Tag: organization

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How I stay organized working from home – work edition

organized woman working from home with laptop
laptop working from home organization tips

First of all, I want to thank everyone who has visited my blog and also liked my Facebook page. Although this is a new thing for me, and I am learning so much, the feedback was overwhelming. And I am so grateful for the positive response.

Now, the topic for today – organization. This is probably one that comes the easiest for me to talk about :D. And if you know me a little bit you know why I’m saying this. And if you don’t, well, fun fact about me, a while ago my close friend Steph was telling people I am sometimes more “German” than her :).

Anyway…so, I thought I would cover today the tips and tricks I use to stay organized at work. Just to keep it short and readable. And will have another post later on regarding the tools I use for personal organization purposes.

PLANNING – take time to save time

As mentioned in one of my previous posts regarding My top 3 tips about working from home, planning is one of my secret weapons. And here I do 2 things.

  1. I take Sunday evening 1 hour to plan my upcoming week. First I work in large chunks. I figure out when I need to block time in my calendar for personal errands and what time slots are non-negotiables from a work priority perspective. I also look for intervals I can block for email, focus time and other key tasks. Then I check which meetings I still need to schedule, which I need to move and so on. While I am getting into Personal Assistants like Cortana and I am training my Assistant Bot to help with my calendar, I don’t feel comfortable yet delegating this.
  2. Every morning, I take 15min to plan my day. I review key meetings I need to participate in and I decide on the key tasks I aim to complete for the day. This gives me a good indication of achievement and effectiveness at the end of the day. For this I use a good old to-do list. And that is simply because I love the feeling of crossing items off the list. I tried OneNote to-do lists (here is a video tutorial in case you want to try it out), I tried Digital sticky notes, yet nothing is as satisfying as my hand written to-do list. Even if the millenials in my team keep telling me I am old fashioned 😀

CALENDAR – give your calendar the power to tell you what to do

I’d be dead without my Outlook calendar. I use it religiously for both work and personal reasons. And I have everything in it – work related meetings, tasks I need to focus on, personal approintments for me and my family – EVERYTHING. And I feel my brain does not need to spend any more effort and energy remembering what I need to do. I just do what it tells me to do. Basically Outlook is more my boss than my actual manager :D. If you are not using a digital calendar, I encourage you to. It is lifechanging, trust me. And of course, you don’t need to use Outlook, it is just my choice because it is straightforward and integrated with my email.

Moreover, it is available on all my devices. And trust me, that makes a huge difference. Because slowly but surely, my phone is becoming my main device for work as well. And having my calendar at hand on the go allows me to stay organized and manage my time all in one place.

INTENTION AND DISCIPLINE – it’s hard but I cannot recommend it enough

“We don’t have to be smarter than the rest, we have to be more disciplined than the rest.” – Warren Buffett

This last one is in fact a segway from the previous one. And that is the fact that I start my days with a clear intention to be productive, to start on time and end on time. Not only the day as a whole, but also each time block I have in my calendar for the day. And I know, this takes a lot of discipline and for many it requires effort at least at the beginning – like any other habit you want to develop. But trust me, once you do it, it works like magic. You will start being more productive and many times finishing earlier than planned. Which is a nice treat both for you and your work colleagues. Everybody appreciates time back.

I hope you found some inspiration here. I’d love to hear your feedback if you try any of these.

Until next time,

Laura

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The 5 biggest challenges while working from home and how to overcome them

Working from home is a lifestyle that many believe they’d enjoy as they choose to think only of the benefits: flexibility, comfort, no commuting time. But once they get the opportunity to try remote working, many find it challenging. So today I will cover some of the biggest challenges I have encountered while working from home and what I’ve done to overcome these.

1. LONELINESS

I wanted to start with this one as it seems to be, at least in my experience so far, THE biggest, yet somehow unexpected, challenge many encounter. Although obvious that one is moving from working in an office surrounded by co-workers, to being alone in their home office, this is one aspect that many seem to be blindsided by. Or at least its impact is somewhat underestimated by many. And, regardless whether you are on introvert or an extravert, you will find this to be a challenge as well at some point in time.

In my case, I am quite comfortable being alone as I find it easier to focus and that helps me be more effective. Nonetheless, I do feel lonely at times. And so, recently I have made a few changes to my working routine that seem to be really helping:

  • I work every Friday from a different cafe. Sometimes I choose the same one if I lack inspiration 😉 What this does, is it allows me to be surrounded by and interract with others, I meet new people and it also forces me to get ready and presentable 🙂
  • I do all my conference calls on Teams with the video on. Again, this not only allows me to see my team and my co-workers and makes the interraction more personal, but it also requires some getting ready and puts me in a proper “working mode”.
  • Thirdly, and this is something I have not tried yet but I am planning to try it out really soon, you could use a co-working space. Nowadays there are more and more of these spaces made available to remore workers and digital nomads. Selina is the one I’ve heard most about, but here in Zurich we have one dedicated to women called Birdhaus which offers a great environment for women of all backgrounds to meet.

2. WORK LIFE BALANCE

As mentioned in my previous blog about My Top 3 Tips about working from home balance is key if you want to myke this lifestyle an enjoyable experience. Taking care of yourself, and consciously deciding ony our start and end working times is crucial. This allows you to spend more quality time with your friends and family, as well as to take time for yourself.

A few other things that work for me:I set up reminders to take breaks, in my Outlook calendar.f

All of my team members and co-workers know I stop work officially at 5:30pm so I don’t take any calls or join any meetings after this time. I have blocked my time in my calendar too so people cannot cheat ;). If you don’t believe you are disciplined enough, I suggest you schedule activities or personal appointments around the time you want to stop working, so you don’t get to cheat either. It’s all about seld-discipline and intention.

3. DISTRACTIONS

This is such an obvious yet annoying one. And it’s not just the distractions around you: your phone, the TV – in case you still watch it, the pot on the stove, the washing machine having finished the load, the door bell, but it’s the work distractions too. Since you are not there in person, many tend to assume you are always available and thus feel fine calling or “pinging” you any time. I will come back to remote working etiquette in another post soon as it is a topic that I find fascinating and think more people should understand these things 😀

4. PERSONAL WELLNESS

Don’t forget to eat and drink enough water. Coffee does not give you more than a short energy boost. And trust me, I am guilty of living on caffeine till late hours in the afternoon when I realize I need to eat otherwise I cannot keep focusing. So I am not one to follow here, but nourishing your body is just as, if not more, important while working from home as it is when you are in an office. And this is because when working from home you have no one else to remind you it’s lunchtime than your own body – so don’t ignore it to finish “just this one more task”.

5. COMMUNICATION

Last, but not least, another aspect that many find challenging when working from home is communication. Ability to bring clarity in your communication and ask quoestions when needed is crucial to being successful here. Otherwise, either you or your co-workers will need to redo a lot of work – and trust me, I’ve been there ;).


“When the bulk of your communication happens via email and the like, it doesn’t take much for bad blood to develop unless everyone is making their best effort to the contrary. Small misunderstandings that could have been nipped in the bud with the wink of an eye or a certain tone of voice can quickly snowball into drama.” –
Basecamp founders Jason Fried and David Heinemeier

Again, I’ll come back to this topic in a separate post as, over the years I’ve learned a few skills that come in handy here.

All in all, remote working is not easy and it is certainly not for everyone. But as long as you understand the pros and the cons, and the positives compensate for the compromises, then I suggest you give it a try. You might enjoy it afterall.

Until next time,

Laura