Covid-19 affected every single aspect of our daily lives and with it, our jobs.

The first months of being on a total lockdown at home where terribly difficult for me. I had to learn how to be at my apartment all day with my cats and keep my will to code everyday without being able to just ask my colleagues, who would otherwise be sitting right next to me in the office.

So here’s 5 things I prioritised while being at home to make my productivity rise again and relieve the hassle of not being able to leave my settlement any time soon.

1. Working while standing

Working while standing was one of the biggest discoveries i had on 2020. Not only does it burn a few more calories than being on your chair all day, but it also makes you become more aware of yourself, which will bring you to the present moment, thus attending what’s in front of you will become easier.

This might work with you too, just think of a place where you can set up your working station a little bit over your belly bottom and you are pretty much ready to go. Bonus points are given if you have sunlight over that spot

2. Blocking my access to random content and Social Media

Internet is an amazing tool that we’ve created and it became a part of our daily lives. Checking our Instagram feed, looking for some new memes on 9gag, reading the news on different sites, sinking all of your morning on reddit, etc.

But even if it’s an amazing way to waste our free time, it’s also an amazing way to waste our job time.

Since I’m not all that responsible on my procrastination while I’m working (or after), I decided to use a web blocker.

StayFocusd is an amazing chrome extension that will block every single website that you blacklist on it. If you are brave enough you can use the Nuke option which will allow you to dwell into your guilty pleasures for just 10 minutes a day. Seems like a challenge, doesn’t it?

3. Asking for more responsibilities

This one seems mostly self-explanatory. Don’t worry about your seniority or your knowledge over the matter. If you are feeling bored and you just can’t access reddit because of point number 2, just ask for a new task. Your boss will sure like that attitude and you are going to learn new things. However the one thing that you are going to love about it is the sensation of doing the right thing.

4. Pushing your cellphone away

If point number 2 wasn’t enough for you, why don’t you try leaving your phone in another room. The constant distraction of notifications will hinder your progress at work. But if you don’t have constant access to it, your reflex to just scroll through it every 2 minutes will diminish or even disappear.

As I stated before, I’m really a sucker for procrastination, so I also found an app to keep myself away from the phone. Forest will grow little trees for every 20 minutes you are away from using your Smartphone. What’s better than feeling that you are growing a tree while being busy doing something else?

5. Working Out

The dreaded advise. The one that most of you will just skip because of the hassle it implicates. However, working out every day (not necessarily during Job hours) will make you feel better overall and will push you to keep doing more things for yourself.

In my case for example, every one hour I do 10 pushups and every single time I go to the bathroom I do 5 pull-ups. This, of course, is not a lot of exercise, but in the long run it will make your body more active and you’ll feel more awake to just push yourself through your day doing as much as possible

Conclusion

So that’s it, do you have any techniques to be more productive while working at home?