4 ways to maintain a work/life balance when working from home

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It is quite the luxury to wake up 10 minutes before your 9am meeting, throw on a tailored shirt and click ‘Join Meeting’ while looking presentable up the top, but sporting pyjama pants below. Social media has been a catalyst in showing the humours of virtual working life, watching baby boomers work Zoom for the first time and that one employee who forgot to hit mute, but in and among all the perks of working from home, employees are struggling to realise how this new way of working is affecting their routine in the workplace. Start and finish times have become blurred, lunch breaks have become shortened or even skipped, and at the pinnacle, employees are feeling an overwhelming pressure to over-perform in order to keep their jobs and prove to their bosses that they are reliable, whether they are in the office or not.

How do we find the perfect balance with work and home life when the two worlds collide?

  1. Set boundaries and close your laptop at finish time

For you, it might be 5pm, for others it may be 9pm, but whenever it is that you are scheduled to finish work, it’s important to set that boundary and close the laptop lid! Sign off completely, including email checking. Clients and colleagues have a great way of making it seem like their email is urgent and must be addressed immediately. The truth is,most of the time, it can wait until the morning and most of the time, your client or colleague will understand. Don’t put unnecessary pressure on yourself.

  1. Take regular breaks

As you would in the office, it is important to step out of your chair or your office and go for a walk. It might be to the kitchen and back for more coffee or it might be down the street with your dog to get some fresh air. Either way, taking a break, especially from screens, has proven to be incredibly beneficial for brain function and increases the ability to retain information and increase productivity.

To build on this, make sure you take your lunch break! Not stopping to put sustenance into your body on a break can be detrimental to job performance and even human interaction. We need brain power and food is our fuel! Eat a healthy lunch, take a time-out, and come back feeling fresh and ready to tick off the next task.

  1. Get dressed

We joke about the pyjama pants, however waking up in the morning and changing into fresh work clothes to kick start your day can be much more beneficial for the way we work from home. It helps disassociate your work time from your sle time and can help you feel more motivated. It’s about getting yourself out of your sleepwear to remind your body that it’s time to work!

  1. Leave work at work

It’s common to finish work and still be caught up on a report with an impending due date, or a presentation that’s far from finished. Although it’s easier said than done, it’s important to make a conscious effort to try to keep your thoughts away from work after hours. Spend time with family or your pet, read a book, watch a movie with take away food or FaceTime your friends. The intention is to draw a line between your work and your life.

‘Enjoy your job and you’ll never work a day in your life’ is a saying we hear too much yet one we need to hear more. It’s not about enjoying every little detail, but more about feeling valued in your position and feeling balanced and dedicated to your work and your life, whether at home or in the office. It’s easy to remain conscious of the working situation that the global pandemic has put on us, but the most efficient employees are the ones who make a conscious effort to draw a line between home life and work life, even if they are under the same roof.

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