.
- Resist the urge to respond to emails or texts outside of these hours unless absolutely necessary
- Similarly, if you decide the closing time to be 6:00 pm, shut down the laptop at 6:00 and completely step away.
- It is perfectly okay if you set aside 1 hour for some focused work-related work later in the night.
- Sleep on time, so you can wake up on time. Its easy to be tricked into catching a movie, or writing a late night blog post (;)), but do not give in to the temptation! Treat workdays just like regular work-days.
2. Productivity
With so many things demanding your attention when working from home, you may find yourself jumping from one task to another, with little breaks, often times multi-tasking, and in the end, feeling drained and exhausted.
So how to pack some productivity and get things done that really matter ?
Tips:
- Keep your to-do list simple and realistic.
- Get an idea of how your day is going to look like based on your calendar and personal schedule, and list 6( or 3) things you want to accomplish today.
- You can mix personal and work related things into one list, or keep it separate.
- Time blocking is the most effective method to get things done, with quality. For example, if you want to take out 30 minutes to prepare for a certification, or spend some quality time with your kids, find a less busy time, block that time on your calendar for 3 days a week and stick to that plan. Do not do anything else in that time.
- Every time you finish a task, take a break for 5 minutes. And really take a break. Get away from your laptop, walk around, talk to family, take deep breaths, and go to the NEXT task on your list. Taking a break rejuvenates you and replenishes your energy. It is not a waste of time.
- Its a good idea to combine/alternate work and household related tasks to help transition between the two. For example, you can say “I will finish work-task1 and then get to cooking”. That way, you would have finished task1 with focused attention. Also the thrill of completing task1 and a change in the type of work might restore some balance in your energy levels.
3. Day turns chaotic and messy
When everybody is working from home in the house, and busy at the same time, things can slip out of hands turning the day chaotic. Having clear communication between your family members can be the one that could save you.
I have said this before, and saying it again now in a different variation, a day in your life is a project and you are the project manager. Your partner is an important stakeholder. How your day unfolds and goes by is based on how well you plan, how well you communicate and how well you set targets and expectations.
Tips:
- When everyone knows what they are supposed to do and at what times, there is less chance of confusion and things not getting done. Sit with our partner and chart out clear roles and responsibilities. Who will do the breakfast, who is responsible for the homework, who will take them to class, who will engage them for how long etc.
- Communicate with your partner on how your day is going to be like. What times do you have meetings, when you CAN be available, and when you cannot. Do you need additional support today etc. Lack of information may result in unmet needs, over-burden and conflicts.
- Similarly, ask your partner to share their schedule with you so that you can manage your expectations of support. As simple as a heads-up on a 3-hour meeting can make life easier than not knowing it before.
4. Staying organized
There are days when we haven’t left our bed or chair for hours together, attending a marathon of meetings, missing breakfast or lunch or both. Not only is this exhausting, but also results in crappy mood, headaches and other discomforts, affecting your experience of the rest of your day.
Here are some things you can do.
Tips:
- Wake up early enough so you can prep your day before diving into work.
- Prep for the day the previous night if required. Like cutting up vegetables, deciding what to make for breakfast, making a to-do list. This frees up most of your anxiety and mind space
- Depending on how your workday looks like, decide what you want to accomplish and when. For example if your mornings are full of meetings, choose to do some focused work in the afternoon.
- Claim your lunch hour. When it is lunch time, it is lunch time. You can keep it short for 30 minutes. Feel free to decline any meetings in that hour. Do not let anybody take your sanity for granted.
- Even though you cannot travel anywhere, take vacations or time off once a month, or whatever works for you. I have seen my American colleagues take one week off and come back recharged. I am still stingy when it comes to taking vacations, but when I do, I take Wednesdays off, that way weekend is not far away 🙂
5. Taking effective breaks
We take breaks but often don’t know how to use them effectively to regain some energy and put it to good use. Here are some quick ways you can feel good about your day again!
Tips:
- Take quick 2 minutes – 5 minutes break from screen everyone hour, or every time you finish a task or a meeting. Walk away from your computer, do not use phone either. Walk around and come back.
- Do some quick 5-minute stretches instead of scrolling through news or social media feed.
- Set a timer for 10 minutes and spend time with family or kids. Be fully present for them without any distractions.
- Lie down on the floor in Shavasan, and release all the stress. This will take you only 2 minutes to feel so much better.
- Take a shower
6. Managing kids when working from home
This is the beast that is the hardest to tame. Being a mom myself to a 2.5 year old, I struggle to keep him engaged, to really focus on work without his puppy eyes melting my heart, to block his voice screaming my name and attend that work-call, to handle his tantrums and to give him the attention he deserves.
It’s emotionally draining, to constantly fight a battle that you will never win.
So the trick is to not really win the battle, but to find that balance, to be present in a way that is important and necessary and not try to be 100% perfect, because it never is.
Also remember that these are not normal times. We are in the middle of a pandemic. This working from home is different than the earlier work from home adventures. It tougher, because we are managing homes, our work, relationships, with limited social connection and getaway opportunities. Add kids 24 x 7 to this mix, and you have a time-bomb waiting to burst. We love our kids, but we also love getting a break from them from time-to-time, which is not possible now!
So more than ever, be kind to yourself.
Tips
- During the work hours, try to take out 10-15 minutes of time between you and your partner to engage with kids. Either play soccer, or tag or hide and seek, just be present with them without any distractions.
- Do not beat yourself up if they are watching too much tv. Ensure they are taking frequent breaks from electronics and moving around like you do.
- You and partner take turns to look after the kids’ needs. For example, the first half of the day, I take care, allowing my spouse to give undivided attention to work, and post-lunch comes my turn.
- If you have kids already attending or going to attend online classes, it might be hard to fathom how you would be able to handle it all. Here is a small story for you.
- I was in a meeting with our Director and architect manager. When making small talk while we waited for others to join, the architect manager mentioned that her kids’ school is going to start soon, and that too online. She said she needed to figure out how to balance work and support her kids, so she would work on only 3-4 days a week for the first week or two. The Director vehemently agreed, and was supportive of her request. He said, “Whatever you need, just let me know. We will work it out.” Sometimes, its as simple as asking for adjustments.
- Take PTOs unapologetically. Do not try to power through exhaustion and fatigue.
Sooooo the summary is
Things won’t get better unless you make some changes. And you can only make changes when you know what you are doing wrong.
All this reading must have been overwhelming, leaving you more confused than ever on where to start! I suggest you pick one area you want to improve, pick up some tips from the above post that you find helpful and do-able, and start practising those first.
For example, for me, having a morning transition routine is the most important need right now. I am going to be intentional about it and start waking up 30 minutes earlier than I usually do, have my tea, stretch myself a bit, and plan my day, before my little hurricane is awake and demands all my attention!
Did you find this useful? What is the ‘one‘ thing that you are intentional about?
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