Stay focused while working from home

Working from home is a real thing that’s here to stay. It’s predicted that by the end of 2025, 36.2 million Americans will work remotely . That’s a huge jump from the 7 million who worked from home pre-pandemic. While remote work has many benefits, like saving you time and gas money, it also has drawbacks.

Many home-based workers have difficulty staying on task. Instead, they spend time scrolling social media, doing household chores, shopping online, running errands and even watching TV. When presented with other options, it’s easy to procrastinate on a task you don’t want to do. In this article, we’ve compiled working from home tips to help you stay focused and be more productive at home.

Designate a workspace

When you work from home, having a designated space for work and only work is imperative to helping you stay focused. It allows you to create a boundary between your work and personal life.

Even if you have limited space, there is almost always a nook or corner where you can design a home office. Consider creating a small office space in underutilized areas like alcoves, closets and even the laundry room. No matter where you decide to put your office space, be sure to designate it just for your office—even if it’s just setting up a desk in your bedroom, it’s more defined than working from your bed.

Get organized

The key to a good, designated office space is organization. Your remote worker office setup should make it easy to access what you need, when you need it. This means getting organized both digitally and physically. Let’s take a look.

Digital organization

When it comes to digital organization, the biggest thing that comes to mind is your digital files. Create a filing system on your computer and group like items together. For example, if you’re in sales, keep a separate folder for each account. You can even break that folder down into smaller sub-folders as needed. Give your digital files easily recognizable names, so when you reach for one, you aren’t guessing what you labeled it. This keeps what you need in easy-to-find places within just a few clicks.

When organizing, don’t forget about your phone and tablet. Group like apps together. For example, cloud-storing apps like Dropbox, OneDrive and Google Drive can all go together, while online project management apps like Asana, Jira and Trello can go in a different group.

Physical organization

Physical organization is important for you to focus at work. If you sit down to work at a cluttered desk, you’re going to automatically be distracted. A visually clean space makes for a more productive day. To get organized, make sure you have a filing system for all your papers. Consider an inbox on your desk where items that need to be addressed can stay out of the way until you can deal with them.

Ensure that you have at least one desk drawer where you can organize your small supplies like paper clips, Post-it notes, writing utensils, calculator and more. If you need additional space, consider a desktop caddy that houses what you reach for most often in an organized way for easy access. That caddy also makes it easy to tote work to a different area when you need a change of view.

Set boundaries

Learning how to work in-home is an adjustment not only for you, but also family, friends and neighbors. Make it clear that when you’re in your office, you’re working and not available to chat with them or open to interruptions. Working from home does not translate into socializing or participating in family activities while on the clock.

It also does not mean you can do housework or run errands during work hours. Make it clear to your family (and let’s be honest—yourself) that work hours are not the time to do laundry or run the vacuum. It’s also not the time to dash off to the grocery store, unless it’s a scheduled break.

On the flip side, it’s important not to let work impede your home life. Since you work from home, it can be easy to blur the lines and just pop over to your desk to answer an email, take a call or review a report while you’re waiting for your dinner to cook. These are all no’s. Make a hard stop at the end of your workday and put work away until your scheduled work time rolls around again.

Use your time off to do all the non-work things. Spend time with family, socialize and help out around the house. Being present when you’re off the clock will help you focus at work. When it comes to working from home advice, setting clear boundaries is a great way to improve work-life balance.

Set a clear schedule

Working from home does give you more opportunity to set your own hours so you can be more accessible to your family when it matters most and work when you’re the most productive. In addition, having a set schedule makes it easier for clients, vendors and team members to know when to contact you. It also helps minimize distractions from other people living in your house.

Define your high productivity times

Everyone has times during the day when they’re the most productive. Perhaps you’re a night owl who doesn’t really focus at work until well after 2 p.m., or maybe you’re an early riser—up before the sun and cranking things out before 8 a.m. You should have a sense of your most productive times. Use that to your advantage.

When you set your office hours, take your productive times into account. For example, if you’re a morning person, schedule your workday to start early and end in the afternoon. You’ll have the rest of your day to do chores around the house and attend your kid’s activities. Vice versa, if you thrive at night, schedule your office hours to start in the afternoon and end later in the evening to give yourself time in the morning to get the kids off to school, run errands and do some housework before you start your day.

Whenever you schedule your time, be conscious of your colleagues’ and clients’ typical work hours. If your company requires you to work specific hours, follow their schedule. If your company is flexible and you need to communicate with others often, it’s a good idea to make yourself available and overlap your schedule with your boss, teammates and clients so you can videoconference, make or take calls or get an email answered promptly. For example, businesses with team members in different time zones might require everyone to work during an agreed upon period, like 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. CT.

Email times

The ping of email can be a distraction. Try scheduling time to check your email a few times during your day. Maybe give yourself 30 minutes at the start of your day, 15 minutes midday and 30 minutes at the end of the day just for email. Close your email app in between those times so you aren’t constantly distracted when one comes in.

Schedule breaks

Working from home requires some well-timed breaks to keep your productivity up. Schedule a lunch break where you have time to make a healthy and energizing meal, and schedule several 10-minute brain breaks throughout your day. During these short breaks, stretch or take a quick walk around the block. Moving out of your workspace for a few minutes increases your ability to concentrate and solve problems while reducing fatigue and increasing your productivity.

Utilize time management tools

Once you have a schedule set up, it’s important to stick to it. Time management apps help minimize distractions and track how much time you devote to each task. If you don’t want to use an app, try a time management concept. For example, set a timer to focus on a block of work until the alarm sounds. Then, move on to the next task and restart your timer.

Communicate your schedule

When you have your work hours scheduled, be sure to communicate them to all applicable parties:

• Your boss
• Teammates
• Clients
• Family
• Friends
• Neighbors

You can post your schedule on the door to your office, include it as part of your email signature, and share your online calendar with colleagues so people know when you’re available. Sure, there will be occasions when work intrudes on personal time, and vice versa, but they should be few and far between once colleagues, family and friends know and respect your schedule.

Minimize distractions

When you’re on the clock, you must minimize distractions. You can do this by:

• Staying off social media
• Closing apps, tabs and programs
• Turning off your email
• Silencing your phone
• Using do not disturb settings on devices
• Designating specific devices like a desktop for work only and a laptop for everything else

If the noise level in your house is distracting, try noise-canceling headphones or a white noise machine.

Use a daily to-do list

To help you stay on task when working at home, consider creating a daily to-do list. When you start your workday, jot down your tasks for the day in order from highest priority to least important. A to-do list helps you prioritize your most important tasks first to ensure they get completed. It keeps you on track and accountable, so there is no floundering about wondering what you should be working on next. It also promotes a sense of accomplishment—let’s face it, checking things off a list is deeply satisfying.

Check-in with your team regularly

Working from home can be lonely and isolating and leave you feeling disconnected. It’s important to make every effort to connect with your team, not only to stay abreast of projects and information related to your job, but also to feel like you’re part of the team. Something as simple as a recurring video call can help alleviate feelings of isolation and disconnection.

Bottom line

Figuring out how to work from home can take some readjustment. The work-from-home tips in this article will help you stay vigilant and keep you focused, productive and on track.

Ooma can further support your work from home efforts with Ooma Office, a smart plan for your business. Ooma Office gives you all the tools you need to collaborate and connect with your team to be productive and minimize distractions while working from home.