How to Find the Perfect Remote Workstation for You
Since I started working remotely, I’ve become more productive, I’ve learned to get my work done faster, and I’ve been better at prioritizing what I’m working on. I also learned more about how I work and when I work best.
This post originally appeared on the Crew blog .
Remote working isn’t for everyone, but for those who love the added flexibility and autonomy, here’s where, when, why, and how to find the perfect setting for remote working.
Choosing a place of work
Remote workers have an unusual advantage: they can choose where we work every day.
Choosing what works for you means you need to know how you perform best and what distracts or negatively affects your work the most. This may take some experimentation, but here are some things you should consider when working with it:
Noise levels
Research shows that if you are creative, you may need ambient noise . A cafe or coworking space is the perfect choice in this case.
However, if you need to focus on a specific task, you need silence, as quiet places help us focus on simple tasks .
So when can you play the melody? When you’re working on something easy . Handling emails, billing, or scheduling are tasks you can do while listening to your favorite music without getting too distracted.
Interrupts
The workspace you select will also change the interrupt rate. If you work from home, you may have a family interrupting you, which can be a great option for getting you to take breaks, but not good for times when you need a little rest and get to work.
Writer Austin Cleon has found that working from home gets in the way of focusing on writing his latest book, Show Your Work :
“I wrote Shaw at the top of the stairs in the open attic, wearing headphones to muffle the screams of the child. Let me tell you, headphones don’t replace a closed door. “
A coworking space can have the same problems – if you work outdoors, surrounded by people chatting, taking phone calls, taking food, coming and going … well, you can imagine what that means for those in need. peace and quiet. around them to focus.
On the other hand, a coworking space can be a great place to network and find a community of like-minded people. Telecommuters often overlook the casual social interactions of employees working in-house. Even seeing other people around us when we are not interacting with them directly can improve our mood and should not be discounted when deciding where to work.
If you need balance, consider what type of work you are doing before deciding where to work. If this is an easy job or something you want to do in small gusts with lots of breaks, coworking may be for you. If you want to spend a long time in silence, without interruption, you can choose a cafe or a home office.
Logistics
Thinking about it is not the most interesting, but there are many logistical reasons, such as travel time and costs, that affect the choice of a job. No one likes to get on a full train every morning, and research has even shown that getting closer to work and shortening commuting times can actually make us happier .
And, of course, you need to consider the cost of a shared desk or rental office , the effort to move your equipment, and the cost of purchasing additional equipment for your home that might be included if you decide to rent an office.
Ergonomics
The place where you work can affect your physical health. When you’re looking for the perfect configuration, there are plenty to choose from: exercise balls to sit on, treadmill tables, standing tables, ergonomic chairs and keyboards, laptop stands, second screens … you can spend hours (and a whole state) to an assembly setting that works for you.
IOS developer David Smith described a tip I noticed in my Developing Perspective podcast. According to David, when he went to university, the professor told him that “the most important part of ergonomics is hydration.”
I know this sounds strange. But the idea is that if you drink a lot of fluids throughout the day, you will have to go to the bathroom a lot. What is great for your body! You take regular breaks to look at screens or other objects close to your eyes, you move your body, which was probably pretty still while you work, and every time you sit down again, you (hopefully) change your pose. …
I find keeping a bottle of drink on my desk makes it easy to mindlessly drink fluids throughout the day, which means I take a lot of breaks without forgetting.
Choice when you work
I am a morning lark by nature . I like getting up early when I can handle it, and I tend to lose steam for anything that requires concentration around 6pm.
My day usually looks something like this:
This means that the standard working day from 9 to 5 is fine for me. But not for everyone. Some people like to stay up late every day and start walking early in the morning.
Teleworking tends to maintain a different biological clock more, allowing night owls to work and sleep when they are comfortable so they can be healthier and more efficient at work.
There are many things to consider when deciding what time to work, besides when you are most productive. You may have a family to hang out with or other obligations to fulfill. You may also need to sync with colleagues around the world, so you’ll need to consider their time zones.
For example, the Buffer team is completely remote and globally distributed, so every team member must make an effort to spend their day with other people with whom they need to communicate in real time or work directly. To cope with the distributed nature of its team, Buffer relies heavily on asynchronous communication such as collaborative documents, email, or Trello task boards.
In Zapier, you can see how varied the work habits of team members can be when they can create their own ideal settings. The differences between the habits of the Zapier team range from loud music and tapping feet to working in silence and discussing problems with others. We all have our little idiosyncrasies to tame when working together in the office, so revealing them in distant situations can sometimes be a blessing.
Personally, I tend to speak out loud a lot when I write code, which helps me find problems and think about them more easily. When I work somewhere I can’t do it, it takes me a lot longer to comprehend what I think about, so I’m lucky that my closest teammate is working upstairs from me with the music that plays to me drown out (and very patient).
Understanding how you work
Understanding how you work can influence your choices about where and when to work. This is perhaps the most difficult part of your setup to understand and can take a lot of trial and error to fix.
