Home > Our Thoughts > WFH Malaysia
Work From Home Malaysia: How To Be Productive and Efficient During These Difficult Times
In our Work From Home Malaysia Series, our aim is to provide you with the best tactics and strategies to make sure you get the most out of your work while maintaining a balance between work and home.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of employees have been pushed to work from home. Whether you’re a teacher, virtual assistant, copywriter, or anything in between, shifting from a structured based office environment to a comfortable home poses its own set of unique challenges that could possibly hinder work performance if not addressed properly.
Working at home can have an increase in distractions, with lesser accountability and communication as compared to working from the office. However, this doesn’t mean that you can’t still be productive. In this article, we’ll be providing you with the foundational tools and principles to make sure you stay efficient and productive while working from home.
Plan Your Workflow
While learning to work from home, a vital way to keep your productivity up is getting smart about planning your day. Before you even begin to start working, it’s important to create a set of priorities for the rest of the day, knowing how long a certain task will take and what other work you can put in when having extra time.
You may find it helpful to take a few minutes before going to bed to plan out how you plan to approach the next day.
While planning your day, consider the following:
- Do the highest priority task first
- Take advantage of your own natural rhythm. Do your hardest work when you have the most energy throughout the day.
- Plan your rewards and take breaks throughout the day
This sets you up for success by staying focused and preventing distractions.
Set Up A Working Corner
We all know home is the comfiest place in the world, but it’s important to understand working from your bed won’t do you any favors, no matter how comfortable it may seem. Chances of you falling asleep are very high, and you will most probably have a backache issue soon!
Picking a consistent room, desk, or chair when it’s time to work is an excellent way to tell your brain to associate these kinds of furniture to work only. Allowing you to feel alter, focused and productive
If you are renting a room, you can place a table next to the window to get the sunlight in. Having a comfy office chair helps you productively, and it does not harm your backbone in the long run.
Track The Time & Set Boundaries
Finding the right balance while working from home is one of the best ways to stay productive. Working too little or too much can be prevented by keeping track of time intervals and alarms.
Pick a suitable medium that works for you to track the time and your to-do list. There are many online tools that you can use to track your daily work tasks. If you do not prefer using an online tool, you can always record it in your journal to keep track. You’ll be able to keep track of your work patterns as time goes on.
Don’t forget work-life balance is essential! You can also set a time-off alarm to remind yourself that you need to stop working. If you have been feeling overwhelmed with extra work and overtime, you will need to set boundaries to have a healthy work relationship with yourself, your co-worker, your boss, and your clients.
Be Your Own Janitor
While normal offices have janitors to clean up after us, you don’t have a janitor clean after you. Keeping your home office clean and decluttered, can help you stay focused and productive.
As the saying goes, — “a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind”. Having a messy home office or a room could potentially induce procrastination or inefficiency, which is bad news for productivity
Even if you’re someone who isn’t bothered by a messy room or desk, having some semblance of organization and simplicity can ensure everything stays in order and nothing gets lost.
Take A Nap
Don’t feel guilty if you have been taking a nap while working remotely! It makes you feel productive, and you will be able to concentrate even more while working. We all have to remember that no humans are designed to work from 9 am to 6 pm.
You will need to rest to avoid overworking, and you need to let your brain rest. Many big corporations even have sleeping pods for their employees to ensure they get enough rest.
A short power nap that is less than 30 minutes is beneficial for productivity. It also helps you to improve your mood. As long as you take a nap during your lunch-time or break-time, you should not feel guilty about it. Keep in mind not to have a long rest; instead, you might end up feeling sleepier!
Light Exercises
Compared to our regular office, we get to walk around the office if we need to get up from the chair to clear our mind. Although the space at home might be smaller than the office, you can still do some light exercises. Here are a few videos that you can check out:
By doing light stretches help you with your back posture and backache issues; you can do it in between work tasks or when you feel extremely overwhelmed with work. You would not want to feel too stressed while working; it will affect your productivity and mental health.
Wrap-up
2021 has not been kind to most of us, with all the social issues and pandemic that we are experiencing can make us feel like a fish out of water. Hang in there and do our best to follow the SOP’s and practice good social distancing.
UnRavel is a 360° digital marketing agency that provides digital marketing services from SEO, Digital PR, Content Marketing to Digital Video Production. Email us if you would like to work with us. We don’t bite!