Are you looking for some tips to make remote working from home easy? The coronavirus pandemic has fundamentally and unequivocally changed the way many business organizations operate. Governments and business organizations around the world have continued to instruct those with Covid19 like symptoms to self-quarantine and everyone else to practice rigorous social distancing. The COVID-19 outbreak has caused almost all business organizations to enforce work from home (WFH) practice for employees. During the peak of Coronavirus pandemic, many organizations (including we at CredibleSoft Technology Solutions) had resorted to remote working by asking their employees to work from home (WFH). Even as the pandemic slowly recedes, many organizations are still continuing to let their workforce work from home or adopting a hybrid work culture where a percentage of the employees are being asked to come to office only on certain days of the week / month.
Coronavirus Forcing You to Work from Home? Here’s The Ultimate Guide to Remote Work
For many, remote work is a new reality. How do corporate leaders, IT managers and individual employees make this sudden shift? What can they do to ensure productivity, ease personal and professional anxiety, and ensure effective collaboration with colleagues, clients and other external stakeholders? How effectively can you implement existing best practices or come up with new ones? More importantly, could this big shift in the way we work ultimately change the way we do business forever? For those used to working remotely, this is not new. But if you are working from home for the first time, then here’s how to master it. Here are a few tips for adjusting to Remote Work During the Coronavirus Crisis — and Beyond!
1. How to Setup a Productive Workspace at Home?
When working remotely from home, it’s absolutely important to have a private space for work. Make sure that you have a separate workspace that is clearly differentiated from rest of the house. In most cases, your home office can be a room but if you’re unable to find a separate room that can be used as your work from home workspace, then you can use a a room divider or even a curtain to serve as a designated space for all the business-related work. Here are some tips to help you set up a productive workspace at home:
– Ensure that your workspace has a stable internet connection
– Get a good quality work chair and desk
– Make sure that your home office has access to sufficient natural as well as ambient light
– It’s better if you have the ability to close the door during working hours
– Use a dedicated desk and drawers for business-related devices, equipments and files
– Have a trash bin near the desk to keep the workspace uncluttered
– Make sure to clean up your workspace after end of each work day
2. Equipment Useful for Working Remotely
Make sure that you have all the right equipment that are crucial in ensuring work productivity. Here’s a list of remote work equipments that you’ll need for a productive home office:
– A good quality laptop or a PC with a webcam
– An ergonomic mouse
– A pair of noise-canceling headphones for remote video calling
– A good quality Printer with a Scanner — if your work requires sharing scanned documents
– A Work phone (this is optional if you are going to use VOIP calls for work)
– A notebook and pen — for taking notes of your daily tasks, minutes of the meeting, etc.
3. How to Work at Home while Ensuring Privacy & Efficiency?
Setting up your home office is just the first step towards ensuring a productive work environment at home. The next step is to make sure that your data is stored and transmitted safely when you’re working remotely. A security breach while working from home be disastrous. Any issues related to data privacy or security (such as hackers, computer viruses, malware) can not only decrease your productivity but also put your job at risk.
Here are a few safety tips to keep your data safe and secure when you are working from home remotely:
– Never use public WiFi when working from home — use personal hotspots instead
– Make sure to store all work-related data on work computers only
– Always keep your computer’s anti-virus and anti-malware protection up-to-date
– Only use secure WiFi, encrypted external drives, security protection, and end-point encryption
– Use a virtual private network (VPN) to connect to your office network for an additional level of security
– Always encrypt sensitive data while sending them via emails and storing them on your computer
– Run a password audit to make sure you are not using commonly used or easy to crack passwords
– Take daily and periodic backup your data
– Avoid using USB to avoid malware infestation
– Be wary of phishing emails or malicious websites — always check the email address of the sender and lookout for email spoofing
– Don’t open attachments and links in suspicious emails
– Keep a backup device for work, such as a secondary laptop or mobile phone, in case of any contingencies
4. Use Remote Tools to Enhance Collaboration and Productivity
There are a large number of remote working tools that are available. These tools help you to stay connected with your team and to collaborate effectively. Different organizations use different remote working tools and collaboration apps. Use them to ease your remote work.