Once you know what you are looking for, it will be easier for you to identify patterns of what works for you and what does not.
How interacting with people affects your energy level
Someone recently asked me what to expect if they take a remote role for the first time. One of the things I told her to think carefully about was how introverted or extroverted she was . Generally speaking, the more extroverted you are, the more you draw energy from your interactions with other people. On the other hand, if you are more withdrawn, you draw energy from loneliness.
Teleworking gives you the chance to get as much energy as you need, but also makes it your responsibility to make it happen.
For a person who is highly extroverted, it is likely that they will not get as much interaction with teammates as they need to maintain energy levels throughout the day. This is where working in a cafe or coworking space can come in handy. You can also schedule lunch dates or take appointments or call during the day.
When you choose when and where to work, you need to make sure you have enough access to other people or enough time on your own to conserve energy.
Communication
Remote team communication is not an easy task. There are so many signals that we perceive and use in our communication when we communicate face to face without even realizing it, and they are absent when you are away. Especially if you rely heavily on asynchronous communication, which is often the case for teams spread across the world.
Filling in the gaps that are missing in text communication takes a lot of effort. Implementing systems to make sure everyone is up to date and on the same page is a good place to start. The Zapier team uses Slack to keep everyone updated, while Stripe and Buffer share all internal emails with their entire team.
Using emoticons, gifs, and emoticons can help add some nuance and personality that asynchronous communication lacks. This is important for establishing rapport with distant teammates and better understanding the tone of each other’s messages.
There is no substitute for real-time communication. From experience, I’ve found that regular face-to-face communication with my teammates made my job a lot easier. Often times, confusion or frustration, which could last for days, was quickly resolved by video calls to my boss or colleagues.
Motivation
I am prone to extrinsic motivation and stress. This means that I need a lot of external feedback and motivation, as well as regular planning so that I don’t overwhelm myself with the task list.
Not everyone works the same way as I do. You need to understand what helps you achieve results. If you get a kick out of the sense of accomplishment that comes with completing a task, you can try using a paper to-do list for a more tangible reward as you cross off each item. Or, you can use a tool like iDoneThis to share every task you complete with your team.
If you’re struggling to stay calm when your workload builds up like me, you can try scheduling your daily tasks the night before, or using the Pomodoro Technique to stay on track and focus on one task at a time.
Giving and receiving feedback
Just as some people need more external motivation than others, some people need more feedback from their boss. I am one of those people. I love to know if I’m moving in the right direction at every step, so the more reviews the better. This means that I often need to directly ask my boss or editor to tell me how I’m doing and where I can improve.
The Buffer team has a daily sync process where team members pair up for a week and make video calls every day to check on their progress in work and life. This allows team members to communicate directly and exchange ideas, as well as support each other in developing healthy habits.
At Zapier, each team member meets each month 1: 1 with CEO Wade Foster to discuss three things:
- What Wade can do to help a team member improve their performance
- What a team member can do to improve their performance
- What a company can do to improve everyone
The regularity of these meetings means that each employee knows what to expect each month and they know they will have the opportunity to discuss any problems they face or ideas they have for improving the company as a whole.
Why work remotely (it’s not for everyone)
Some people would rather drive to the office every day and work with their teammates in the same building than be on their own. Remote work isn’t for everyone, but it has advantages that a traditional office doesn’t have.
Liberty
When you work remotely, you tend to have better control over your day and can often more easily adapt the work to your life. Whether you need to skip a doctor’s appointment or schedule an afternoon appointment, it’s much easier to organize these events when you’re in an office full of people. And since you can choose when to work, it’s much easier to work later or add a little work on the weekend to make up for the time you need for yourself during the week.
Sometimes I like going to brunch with my co-founder Josh. We go on weekdays because we’re comfortable, but that also means most cafes are quieter than weekend brunch. Working remotely means I can extend my working hours to meet those plans, even if we decide to leave at the last moment.
Not all telecommuting is so flexible, but usually the flexibility is greater than traditional work.
Better to focus on results rather than time
When you work in a traditional office, it is much more difficult to ignore the fact that you work during certain hours and instead focus on the work you do. Remote work means it’s harder for your boss to look over his shoulder all the time, so it’s more natural to focus on the results of your work rather than the amount of time you put in.
Autonomy
Another advantage of not looking back at you all the time is that it leads to more autonomy. Remote teams are usually made up of people who are proactive and perform well. Remote team builders need to trust their team members to do their job in the best possible way for them, as they cannot micro-manage people around the world.
And team members need to be able to focus on what needs to be done and make decisions as their boss may or may not be sleeping during their work hours.
If you haven’t tried remote working yet, hopefully this post has given you some idea of if it’s the right fit for you.
And if so, I hope you’re ready to get started creating your own ideal remote work setup. Pay close attention to how you work, and use these hints to decide where and when to work.
First of all, don’t be afraid to experiment. Trial and error is your best friend when walking into the unknown.