As a Gen Z’er, my brain has been ravaged with enough 6 to 30-second length content to completely decimate my attention span.
In that, remaining on task whilst working from home has been tough. Even though it’s been over 5 months since COVID subjected us to a life of (mostly) solitary, I still don’t feel like I’ve completely ‘cracked’ the secret formula to conquer this situation.
So, to get some insight into how my much wiser colleagues have managed to maintain productivity during this time, I got them to indulge me in their WFH-secrets.
Although the tips are helpful, I now feel like a wildly unproductive doofus – here’s what they had to say.
The Fake-Commuters
“My productivity hack is using the time I’d normally take commuting to and from work with a walk, run, or some yoga, to get my mind moving and transition into that work mindset (alternatively, to help wind down after clocking off).”
“There’s something exciting about re-entering my home space when I’d normally arrive and leave the office that I’ve found really useful in helping me separate work and home life, and stay motivated and productive during the day.” – Mina
“Fake commutes! Do a lap around the block before you start working and it’s like you’re on the way to the office.” – Izzy
The Health Gurus
“Setting up signals for ‘work time’ VS. ‘relax time’ is so important. Every morning I shower and put on pants to signal it’s time to start work. At the end of the day, I have a shower to signal it’s time to relax. I was ending the day by drinking a glass of wine and realised it was v unhealthy but also global unprecedented pandemic so who cares?” – Beau
“Prep your snacks so they are healthy and keep your energy high instead of smashing a full box of shapes (I learnt this one yesterday).” – Emilia
The Digital Darlings
“I’ve been using the Pomodoro timer and it’s been great! Why haven’t I used this before? Why has no one told me this?” – Sam
“I’ve also had heaps of Zoom fatigue. To stop people randomly filling up my calendar with work requests because we all assumed ‘online’ means ‘available’, I started proactively blocking out huge spaces in my diary to write and signal to colleagues to leave me alone. It worked.” – Nick
“Dedicated silent time blocked out in the diary to focus on bigger work projects and also to stop colleagues writing, ‘heyyyy’, followed by a request.” – Celine
The Glow-Upper
“I get dressed like I’m going to work, it helps my mental state! I normally wouldn’t wear jeans to lounge around the house.” – Ange
The Playlisters
“I do have a small playlist I use to get into the swing of things every morning. That certainly gets me in the mood to be productive.”– Chris
“This is lame but created dedicated Spotify playlists to signal different types of work. I have a playlist for when I need to write. I have a playlist for when I need to pull data. I think there is probably some science around triggering a mental state or something that I read but it’s been good.” – Niamh
The wealth of hackery on display here is so meticulous – I’m surprised Telsa haven’t scouted this lot to jump on board.
Since distanced working doesn’t seem to be going away any time soon, it definitely seems like people have embraced a variety of things to keep them motivated.
Whether it’s faking a commute or using productivity tools that help manage time, enhance workflow, or even aid revision making (like Adobe Acrobat’s software that you can try free for seven days), there’s definitely a method out there for everyone.
Even if you are completely convinced doom-scrolling has obliterated your ability to concentrate, there’s going to be simple trick out there that’ll help you get back on track.
