Whether you're a stubble-bearded/legged, freelance creative or a Ponsi scheme hack, Working From Home (WFH) is a big part of the job. At first the concept might seem romantic – you've got time to make your own pour-over coffee, your loyal dog is curled around your feet as you sit at your desk, and best of all, there's no need to keep your fingers poised over alt-tab as you sneakily update your facebook status at 10am on a Monday.
As
an experienced work-at-homer though, I can attest that those romantic
notions shrivel and die in a pit of unproductive despair as social media
claws at your business dreams and 9 to 5 slowly becomes noon to midnight. WFH is about survival.
Set the Alarm
It
might not seem like it, but routine is especially helpful to the
creative (and/or productive) process. I recently met a very successful
author who is currently ¾ of the way through his latest novel. His hours
are INSANE, but they are routine (2am to 10am) and they meet his needs
perfectly. He has tamed his creative process like a boss – which makes
it his, rather than the property of his muse.
Personally I function better on the 9 to 5. I'm focused and sharp when I need to be and it
ensures that I'm socially available when the bulk of my friends are. I
also take weekends like a healthy individual should – no-one in their
right mind would willingly accept employment that was more than 5 days a
week and on-call 365 days a year.
Learning
to work when it's work-time and to play when it's play-time helps with
the most difficult part of WFH, which is “discipline”.
Put on a Tie
It's casual Friday EVERY DAY at home, homie! Doubleyew-Eff-AYCH!
No,
it's not. You're at your home work-station to work. Nothing in a
work-week feels better than churning out a productive day and feeling
like a pro at the end. You CAN'T feel like a pro if you're in your
underwear – it's not possible.
Get
up, take a shower, get dressed in a fashion suitable to your career and
be the image of a useful employee. If you want to wear pajamas all day,
go be homeless.
Commute
WTF, if you WFH, you don't have to commute?! That's 50% of the reason we do this, right?!
A
percentage of my work is out-of-home and typically that means a 1.5
hour commute through San Francisco rush-hour traffic. Rough.
However,
that 1.5 hour block has taught me something. I'm much more efficient
(and creative, and energetic, and engaged) at my job if there's a
transition period between home and work. I love that 1.5 hours, I can
listen to NPR, chat with my ride-share buddies and even read a book
(well I could if there were reasonable public transportation along my
route...). It takes a lot of the pressure out of the day and allows me
some personal time that I would otherwise only get on weekends.
I'm
not suggesting that you drive your car around the block for an hour
before work, but do give yourself some time between getting dressed and
starting work. I like to sit down with a cup of coffee and read a book.
This is your time, after which you belong to your job.
Climb the Ladder
One of the grandest discoveries of WFH is that you are, to some measure, self-employed. You are
the boss. The discovery that quickly follows is that the structure of
regular employment really did a lot for you and suddenly you can't tell
which direction is up with your career.
You not only
have your own workload to deal with, you also have to do your own taxes,
come up with ideas and implement them all on your own...you even have
to manage marketing campaigns (we all have to advertise if we're
self-employed). If you're constantly clambering over tasks that distract
from your main workload it's hard to advance.
So dump it like a truck. If you don't have time or skills to manage these outlying tasks find
someone who does and dump it all over them (there are plenty of other
WFHers out there that specialize in the stuff you suck at). If you're
lucky, you might find a friend or intern who can do it for free/cheap.
Expect that you'll end up paying though, and that it’s just part of the
process. Start by outsourcing your taxes (ain't nobody got time for
that). If you can afford to feed yourself, there’s a good chance you can
afford a CPA to do your year-end taxes. With a schedule cleared of
decentralized tasks you can start reaching for the next level with your
work.
Be Your Own Worst Boss Ever
Wrong,
child in your cute little pajamas, you need to start conducting
yourself as though you have a conniving, grown-up, overbearing,
metrics-oriented, drill sergeant of a boss. They are monitoring your
internet traffic! They are watching over your shoulder! They are telling
you to tie your laces and straighten that damn tie!
It's
wonderful to not have to report to anyone and to have the freedom to
troll the internet for hours taking coffee breaks whenever you want and
eating all the office doughnuts in one sitting. But no-one is paying you
to be a slouch – you're paying yourself to be productive, so be productive. Wasted hours do not a rent-payment make.
Cut
yourself just a little slack though, it's awfully hard to stay laser
focused for an 8 hour block without anyone around you setting an
example. Try working in 90 minute blocks. Set an alarm and don't allow
yourself to do anything outside of your task for that period. When the
alarm goes off you can take your bathroom break, have a glass of water
and assess where you're at in your day.
Visit the Water Fountain
It is miserably lonely at home alone. It is so nothing at all like the MacCaulay Culkin movie promised it would be...
With
no one to talk to you may start to feel like your closest point of
social contact is updating your facebook status or neurotically checking
your inbox every 8 minutes. Obviously, doing so would make you a
useless self-employee, but don't feel so bad, we're social creatures and
there are healthier ways to get our social tummies rubbed. On that gap
between a scheduled 90 minute productivity block give your grandmother a
call, she'd love to hear from you.
Be human about your social needs. “Likes” don't stimulate like real conversation does.
Take Lunch
You have to eat.
It
undoubtedly seems like no-matter what you do you're swamped with tasks
and there's just no time for a lunch break. You're lucky to eat at your
desk, and yet regular employees (those fools with their over-bearing
bosses) always set time aside just to eat – 5 days a week in fact.
Breaking
up your day by taking a lunch break (out of the house if you can afford
it) resets your drive and motivation to get work done. You come back
refreshed and full of healthy calories that your brain and body can
metabolize into dollar bills. If you leave your brain on all day it
burns out. Consider this your screen-saver moment.
Go Home
I
live in San Francisco so I can barely afford rent on the best of
months. This translates to renting a one-bedroom with my wife and being
very very organized so as not to have our lives constantly spilling out
of the limited closet space. We both WFH, and we both sleep in this
home, so finding a dedicated office space requires some creativity. This
is our 3rd permutation of the WFH one-bedroom solution and this time we
nailed it. Our living room has a super comfy futon and so is the
official bedroom now, and more importantly, the “bedroom” is completely
office space.
Everything
office lives in the office and at the end of the day we close the door
on all of it. We call this “going home”. One of the biggest challenges
with being self-employed (and WFH) is learning how to turn the work off
at the end of the day. After a super productive day I love nothing more
than “commuting” home from the office to my cute apartment with plush
furniture, no computer screens and a cold beer waiting for me in the
fridge.
The work day is over – go live the life you've been paying for all day.
