Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: This week, we're talking about strategies for making remote work
Speaker 1: efficient and effective. Today's tip is about setting boundaries when
Speaker 1: you work from home. Disconnecting can be hard when your
Speaker 1: work is right where you live, but breaks make us
Speaker 1: more productive and are definitely worth taking. So I've found
Speaker 1: over the years that when managers have concerns about employees
Speaker 1: working from home, they're often worrying that people will spend
Speaker 1: their entire work days watching old episodes of Game of Thrones.
Speaker 1: But when these same managers wind up at organizations where
Speaker 1: lots of people work from home, they learned that the
Speaker 1: biggest problem is entirely different. People who work from home
Speaker 1: often have trouble disconnecting. Then they wind up getting burned
Speaker 1: out and their performance suffers, or they quit. Neither of
Speaker 1: these are good outcomes. Here's what winds up happening. People
Speaker 1: who work from home want to show their managers and
Speaker 1: teammates that they're responsive, but then they wind up on
Speaker 1: email or slack constantly. They don't take breaks because they
Speaker 1: don't want their managers to think they're watching TV. One
Speaker 1: woman who works from home told me that she'd hired
Speaker 1: a dog walker because she didn't think she could step
Speaker 1: away from her desk for ten minutes twice a day
Speaker 1: to take the dog outside. Needless to say, if she
Speaker 1: didn't think ten minute breaks were feasible, she was dealing
Speaker 1: with a lot of stress. Then there's this problem. Commutes
Speaker 1: can be terrible, but they provide a very clear line
Speaker 1: between work time and non work time. When your office
Speaker 1: is right next to your kitchen or bedroom, it can
Speaker 1: be very easy to just keep going back in all
Speaker 1: evening or all weekend long. I know this has happened
Speaker 1: to me. I have a confession here. Because I work
Speaker 1: from a home office and working is almost always an option,
Speaker 1: I used to just leave my laptop on. I literally
Speaker 1: never shut it down. Then one day last summer, the
Speaker 1: laptop simply stopped working, which is understandable. I managed to
Speaker 1: get it going again, but I realized I needed to
Speaker 1: stop overwhelming it. My laptop could use some time when
Speaker 1: work was not an option, and I probably could too,
Speaker 1: So I've gotten much better about turning it off at night.
Speaker 1: Once it's off, I can turn it back on if
Speaker 1: I really need something, and I have my phone too,
Speaker 1: so it's not like I'm unplugged from the world, but
Speaker 1: it raises the bar on answering an email that can
Speaker 1: really wait until the next morning. If you struggle with
Speaker 1: these boundaries, you might try creating some sort of break
Speaker 1: to indicate that the day is done. Indeed, you might
Speaker 1: create a fake commute, walk around the block, or run
Speaker 1: a quick errand to buy milk or put gas in
Speaker 1: your car when you come home. Then you can be
Speaker 1: a non work mode. Most things can wait until tomorrow.
Speaker 1: We may think the world will stop spinning without our input,
Speaker 1: but you know what, it's probably not the case. What
Speaker 1: kind of boundaries will you set if you work remotely?
Speaker 1: Take some time today to think about this, and in
Speaker 1: the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's
Speaker 1: to making the most of our time. Hey, everybody, I'd
Speaker 1: love to hear from you. You can send me your tips,
Speaker 1: your questions, or anything else. Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook,
Speaker 1: and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod that's b E the
Speaker 1: number four then breakfast p o D. You can also
Speaker 1: shoot me an email at Before Breakfast podcast at iHeart
Speaker 1: media dot com That before Breakfast is spelled out with
Speaker 1: all the letters. Thanks so much, I look forward to
Speaker 1: staying in touch. Before Breakfast is a production of I
Speaker 1: heart Radio. For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit
Speaker 1: the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.