The UK workplace has had a huge shift in how work is currently being executed. According to the Office of National Statistics, only 5% of the active 32.6 million UK workers considered their home as their main place of work in 2019. However, some 70% of workers (around 24 million people) have had no experience of working from home, which means the majority of people are struggling to adapt to the new work experience.
A lot of new home workers and students have said they are struggling to stay motivated. This is because we usually go to different places to do certain activities and it has always been that way since we were children so having to do all our weekly activities in the same place can be frustrating. Personally, before lockdown I would have three main places to do activities, the first being university in which I would travel to do work and learn, the next would be the gym where I would travel to work on my body, and being at home where I would chill out. Having all three activities in one place, especially the places where I would have downtime and time for myself is psychologically very challenging and adapting to this pattern most people have had their whole lives seems almost impossible. Luckily there are a few tips which are very useful to restore some balance between these activities instead of them all blurring and merging into one.
A few small, easy to adapt to tips are:
- Keep home life and work-life separate
- Take regular breaks
- Clearly define your workspace
- Aim to stick to a normal routine as much as possible
- Exercise daily
- Reduce distractions
- Communicate with colleagues are regularly as you would at work
The biggest one on this list is keeping home life and work-life separate, as discussed above, they can easily merge into one so to avoid this it is best to have a specific room such as an office in which you only go into to do work. Some people also still get dressed up to work from home and do their morning routine in order to get their mind in the right state and has shown to increase their productivity so is definitely recommended.
Staying connected with colleagues is also another important one as you have gone from collaborating with them every day to no contact at all. A good way to keep connected is by using video calls as virtually seeing someone’s face makes people feel less isolated. Checking in regularly is also important, having set call times for meetings once a week could easily save a business. Another popular tactic has been to have informal catch-ups to reduce stress and talk as a team which will increase productivity in the long run.
We recommend the following for video calls and workplace communication platforms
- Slack – A great solution for text communication and collaboration.
- Zoom – Designed for video conferencing,
- Microsoft Teams – An all-in-one tool which combines video conferencing, document sharing and collaboration
- Trello – Allows teams to manage tasks and organise projects.
- Skype – Can be used for text as well as voice communication
The best solution to all of this working together and talking to each other with passion and respecting that mental health is very fragile during this time so take things slowly and keep employees and clients happy by being as transparent as possible.
Guest blog is written by Jake Biddiscombe-Barr
Instagram: @jake_barr15