It is no surprise that there has been an increase in remote work. The ongoing pandemic has shown that many roles today require work that negates the need to go into a physical space. This shift to stay at home work brings with it a lot of benefits ranging from location flexibility, easier to maintain work-life balance, and an ability to work at your own pace.

However, working from home has many challenges and can become a burden if not adequately addressed. For this reason, we have compiled top mistakes many remote workers make and how to avoid them.

Not Taking the Job Seriously.

Working from the comfort of your home, which can sometimes be from your bed or favourite couch, can make a stay at home worker forget that this is still real employment. People try to squeeze in personal routine, claiming to be able to make up for lost hours at a later time.  

The best way to avoid falling into this mindset is to approach working from home the same way you would while working in an office. Highlight tasks that need to be done then prioritize and schedule and make sure to stick to the plan. Doing these will help you use your work time effectively, even while at home.

Taking the Job too Seriously

The opposite of not taking the job seriously is taking it too seriously. Often there are no clear cut hours, and remote workers tend to allow work seep into their personal time. Working from home should not mean work is the only focus, and many stay at home employees think that to show productivity they have to always be available to respond to every email or take every work call.

The best way to work around this is to ensure a proper working schedule that gives time for breaks; full lunch breaks, social media breaks, and even mental health breaks. Taking breaks gives you the needed time to rejuvenate, and boosts productivity.

Listing, Prioritizing, and Separating

One of the biggest challenges with working from home is that in addition to doing the work that pays you, there are also personal chores to do. One typical mistake stay at home workers usually make is jumping right into work first thing in the morning and winging the rest of the day, sometimes combining personal chores with work tasks.

Writing, lists and prioritizing them helps with focusing, maintaining a healthy work-life balance, creating a needed divide between work life and home life. For example, if you are more productive in the morning, it might help to schedule work tasks for then and simpler house chores for later in the day

Self-Neglect

With working from home, it is very easy to forget self-care. Neglecting oneself can lead to bad posture, weight gain, declined hygiene, and many other issues.

It is essential always to take time out to focus on self-care when working from home. Standing up occasionally for a few minutes, taking walks, climbing stairs where available, having long shower breaks, prioritizing cooking homemade healthy foods, and investing in a decent ergonometric home office would go a long way in avoiding self-neglect.

Going Ghost-mode

One mistake that most work from home employees make is hardly communicating or not communicating at all. One of the significant changes that come with remote work is losing the ability to talk to colleagues and to network. It is very easy to become comfortable with the silence of working alone and only allow your work to speak for you.

However, it is important to realize that working from home does not mean you are a team of one. It simply means you are part of a larger team working apart from each other. Making sure to make regular and meaningful contact with co-workers on things ranging from work updates to simply checking on one another goes a long way in boosting work productivity output.

Although stay at home employment sounds like a fun and preferred way of working, ensuring not to make these mistakes would make for a more enjoyable work from home experience. Always take the time to think about what would lead to better productivity and a better you.

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