This post has been on my mind for some time. A few months have passed since I last wrote comparing working from home and in an office environment. During this time, I kept working remotely due to the Covid-19 lockdown. Some of my initial thoughts have been reinforced, and I made some new observations that I’d like to share here.
It seems that, although on the surface working from home is great for work-life balance, the reality is harder, at least for software developers like me. So, how do our expectations of the effects of working from home match the reality?
Expectations and Reality
It seems undeniable that as a whole, the perspectives in our industry regarding remote working have shifted during the pandemic. That is a result of direct experimentation, and confronting what we thought we knew with what really happened.
Before the generalized lockdown, the biggest fear of employers was that employees would slack off and become less productive when working from the too cushy environment of their homes. As for employees, the reasons to avoid working from home can be varied, from not having a dedicated space to needing to see people and have some daily variety. Some of our preconceptions can be so strong that many companies would only try remote working sparingly or by selected individuals.
Now that Covid-19 happened, we all suddenly had to try it, and in many cases in less than ideal conditions. At least at the start, we did not have time to prepare dedicated home offices, and even after months we are not in a “normal” (in pre-Covid times) environment because more of us are at home due to furlough, redundancy or reduced childcare.
So, these are new times, and this home-based work is not exactly what it would have been before. And yet, let me identify a few of the things I’ve noticed.
You Probably Work More When Working From Home
In my experience, working from your bedroom can be more relentless than working in the office. Meetings can be easily booked in succession, with everyone expected to be there on the dot. You can easily push past your leaving time because you’ll be “home” earlier anyway. And there are fewer of the small office distractions (coffee, small-talk, walking to a meeting room) that can break the implacable discipline of sitting at your desk and getting the work done.
This unstopping succession of things-to-do is draining. If you jump from one task to the next you’ll miss the time to organise your thoughts and your notes on what you just finished. But in a remote environment, you can often have meetings booked back to back, without any break.
In an office setting, it is easy to see when a meeting wraps and a new one starts. You can see people leaving the room, chatting as they do so, and small comfort breaks naturally occur at this stage. But that does not exist in a virtual world, where you are expected to leave a (virtual) room and be in the next one in one second, with everyone else already waiting for you. There is no pause for coffee, for quick exchanges on the points of the previous meeting or just for clearing your mind.
Of course, the majority of your time is likely spent on development tasks rather than meetings. But it can also be difficult to create breaks between these, to get up and take your eyes from the screen. These natural pauses seem to happen more easily in the office. Maybe it’s because the office may have dedicated “thinking spaces”; or even an area for a casual break with others. Or maybe it is just more difficult to stop whatever you are doing when there is no one else around that can pull you into something else.
You Need to Enforce Breaks Actively
It follows from the previous section that you should enforce breaks in your schedule. They happen naturally in an office environment, so you should try to do the same in your home as well. Don’t overdo do it, of course, but allow yourself some time between tasks to get up and stretch your legs.
Have time to think. I’ve often found my mind feels more constrained and less productive when I have to think in front of a computer than with a sheet of paper and pen in my hand. Technology limits me. When I can draw and write whatever I need, my thinking process becomes freer and the results tend to come faster and with less fatigue.
I keep finding, time and time again, that physical breaks between different tasks help you make the shift in context. This hard separation creates a natural limit between the previous stage and the next one. It helps you to intuitively make the break between tasks and allows new thoughts to enter your mind and force refocusing to your new context.
Before this experience, I might consider these unwanted distractions or wasted time. Now I don’t. We grow and learn.
Don’t Be Afraid of Video-Calls
The deeper we go into this lockdown, the more I feel the need to see, talk and be with people. I see my colleagues everyday, but only through the intermediation of a screen. It’s not the same thing.
Even if a lot of IT people tend to introversion, Human contact is essential. And even though I find I am self-conscious in front of a camera, I do feel the need to turn it on on smaller meetings. Or let’s not even call them that. Some of these are just regular office chats, possibly around a kernel of some technical difficulty, but often about life in general.
We are not machines. We need these more personal chats. They are vitally important to keep our mental health in a scenario where our workplace is permanently also our home. And when I do them, I prefer to have the camera on. It’s the least bad replacement to not being there with the person. At least, you can still see a smile on the other side.
You Need Time For Yourself
That said, you also need time for yourself. This means away from others and away from work. It is easy to stay in front of the screen for the whole day, but that saps your energy.
As I said above, I often feel a computer screen constrains my thoughts, even if turned off. For creative thought, my mind needs to be free to wander. And one nominal advantage of working from home, at least in the summer months, is that you can go out in the good weather and do precisely that. Let your mind race free while you walk, and sort and organise your difficulties by itself
There is some research suggesting that freeing your mind for a while can help your brain work in the background and solve hard problems with sudden insights. This has tremendous power, and I encourage you to let your brain loose to harness it. Go out for a walk, watch a few photographs (kittens anyone?), even do some exercise.
Commuting To Work Plays A Very Important Role After All
I’ve found in this lockdown that, maligned as it is, the long commute does play an important role. It gives you that neutral time where your mind can roam, where your attention is not required. When you commute, you can finally put to rest the worries of the working day and start handling the numerous things you have to do at home.
Physical breaks, physical separations without any pressure from the outside (and this most definitely includes screaming toddlers and defying pre-schoolers) allow you the time for that clean-up process.
I’m not advocating a return to the commute, of course. But remember that that time had a useful purpose. Carve some time for yourself that you can dedicate to the same end, but in a kinder way for yourself: without the traffic fumes, running for the train, or dodging millions of rushing people in a busy city like London.
Stay Safe, Stay Healthy
I keep having to remind myself (or being reminded by others) that my health is my greatest asset. The same is true for you. An that is before we get into the other people that depend on us and our health.
In her book about how to manage IT teams, Radical Candor, Kim Scott dedicates a full chapter to bringing your whole self to work. An important part of this is ensuring you feel balanced and centred. She mentions taking regular holidays, going away on romantic weekends, having enough sleep. It’s the kind of thing that, some years ago, you wouldn’t hear in serious manager books or career advice.
I grew in this environment where all that counted was the number of hours you put in or how technically good you were. But as Kim explains in her book, there is a lot more to productivity. Not only do personal relations matter, you must also be in your best shape, and that means healthy and mentally balanced. Let’s keep that in mind.
Working from home can, insidiously, be more taxing than an office environment, so remember to manage your time and your degree of isolation. Create breaks for yourself in order to focus your thoughts and recover emotionally. In the long term, this will conserve your productivity.
Stay safe. Be active. Have fun coding.
See you next time.