How to be productive when you work from home
Starting your own creative business and working from home is many peoples dream. Imagine being able to have control over your own time, decide for yourself when to get out of bed every morning AND how many hours you spend each day on work. What a dream! But how do you get stuff done when working from home? How can you work efficiently and productive when there’s so much that can distract you? Read on for my personal tips on how to be productive when you work from home.
One thing that really didn’t suit me back when I was having a full-time employment was to get up at the same time (really early) every morning and go to work (never heard that one before have you 😂). I’m guessing I’m not alone with this and I think a lot of us creatives can recognise the feeling that the creative flow really can show up at anytime. And when I mean anytime, I mean ANYTIME.
Sometimes I get an idea and start to create early in the morning and sometimes at midnight. And when you feel the flow you can’t just stop creating! At least this is how my creative brain works. So naturally for me, having a full-time job where I needed to get up to work each morning at the same early hour, could get really frustrating the days when I’d been awake until 3 am creating.
When I started my business I remember feeling this enormous feeling of freedom. I mean, I knew that this wouldn’t be a piece of cake and that I needed to work really hard to get my newly started business rolling. BUT I got to work with all the things that I loved to do AND I got to decide over my own time.
And that is my first, maybe a little bit cheesy 🧀 but still very true, tips on how to be productive when working from home:
Appreciate your work situation
If you have the privilege to work from home, you really should focus on appreciating it. Start everyday when you wake up to be grateful for it. AND try to remind yourself about this privilege every-time you’re having a hard time getting stuff done. If you approach your work situation with appreciation it’s so much easier to be productive, because my believes are that productivity has it’s base in motivation - and if you appreciate something you’ll get more motivated to follow through and get stuff done.
Have a work space
It’s so important to have a space that is made only for work. It can be a whole room in your home or just a desk where you have your computer and other working materials. For me this is a mindset thing - I know that when I sit at my desk it’s time to work. AND that makes me so much more productive than if I try to lay in the sofa with my laptop and get stuff done.
Get organised
Chaos is kind of the opposite of productivity. If you want to be productive when you work from home, you need to get organised. Make sure you have your files organised and that you have systems in place for all the parts of your business. If you know instantly where to find a certain file or where that email from a client is, you’ll be so much more productive. There’s really nothing as frustrating and time consuming as not finding what you look for - “but you know you have it somewhere”.
Get out of your pj's
I got this advice from a friend when I started to work from home and I seriously doubted it at first. I loooove sweatpants and all clothes that are soft and comfy - so naturally that was what I was wearing when I started to work from home. But you know what? After a while I felt sloppy and it actually felt as I never really waked up during the day. So I took her advice and started everyday with a shower and then to put on some regular clothes. Still comfy though, but not sweatpants. AND instantly I felt more inspired, motivated and productive to get to work.
Plan your days in advance
Now this is a big one for me. To make sure that I get stuff done when I’m working and don’t just scroll around online and on social media - I plan my days in advance. Actually I plan my whole year in advance. And then take it down to quarters, months, weeks and lastly DAYS. So everyday when I stop working for that day I make sure that I know what I’ll start to work with the next day.
