Starting Off Right
Remote working or not, starting off your day doing something you enjoy is an effective way to begin. It does not have to be anything complex or the same thing every day, just something small that you enjoy. As a result, you will begin the day positively and most likely notice an increase in your productivity and efficiency.
Designate a Working Area
When remote working it is easier to stay mentally focused if you designate a specific area in your home to get work done. That could be a home office, spare bedroom, or some other dedicated area that offers privacy. If you can find a spot that provides a lot of natural light, even better. Sadly in this context remote does not mean on a deserted beach.
Comfortable Working Environment
Make sure you have the right equipment to be efficient and productive. Things like your computer or laptop, high speed internet connection that supports video conferences, office supplies and a comfortable chair.
Stay Connected to Colleagues
The increase in remote working has been influential in the rise of applications such as Teams and Zoom. Such programmes contribute to not only workflow but also serve as a social outlet. Using Teams for quick and easy calls to colleagues will help you maintain your social connections and give you that little interaction boosts that some of us crave.
Explore the Limits of Your Resources
Learning and making the most of your virtual resources is also a productive way of dealing with separation. Finding something new about the applications you use not only develops your skills and knowledge of your resources but also provides content to talk about on those teams chats.
Maintain a Consistent Routine
Set a work schedule for yourself and stick to it. Try to wake up at the same time every day and treat weekdays just as you did before. For most people, the morning is the time to get serious work done, so try to complete any difficult tasks as early in the day as you can. This not only keeps your mind busy and focused as you know the next task, but it will also distract you from thinking about the physical distance between you and your colleagues.
Set Boundaries
You may feel compelled to talk to your colleagues using your work chat, but you must maintain the professional standards that your team has set out. Create private chats with colleagues to separate your work and home life. This also applies to your home environment, set boundaries with your family to show when you need to be left alone. Things like closed doors or allocated time in the day for socialising and resuming work afterwards. This will maintain productivity and minimise distractions so that you hit your work goals when remote working.
Virtual Protection Using VPN
Some professionals working remotely don’t have technical backgrounds but work with sensitive data or have elevated credentials due to their job roles. This makes them targets for cybercriminals. It is vital to also be a human firewall. Use common sense by consistently using VPNs and endpoint protection against unknown threats and be cyber-aware avoiding clicking on phishing emails or malicious files.
Phishing Email Protection
While you are remote working it is important to be educated about the ways to protect yourself online. After all you will be online the majority of the time. Phishing attacks are quite common when working from home and is something you want to learn how to deal with. The more realistic the content, the more likely you may be to click on it. You must be vigilant with email and rely on best practices such as checking sender email addresses and not opening attachments unless they are expected.
Keep Work and Personal Documents Separate
If your organisation has not invested in remote working systems such as laptops, it is an absolute must for you to keep work and personal documents separate, this is not only for file management but is crucial for security. The mixing of your files could cause a variety of issues for you and your organisation. The protection on your personal drive and work drive is most likely lower and could lead to data breaches or even hacking if information for logins is inside the compromised document.
Remote working from home can be stress free and productive if you maintain your working processes and can manage your work and home lifestyle in the areas that count.
Contact us at www.norfolkcs.co.uk or 01953 857980 for a free audit and friendly discussion on how we can help.