5. Make a List of Contacts & Login Credentials
It can become tedious to memorize all these details. So prepare a list.
– Make a list of mobile phone numbers and email addresses for everyone you’ll need to be in touch with
– The above list should cover all your coworkers, clients, vendors, teachers, school administrators.
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– Make sure that they also have your contact details in case of any emergencies
– Double-check that you have all the required login and password combinations (login credentials) that you’ll need to access your work files
6. How to Avoid Distractions When Working from Home?
When working at the privacy and comforts of your own home, occasional distractions are bound to happen. Here are some expert tips to help keep you focused on the job when working from home remotely:
– Even though the prospect of multi-tasking may seem alluring, try to focus on doing one thing at a time
– Create a daily planner or schedule and then try to stick to it
– Take a break when you believe you are beginning to lose focus
– Take lunch and snack breaks as per your regular routine to avoid work fatigue
– Get dressed for work — avoid working in your pajamas
– Switch off or keep your personal phone in silent mode, if you can
7. Got Children? Keep Them Busy with Fun Activities
If you’re currently working from home, your kids might as well be home from school, too. Be sure you know how to log in to their school’s learning portal and use the necessary tools (if the school has them). If not, make sure that the kids have other fun activities besides school homework to keep them busy and occupied. Activities like drawing, coloring, solving puzzles, playing indoor games, or even watching a movie or TV show can not only make sure that the kids are adjusting well to their indoor days but also that they are not being a distraction to you when you’re working from home remotely.
8. Stick to Your Usual Office Routines
If you used to reach the office at 8 a.m., then make sure to start work at home at 8 a.m. Don’t feel obliged to start working earlier, let’s say at 7 a.m. just because you are now working from home and can start earlier.
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Same way, don’t get lazy and not start until 10 a.m. because the boss isn’t watching anymore! Whatever is your reason for working at home remotely, always make yourself available to your coworkers and clients the same way you would if you were working at the office.
9. Stock Up on Household Essentials
Here are some essential protocols you must follow when you work from home during the Coronavirus pandemic:
– Stay at home unless you must venture out to fetch necessities, such as foods or medicines
– Stock up on two-weeks worth of non-perishable food items, medication (prescription and over the counter), and vitamins for your family and pets
– Keep enough supply of sanitation products such as toilet paper, paper towels, hand sanitizers, soap etc to keep your house virus-free
– Fuel up your vehicle to be prepared for any emergency
– Keep track of latest news and updates on your local community
– Always have cash on hand
– Have a contingency plan if you run out of supplies or you are required to evacuate
10. Take Good Care of Your Health
Even though you are working from home, to be able to make sure you are performing at your best, your health and safety need to be given utmost importance. Never compromise your health and safety. Stick to your regular work schedule but more importantly maintain a strict work-life balance.
– Keep yourself hydrated — have a large bottle of water on your work desk
– Get enough sleep
– Wash your hands frequently
– Use face masks and hand gloves when your are forced to go outdoors (to fetch food or medicines etc)
– Exercise your body — Gym or outdoor runs might not be possible, but yoga in the living room, situps or pushups can be good alternatives
– Exercise your mind (outside of your work hours) — Read a book, watch a movie, or play a board game.
Conclusion
Coronavirus may have forced them to work from home today but more and more business organizations are adopting the digital transformation journeys to continue to evolve with the world’s changes. Hence making sure that their employees successfully work remotely from their own homes can help the businesses uncover areas where they’re strong in business communications and emergency situations — and also where they can improve.
We at CredibleSoft, have always been supportive to our employees as far as work from home is concerned. Hence, with our already proven work from home work culture we’ve emerged as a leading work from home (WFH) enabled company to help you overcome these challenging times. If you are an organization that is looking for some expert software development or QA, testing services to be outsourced at the best possible price ranges, then use this form to request an estimation and we’ll prepare and share the same with you free of cost.
