COVD-19 hit and blew our normal daily lives out of the water. I have been battling this week with working from home. It has been frustrating and stressful. Not just getting myself up and running but also my wife. Then there are two school kids to get online and doing their school work. Then there is a three-year-old to entertain without letting him being plugged into an iPad all day.
I had never really given a thought to the difference between ‘home working’ and ‘remote working’.
The idea of working from home excited me. It meant setting yourself up for being able to work anywhere. The reality, however, is very different.
With COVID-19, ‘home working’ means ‘home working’. You can’t leave the house. You feel stuck in. Trapped.
I think in my ‘dream lifestyle’, I was actually thinking of ‘working remotely’. Being able to write on my phone whilst out for a walk. Being able to flip open a laptop and log in whilst drinking an Americano in a café. Being able to work and research from my own laptop whilst gathering books and journals from a library.
‘Working remotely’ was not being trapped indoors for an indefinite amount of time.
What makes ‘home working’ so difficult? What are the major obstacles we face?
Routine
Normally we get up. Get dressed. Drop the kids off at school. Take the commute to the office. Get the work done in the office. Go home. Have dinner with the family. Go to bed.
We might do some slightly more exciting things on a weekend.
COVID-19 has turned all that upside down.
The first day of working at home I tried using the old routine. Logging on between 9am and 10am. Working until lunch. Having 1 hours break. Then working on until 5pm to 6pm.
It didn’t work. The wife was asking how to do this and that? Where was this button? This doesn’t look like the old one. Where has my file gone?
Then the kids were asking where to access certain Websites. How to do this. Where do I find that?t? My mouse isn’t working. My screen has gone blank.
I couldn’t do my own work. I couldn’t access certain systems during the day. There were too many people using it.
I decided to get up early. Start at 5:30am then have half a days worth of work done by 9am. I could then get on the system. Nobody else was up in the house. No distractions.
It worked for a while. But I was very tired by the weekend.
Equipment
A big part of the frustration was the IT. I was mainly using laptops and mini PCs that were 10 years old. I installed windows 10 on them. I got them up and running.
Anything outside of light web browsing and email and the computers would freeze. They would crash. They would just give up. Sometimes they wouldn’t even try in the first place.
This affected everyone. There were tears. There was shouting. There were clenched fists. There were gritted teeth.
My employer kindly supplied a laptop towards the end of the week. What a difference. Things were so fast. It didn’t give up. It didn’t crash. It did what it was supposed to do.
Having the right equipment makes a big difference. Having the wrong equipment can be a big obstacle.
Environment
When I first started off I sat at the dining table all day. Hunched over a laptop. Surrounded by my kids and wife. My neck, shoulders and back would start to ache halfway through the day. I could feel the strain and tension in my body.
I decided that a standing desk may benefit me. I mentioned the bookcase with an incorrect part in another post. I realised I could drill the correct holds in the incorrect piece and I could maybe make the bookcase work. And I did. It was just wide enough to stand a monitor at face height. I could position the keyboard around navel height. I could now stand part of the day stood up.
I would also find the people around me distracting. The children’s TV programmes were annoying. The questions were frustrating.
I positioned the bookcase in my bedroom. Out of the way. Nice and quiet. Free from distractions. As well as the standing up desk, I also found a folding table and chair which I could put at the end of the bed. I could close the door on the noise and distractions.
Takeaways
Working from home has presented opportunities. It has also presented obstacles. Obstacles that needed to be overcome.
Trying to fit your old routine into your new day won’t work. You need to find a new rhythm to the day. Allow yourself to experiment. I have found it easier to work on a morning and late afternoon/evening. Early afternoon I struggle. I did it better to work a couple of hours then take a 1-hour break. And repeat.
To work from home you need the right equipment. Trying to do proper work on a 10-year-old laptop doesn’t work. Before my work offered me a laptop, looked to purchase a laptop or computer myself. I found websites where you could buy computers on interest-free credit over 24 or 36 months. Spending £20 a month would be well worth it to be able to do my job.
When working at home you need to play with your environment. Do you like it quiet? Do you like the TV in the background? Do you like music or the radio on? Do you want to sit or stand? Sit in a chair or on an exercise ball? Do you like it warm or cold? Light or dark?
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