Due to COVID-19 Outbreak, most of you are working from home for your clients and businesses. It is one of the effective strategies to control the spread of the virus. But it can be tricky to turn your home into the office. For many, it is hard to separate their personal and professional life when both are happening at the same time and in the same place.

Here are some things you can try while working from home and adjusting to a new normal.

• Communicate More With Your Team
• Set a Schedule
• Stay Secured with VPN
• Find a Dedicated Workspace In Your Home
• Make Yourself Comfortable
• Pre-plan activities for your children
• Invest in Good Quality Headphones
• Use a Planner

Let’s discuss them in detail-

• Communicate More with your Team: Working from home can make you feel lonely, especially if you live alone. In such a case, you should communicate more with your team. You can use a video chat and connect with your colleagues, team members as well as clients. It is not always necessary to talk only about work, but just get connected with your people and have a little fun while working. There are certain video chat applications available today, you can use such as Skype, Facetime, Whatsapp, Microsoft Teams, and even Google hangouts. Whether you work for an IT firm, you manage inventory for any food business or offer expert consultation, you can spend your time on video conferences depending on your work demands.

• Set a Schedule: For those who work from home, it can become difficult for them to set a schedule and work according to their to-do list. One of the perks of working from home is that you don’t need to dress formal, you can work in your casual wear or whatever you want unless you have any video call scheduled. Thus, you can make a to-do list in the morning and stick to it to ensure your productivity at work. It is also recommended to make a schedule for your children so they can stay preoccupied while you are working.

• Stay Secured with VPN: Just because you are not working at an office does not mean your data and system are not a target of cybercriminals. Even at home it is important to take care of your systems, data and network by using a business-grade VPN for encryption. Moreover, stay aware of your company’s network policies for the usage of personal devices, Wi-Fi and other devices. Understand how your IT experts with support in terms of security threats while working from home. One more thing you should consider is the “trust but verify” mentality before checking any attachments in your inbox. If you are ever unsure, you can always contact your managed IT provider and have them check.

• Find a Dedicated Workspace In Your Home: Some folks think that “work from home” is an opportunity to bring your laptop to the couch and binge Netflix. Some might love to work in their living room where they take a small nap while working. This is another productivity killer and distracts you. To avoid such distractions, you should find a dedicated workplace in your home where you can focus on your work and send your deliverables on time to your team or clients. You can work in a separate room to avoid TV and other digital distractions.

• Make Yourself Comfortable: When you’re working from home, make yourself comfortable and relax a bit. That means you can take short breaks to increase your productivity and creativity. Sometimes over-committing too much can also kill your work productivity and efficiency. You can make a habit of taking multiple 5-minute breaks and eat healthy meals & snacks. With extra planning, you can keep some stock of nutritional snacks to stay energetic and active all day long.

• Pre-plan Activities For Your Children:If you are working from home with your children there, then it is important to pre-plan certain activities for them to keep them preoccupied and busy. This can be very difficult especially when you have young kids at your home who will want your attention. You can set some clear boundaries with your family while working to avoid distractions. You can pre-plan certain activities for your kids to avoid interrupting during the work or even in the video conference call. You can even close the door of the room where you are working.

• Invest In Good Quality Headphones:If you are using a brand new laptop while working from home, you will also want to invest in good-quality headphones with noise-cancelling features to improve the clarity of calls. With the modern VoIP service, you will enjoy the high fidelity of your calls. When you’re buying new headphones, consider features such as a microphone, Bluetooth compatibility, long battery life and noise cancelling. These features will make your “work from home” policy easier to follow.

• Use a Planner:Apart from making a to-do list, make a habit of using a project planner. For example, if you are working from home, use a planner to keep track of deadlines, schedule meetings and appointments. There are many types of project planners and task management tools are available, you can choose the reliable & secure one and organize your tasks.

The bottom line

During a crisis, it is easy to get distracted with news and rumors. Our anxiety and stress-levels may be at an all-time high, but by following these work-from-home tips, it will be easier to adjust to working from home. These tips will make it easier to maintain the same productivity and efficiency you show at your workplace. Nobody knows how long this COVID-19 time will last, you need to stay aware, alert and safe. Following these easy pro tips will benefit you to manage your work-life balance while working from home.