Working at home: Don’t let it get stale
Working at home is wonderful. The commute is about 30 seconds and rarely is interrupted with traffic conditions or adverse weather. It’s a great way to work, but having done it for a while I know all too well that sometimes you have to change your environment to avoid getting “stale.” Home workers generally have few (if any) distractions, and while that is a good thing, after a while it can get very boring.
I get out and work in local coffee shops as needed and while this does provide a different angle on work and stirs the creativity pot it’s not usually enough. What’s needed at that point is a way to totally change the scenery and get a new perspective on things.
Our friends at WebWorkerDaily have taken a look at this need and penned a great article on how to shake things up in the routine department. They cover everything from coworking to renting office space to get a different take on things.
The author, Darrell Etherington, has picked up an Asus Eee PC 1000HE with 8-hour battery life and paired it with a USB 3G modem to go totally mobile, something we are firm believers in doing. He also covers a unique working scenario where he hangs out in local museums and works for the day. This allows him to get a totally new perspective on things and have an interesting work environment for the low annual cost of membership at the museums. This is a great idea and one I’m going to think about trying. Check out the entire article if you work at home and need to shake things up from time to time.
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I love working at home as well. How does everyone else handle meeting with people? I got so fast having a breakfast meeting, then a coffee, then lunch, then an afternoon meeting! I don’t always have client engagements so I might be working with contractors etc. I finally had to give up working from home and got a small office with a conference table.
I am only 2 miles away but I wish I could have figured out how to do it otherwise. Any suggestions? Lease is up in July!
I own a small business and find working from home often distracting, but it’s the best set up for me. I need meeting space from time to time and often use my local coffee shop as an alternative.
Here’s something new….
Recently I contacted a local self storage location to ask about renting a short term storage space. To my surprise I found out they offered a meeting space with conference table, free wifi, and a flat panel tv/monitor wall mounted for presentations. They offer this space at no additional charge if you have a storage unit rented with them. All you have to do is reserve the space in advance. These type of solutions are perfect for my situation.
I got laid off last week so I guess every day is a work at home day. Work being looking for a new job.
Good luck, Al!
Best of luck to you, Al. We’re pulling for you.
I work from home as a ‘teleworker’ and I like it. My particular work is to do web connected meetings and therefore for me a quiet room with a nice headset and good connections to voice and data networks are a must.
I have done the coffee shop for a break and it does work. I try not to make coffee time ‘call customer time’ so I agree with the previous article where I don’t want to listen to sales guys on the phone for hours on end. Take it outside or in your car for those types of calls.
On the aspect of keeping motivated and active, I recommend setting up ‘lunch’ with people and taking that opportunity to catchup, network and have water-cooler time.
I have also considered co-working arrangements but as an employed teleworker rather than a consultant or self employed person co-working is not a good fit. If I can move forward with my small business idea I think co-working will be a great thing for me in the future.
For anyone that has recently lost their job or is striking out on their own I also want to wish you the best of luck.
I break up my day by working at two difference places with two different computers. One is a desk with a desktop computer and the other is reclining chair where I use a laptop in my lap. Remote control software lets me access the desktop computer from the laptop machine.