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Working from home is harder than people think.
It’s even harder when your partner is also working from home.
And your kid needs help with schoolwork. Or needs some outdoor time. Or are just bugging you because, you know, they’re children?
Now the entire world is working from home. And most of us are learning how to work remotely while the next distraction is around every corner.
I’ve only been working remotely for ~5 years, so I’m no “expert.” But as someone who has experience in this area and wants to be helpful to others, I thought I should write a quick guide on how my family has adapted to all working remotely (and from home) over the past few months.
Some background
Before I get started, let me lay out my situation:
- My wife (Sterling) and I are both working full-time from home. She actually just started a 100% remote job so this is just the beginning of it!
- We both just finished ~3 months of parental leave. So we’ve been spending a lot of time together (even though we weren’t working during that time).
- We have a new addition to the family, Morrison! He’s 4 months as of last week and a lot of what I talk about today will revolve around having a young child at home. Adjust as needed for children of different ages.
OK, let’s dive into strategies you can use starting today.
1. Do a comprehensive inventory of what’s urgent, what’s important and where you’re a bottle neck
My definitions are:
- Urgent tasks need to be completed ASAP.
- Important tasks need to be completed, but maybe not ASAP.
- You’re a bottle neck if others on your team can’t get their work done without you getting yours done first.
It’s really important to do this first because, let’s face it, you’re going to be less efficient working from home for a while.
What’s most important is that your entire team continues to move high-impact tasks and projects forward.
That means everybody on the team focusing on priorizing their daily task lists and being honest about what needs to get done this week, month, or quarter and what can wait.
Having an open and transparent dialogue with your boss or manager will also be helpful here to make sure you’re both on the same page about what you’re working on, why it matters, and when a realistic due date is.
2. Check in regularly with your partner when it comes to mental health
The coronavirus pandemic is pushing America into a mental health crisis.
Depression, anxiety, insomnia, and a host of other challenges are hurting a lot of folks working remotely from home with their partners and families.
If you’re feeling off more regularly than normal, make sure your partner knows.
Ask your partner how they’re doing when you’re brushing your teeth or before you start working for the day.
Other things that have proven to have tremendously positive effects on mental health are:
Exercising regularly. Even if it’s just breaking a sweat or doing a few pushups or squats, this can make all the difference;
Eating clean. Everybody tries to eat healthily in a different way, but if you can stay away from sugar, soda, and processed carbohydrates whenever possible, it will help tremendously with mental health and clarity.
Also…keep your home as clean and tidy as possible. Having a cluttered or dirty house can stress you out, even if its’ not consciously. I try to spend ~15 minutes a day just cleaning, doing dishes, picking up, etc.
3. Collaborate on call times
Just because we’re working from home doesn’t mean no more meetings.
For a lot of folks, it actually means more because companies just learning how to do remote work now are overcompensating.
And we all know how frustrating it can be to try to hop on a Zoom call when somebody else is in the same room, on their own call, about something completely different.
I can’t even listen to music with words in it while I’m working because I’ll get my wires crossed. Forget having an effective call when somebody else in the room is trying to do the same.
Plus, the noise saturation is killer. There’s nothing more annoying than trying to hear somebody else talk but hearing the person talking in the background more clearly than the person you’re talking to.
Solution: split your call times so that only one person can have calls at a time.
I know this isn’t always possible, but if you can, this has worked fantastically for Sterling and I, especially when somebody always has to watch the baby while he’s awake.
At Sterling’s new job, she has most of her meetings in the afternoon. Because my schedule is pretty flexible, I blocked off my calendar during my afternoons to make sure all my calls are scheduled before 2 PM EST.
Here’s my availability in Calendly. Now when folks want to book a call for podcast recordings or discuss selling their WordPress business, they’ll only be able to schedule calls when it’s convenient for me (and Sterling).
And here’s my availability in my Google calendar. This doubles down to ensure nobody can book calls during my afternoons.
Also if somebody wants to book a discovery call with me via HubSpot, because these No Call calendar events are marked as busy, nobody can book calls during these times.
4. Try to make sure not too much background noise makes it into calls
I already chatted about this above, but let’s talk about specific ways to minimize the background noise during our calls when we have a lot of folks at home at the same time.
One way to keep your calls clear from background noise if you’re on calls on your computer is to use a microphone for audio and turn the gain all the way down.
This means your mic will capture audio that’s coming from right next to the microphone and not from across the room.
Apparently Microsoft Teams already does this so if you’re using it, you’re in luck!
Using a basic headset is another way to cut down on background noise. This pair claims to have AI noise-cancelling technology and since headsets like these are used in busy call centers, it must cut out at least some of the background chatter.
5. Decide who’s taking care of the baby in advance (and be flexible when that plan explodes)
We use the time of day when we take calls as an indicator that the other of us will take care of the baby during that time.
So Sterling put more focus on Morrison until after lunch, then I take on more of the parenting after 2PM.
NOTE: if one partner is breast feeding your child (Sterling is) she has to take time regularly to do this, sometimes during calls and when trying to get work done. If you’re the other partner, you need to be more flexible since the person breast feeding does too!
Most importantly, babies are pretty unpredictable. If they decide to have a bad day (or just do normal crazy baby things), it’s likely someone has to get pulled away from the work they have right in front of them.
