How To Be Productive When Working From Home

If you have a job where you work some or all of your week from home, you’ll know how important it is to have a dedicated space where you can get your head down and get on with your work.

Having the option to work flexibly in this way brings a wide range of benefits and typically makes staff happier and helps them to create a better work-life balance. However, as anyone who  works from home regularly will know, there can be some challenges.

If you want to spend more time working from home in 2020, now could be the ideal time to look at how to facilitate that. One option, if you have space in your garden, is to build a garden log cabin that can act as your home office.

In fact, having a separate space that’s dedicated to your work is one of the recommendations from Architectural Digest.

The publication offered a number of tips about how to maintain your productivity when you’re working from home. Maryline Damour, who runs her own design firm out of her home, said that it’s important to make sure you have a professional space.

Her top tip is to think about the kind of environment you find most productive and to set up a space in your home that caters to that.

“Just because [your business is] in your house doesn’t mean it should be any less professional,” Ms Damour stated.

You also want to make sure that your workspace is away from the hustle and bustle of your home, which is another reason why having a cabin in your garden is a good way to separate your home and working life.

Having this separate space can also help you to remain organised, which is another important aspect of working from home.

Earlier last month, the Mirror shared research from Tiger Recruitment, which found that just one in three UK workers have the option to work remotely or from home.

David Morel, chief executive of the firm, told the newspaper that businesses should change their opinions of flexible working.

“Flexible working shouldn’t be seen as an inconvenience, as a benefit that is only open to women, or just relevant to parents, but as something that can help all employees to boost their well-being and job satisfaction,” he asserted.

In the Queen’s Speech following the Conservative win in the general election earlier last month, one of the points raised was flexible working by default, unless there’s a good reason for employers not to allow it, Personnel Today reported.

While this is subject to consultation, it is something that’s been proposed under the flexible working bill that’s been raised twice in parliament.

Speaking to the Mirror, Helen Whately, Conservative MP, stressed that flexible working shouldn’t be a benefit that employees have to request, but the default option for all those in work. She pointed out that 87 per cent of workers would like to have the option of working flexibly, but just 9.8 per cent of jobs paying over £20,000 are advertised as offering this.