Working from Home

It only took about a half-hour of working from home that first morning for me to realize I needed a plan. The distractions were everywhere. I slept in longer than usual, then spent time talking with my wife Sarah about the bizarre state of the world.

Sarah would be busier than usual, chasing our three-year-old Danielle around the house. I would have enjoyed joining in on that fun, but I had my own work to do. I had a team and a business to lead through this crisis, and I needed to work. It wasn’t going to be business as usual—business was definitely unusual . I could barely leave my house, much less head to the office early in the morning.

To get anything done, I’d need some rules.

Rule #1—Have a place to work in the house.

Having a set place to work would be crucial. Usually, I loved working on the kitchen counter, being in the hustle and bustle of the household. But I also knew that was a very distracting space and wouldn’t work for a prolonged period (or video calls). I spent the next fifteen minutes organizing my little-used home office to make it feel more workable. It didn’t take long to realize how lucky I was to have a quiet space to work.

Rule #2—Make the bed and get dressed.

A little bit of research on the topic of working from home helped me see that one of the tricks is to make it seem like you’re actually going to work. Making your bed and showering and getting dressed seemed to make people more productive. Since I was determined to be my usual productive self, I got to cleaning myself up.

Rule #3—Be clear about work time and hang-out time.

I could already see the problem of signaling when daddy was available, and when he wasn’t. I decided to give myself some clear boundaries. I would work from 7:30 a.m. until noon, and then I’d take a one-hour lunch break. Then back to work from 1:00 p.m. until 2:30 p.m., when I’d take a half-hour to check in with the family. After that, work from 3:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.

At that point, my goal would be to shut “work” down for the night. Maybe I’d check in around 9:00 p.m. to see if there was anything my team needed from me. Previously when I worked from home, I was very inconsistent with my availability for work and my family. I was determined to draw that line more clearly this time around.

Rule #4—Embrace the flow to be more productive.

I know me, and I know that there are times when I am super productive and times when I struggle with distractions and, well, laziness.

Years ago, I wrote a huge article and speaking series about leadership. As I was working on the plan for it, I was worried that I’d fall prey to distractions. Writing can be a lonely process, and because you don’t have to write it, it’s easy to find other things to do.

An article I read about building habits suggested committing to writing every day. So I made the plan: I would sit down every single morning and write for at least fifteen minutes. If I didn’t feel it at the end of fifteen minutes, I would stop. If I had a good groove going, I’d keep at it.

Sure enough, the first few mornings, I just kinda felt bored writing and stopped after the set amount of time. But on the third morning, I didn’t even look up to check the time. Well more than an hour had passed. I kept writing and didn’t stop for two hours. The time flew.

I kept with that routine for weeks. Some mornings it was fifteen minutes, and I was just done. The words wouldn’t come, and I found myself thinking of other things. And then other days I would write for over three hours, only stopping because I was ready for lunch.

By the end of thirty days, I had my first draft complete. And that was when I realized that by embracing the flow, I could relieve myself of the “distraction guilt” and lean into those times when I was really feeling it.

That experience taught me it’s ok not to “feel it” every day. Sure, there are days when you just have to accomplish a task or goal. On those days, find an accountability partner or post it publicly to give yourself more pressure.

But other times, it’s acceptable to have an off day or two. The trick is, when you’re in the zone, move everything else out of the way and allow yourself to go deep. Maybe give yourself two hours on the calendar for the work, and if you just can’t push past fifteen minutes, give yourself the rest of that time to accomplish other things.

That was how I was going to approach working from home. I would lean into the times I was in the zone, and I’d be comfortable switching to a new task if I didn’t feel it.

Rule #5—Lots (and lots) of video calls.

I’ve never been a big video conference person. I think it was always easier to make a phone call, but that was when I could also see people face-to-face periodically. And there were always good excuses in the past to avoid them (like the Wi-Fi bandwidth was too slow or the video software was buggy). At this point, there were no good reasons not to use video calls, so I decided to require everyone on my team—myself included, to use video calls so we could be ‘together.’

Key point: When working from home, be purposeful about productivity. Find ways that work for you, even if it requires ‘tricking’ yourself into it.