Now wait a minute, Pop Mom. We are changing gears from our new obsession of bullet journaling and planners to working at home?!? What the what? Yes, and no. Wait a minute, huh?
For several years, I was working at home. From the time my son was 2 years old, until a few years ago, I worked at home, and made a good bit of money doing so. My main source of income at home, was through two main companies. One being arise.com, and the other being liveops.com. I am not currently affiliated with them, or any other work at home company currently, so I will be discussing my favorite ones in upcoming posts, with how to apply, in depth reviews of a past agent, etc, and doing more videos, such as arise vs liveops, like this one, on my youtube channel.
You might be asking why two? To guarantee that I would have enough hours to make up my 40-50 hours a week and make enough money being at home to continue working at home.
Out of all of the issues that home working presents, time management is one of the most problematic. How can you get everything you need to get done completed, when there are increased distractions to contend with? The other one is convincing your family and friends, I am working, just like I would out of the home, my only difference was that my commute was walking down the hallway and not driving somewhere. I had a crazy aunt call me one day saying, can you go take food to my grandmother. Which was insane, because my grandmother always had food, always, no matter what. I called my grandmother, because, I would have if she needed me to, yes, but as usual, my grandmother had food, and my aunt was just crazy. We all have crazy aunts, though, right? I hope so, because I have at least two!
Below, you’ll discover some great time management hacks you can implement when you work at home.
Avoid trying to multi-task
It’s common to try and multitask when you’re working at home. Especially, as moms, we are so very used to multi tasking, right?
Whether it’s trying to work on two different projects at the same time or trying to work and take care of the kids, multi-tasking can prove detrimental to your productivity.
Instead, you’ll need to focus on just one task at a time. When you focus on just one thing, it makes you far more productive. Similarly, grouping similar tasks together can help you to complete them much quicker.
LEARN TO BE LASER FOCUSED
That’s great advice, PopMom, but how? I set a timer, and already have that time planned out. For example, when I blog, I know what I am going to blog about, have my timer set, and it’s go time. Log in to your hosting service, and go to add new blog post, and either copy/paste it from a word doc I already have saved to my desktop, or at least an outline, that I fill in my thoughts at that point. Sometimes, like on Monday morning, during my walk, I come up with ideas, and open up my notepad, or tell Siri to take a note, so I don’t break my stride. Once again, being laser focused. By the time I’m done with my walk, my mind is empty enough to come up with ideas while getting ready. Once again, I’m usually telling siri to take a note. You should see my notepad. It’s super helpfull though, because then when I am thinking what am I going to blog about today, I already have it laid out, and usually not just in my head. Lord knows in the morning, I am very slow to get going into full speed, usually. Other mornings, like today, I wake up ready to rock n’ roll. Not literally, but you know what I mean! Time to jump into boss girl mode!
Set yourself realistic deadlines
A good time management tip when you’re working from home, is to set realistic deadlines. You’ll want to compile a list of the most important tasks you need to complete that day. Then, work on them in order.
Set yourself a specific amount of time for each task. You’ll find this really helps to keep you focused on the job at hand. When you work to deadlines, it helps you to get more work done in a shorter timescale. This is because you’re much less likely to check things such as social media, when you know you only have a set amount of time to complete what you’re working on. And of course, I got you, girl. Just jump on over to the my printables hub, and get your log in info, then log in, find the printable you like, or more than one, and download for free! You can sign up for the my printables hub either at the bottom of this page, or on the home page of my blog.
Take advantage of productivity tools
If you take a look online, you’ll find a lot of productivity tools available. Many of these are free to use and they help to boost productivity when working remotely.
Task management tools are especially great for productivity. They enable you to keep in touch with the team, organize tasks and see exactly what needs to be completed.
You can even find time management tools online. These enable you to better utilize your time, ensuring you get the most important tasks done first.
Eliminate distractions
One of the biggest challenges you’re going to face in terms of time management, is distractions. There are a lot of distractions when you’re working from home. Whether it’s the phone ringing, the temptation to check social media, or the television; it’s easy to procrastinate with so many distractions around you.
This is why it’s really important to work in a quiet space away from distractions. You could also purchase noise cancelling headphones to ensure you don’t get distracted by surrounding noise while you’re trying to work.
Time management can be difficult when you’re working from home. However, the tips above can really help you to minimize the challenges it presents.
