We are all facing challenges on productivity as it stands. The recent poll of K&S staff’s main productivity concerns ranged from the pressures of caring for family, both young and old, through to loneliness and a lack of routine. Work productivity will inevitably be affected by any of these points. For me, the monotony and lack of routine is what hits home.
My experience is that work productivity improves when there is a good balance with non-work life. You can take this with a pinch of salt as I don’t have to act as maths, English and PE teacher to kids at home school, and I don’t have elderly relatives reliant on me. My IT set-up was ready to go for working from home. However like many people, my new desk is perhaps 2 feet from the corner of my bed in a slightly cramped flat in London, where the two worlds of work and down time are in danger of bleeding into one. What I have found is a necessity to break up work from home life to try and stay productive in both.
We cannot travel, cannot see as many people as we would have liked, cannot socialise in the same ways, cannot play sports, and cannot go to the pub. Most news outlets have actively encouraged people to make the most of newfound spare time before life gets back to full speed, learning a language, improving existing skills, getting fitter, cooking – the list goes on, and this may be a rare opportunity for those newfound hobbies.
I try to make the most of my daily exercise allowances just to get out of the house. I already enjoyed exercise (and even miss my monotonous cycle to the office just to break up the day), but repeating the same activity or route over and over again for sake of it could get stale quickly. I could get stuck in a rut in something that is supposed to be a pleasant distraction from work.
There are a range of claims online of how long it takes to form a habit – anywhere from 21 days to 9 months, and I think I’ve now got enough time to have a good crack at things I’ve been putting off and try to make them last. For me, the key to getting a new hobby to stick is having a longer term plan. I find that the combination of a regular routine with a longer term goal helps me break up the days, as well as giving me something new to focus on. The extra stage of setting a goal outside of work, be it four weeks, six weeks, or ten weeks away, can give tangible improvements, and improvements keep that activity or hobby fresh. Those small periods of time then start to seem more worthwhile, especially when the days otherwise seem to blend together. I get a necessary distraction from my inbox which in turn makes me more focussed on the work time I have. I can switch off more easily, keeping me fresher and more productive for the next day’s barrage of emails.
The internet is awash with free courses, plans, apps for learning languages and the like, and I intend to try to take advantage of them before the pubs open again.There are lots of free resources available, from Harvard and Khan Academy through to the Duolingo apps and podcasts.