Courtney O’Connell, one of the masterminds behind “The Big Ideas in Higher Education” conference and now Director of Business Development at Equalman Studios, put out a tweet recently for ideas on how to work from home without becoming a recluse. I tweeted to Courtney that her question was great fodder for a blog post. So here are 6 ideas for anyone making the transition from an office to a work from home setting to avoid the recluse trap.
For me, this is going to church every morning at 6:30 a.m. It makes me get up early, get dressed, and talk to people before most peoples’ days have started. Making your IRL interaction regular is especially helpful if other people you interact with come to expect you. It creates just enough informal accountability to keep you from letting yourself off the hook to stay home and starting working – or sleeping late.
There are lots of people who will want to get together for a “coffee meeting.” While it’s nice to cheat every now and then and have a purely fun meeting, they eat up valuable time. Just because you work from home doesn’t mean you don’t want to try and stay on some semblance of a schedule, even if you’re the only one making sure you stay on it. When you get out and about to meet, make sure it’s going to contribute so some goal or objective – and will be productive.
I know what I said in the previous point about meetings with a purpose. Sometimes the most important meeting objective is commiserating with someone else who is dealing with the same ups and downs you are. Be sure you know at least a few other work from home people in your area who can get together when either one of you has to vent or really needs a cheerleading session.
Social networks are fantastic for keeping you connected in certain ways, but not in others. You can find people to connect with 24/7 if you’ve made friends globally. Through messaging, you can have some tremendously helpful conversations that are much deeper than people not into social networking might ever expect. But it is SO easy to waste WAY TOO MUCH time on interactions and content consumption that aren’t positive or helpful for you.
You’ll typically have great flexibility to eat lunch on the cheap, and maybe combine business as well (The Brainzooming Group crew are regulars for long meetings at local place with Taco Tuesdays and great Wi-Fi). While it’s fast to grab something from the fridge and eat at your desk, lunch is a wonderful time to take a mid-day break and go see people.
There you go, Courtney, and anyone else wondering about how not be a recluse when you work from home. These six typically work for me. It’s just a matter of making sure to DO them! – Mike Brown
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