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Remote Work
July 7, 2020
11 minutes

The Ultimate User Guide on Staying Focused while Working from Home

User Guide Staying Focused Featured

The best way to solve a problem is to trace it back to its origin, you would agree, right? So the loss of focus amid work from home situation is a problem, but to trace it back to its origin might not be as simple as Brad Pitt’s WorldwarZ script, we will still give it a go. 

Let’s go over a few things that have happened during this pandemic, apart from an uncontrollable hike in the virus, we have seen major industry shutting down and remote work taking its place becoming the new normal. 

Before the entire industry migrated to remote working, 38% of the total American companies were still using punching machines for attendance. With this “new normal” came new issues for the employer and for the employee subsequently. One of these issues was a distraction that sub-divided amongst many other hurdles workers were facing while continuing work from home. So before we move further let’s just do a recap or a re-visit to a few popular issues faced by employees and employers while pursuing remote working:

 


Distractions are real

According to a study carried out in 2018 about 34% of the employees use social media in order to relax during work. Whereas 51.4% of companies do allow social media usage in their offices.

The mother of all issues while remote working is: inevitable distractions. Keep in mind it is not only the kids or pets, but it is also everything and everyone you have in your surrounding that is essentially disturbing. Including smartphones and social media, which contribute the greatest towards distractions, all the apps we have that we use contributes to distracting us from our real tasks and there really is no shame in admitting it. 

 

The Lazy highness

This here is an issue related especially to being locked down in houses and not being able to leave, the more we stay indoors the lazier we become. What happens when we become lazy? We lose creativity, we start finding shortcuts and we plagiarize stuff which ultimately gets us caught. But that’s for another topic, let’s stick with the former: loss of productivity.

 

Loss of productivity

Now we have already traced the reason for productivity, and we find laziness a big contributor to it. Loss of productivity refers to the inability to do simple tasks efficiently and important tasks with care. This situation breeds frustration and anxiety.

Productivity

Burnout incoming

Oh yes, this is important, running on full cylinders and exhausting routines do eventually cause burnout. The simple reason for this is turbulent mental health. 

While working from home anxiety and frustration can creep up sometimes due to pressure other times due to a monotonous routine and never-ending work. These two symptoms piling up are detrimental to mental health, couple this with lack of communication with the office, and voila you have yourself a dose of potent burnout. 

 

Wake up already!

Sleeping at 3 waking up at 3, a common issue these days. Sleepless nights and sleepy days eat up productivity and creativity making you nothing more than typing zombies. So no sleep at night can be considered as the core issue for all other issues to take place.

Less or no sleep means the body is tired; the recuperating time of a body normally is 8 hours, which is also the amount of sleep a person needs, coincidence I think not. So no sleep means, starting the day late, inviting pressure from peers, going through tasks rapidly with no real conviction and just getting stuff done. Repetition of this cycle can and will cause burnout. 

So after going through the previous predicament, we can establish a course of action for the future that would help not only you but people around you dealing with similar issues all the while enhancing your productivity and bringing the positive vibe back in your life. A brief introduction of the common factors impacting performance and focus during remote working, let’s get to the point of dealing with them one by one. 

It is important to notice a few pointers regarding remote working before we further explain how Staff Timer App is exactly what you need. During this Pandemic 39%, fewer people globally visited their offices making remote work inevitable. So for you to get your focus back on track here are some pointers from the best remote working solution: Staff Timer App.

meet stafftimer app


Go to sleep

According to the sleep association in the USA, they report 37.09% of 60 million Adults, with sleeping disorders, report unintentional falling to sleep during the day.  It only gets dangerous from here on, 4.09% of that population reported falling asleep or dozing off behind the wheels. 

Remember the lullaby back when we were toddlers, go to sleep, we need that right now. Remember your entire life depends upon how you spend your night, no puns, so try sleeping on time. The reason for that is you need a full 8 hours sleep to function normally and at full capacity. Also when you spend your entire day staring at your screen it is better to give your eyes rest because 10 hours of screen time is by no means a healthy habit. 

 

Eat healthily

Now before we enter the tech and other areas of the discussion it is essential that one keeps full track of their health, being at home puts us at an extra advantage that we often take for granted, we have “food at home”. Yes so say goodbye to the oily chicken burgers from the office cafe. Eating healthy food, fruits and nuts are essential for enhancing brain activity Vitamin C, B3, B6, and B12 are an absolute necessity to increase focus and there is only one way you get this in abundance, fruits, and nuts. So eat healthily

Now here we are to the technical aspect of the discussion where we uncover simple tools that can help you focus and push your burnout farther ahead and keep you fresh Staff Timer App here is how simply an app can keep you focused and keep you fresh and take care of all your worries regarding work and productivity. 

 

Distraction disabled

Since the pandemic struck us down 88% of the companies have encouraged their employees to work from home or remotely. Whereas in contrast prior to the pandemic 3.4% of the U.S  population works remotely already. 

The first and foremost issue we uncovered was the advent of countless distractions ever since we’ve moved to remote working, now how do you disable them? The answer is simple, staff Timer App: it calculates the total hours worked minus the idle time. This feature keeps the user on toes regarding idle time and also keeps him or her away from social media apps and other distractions. 

The other efficient way to deal with this is to choose a workplace that has less or no distraction, no TV work beside a landline you are already logged into the Staff Timer App you don’t need a smartphone for communication. 

 

Break the habit

Quit taking breaks after every twenty minutes of writing an application or blog. The best way to deal with it is by taking a regular break during the work for an hour or an hour and a half. In this hour you can carry on with everything you have a habit of, jump on the couch, watch TV or scroll through your feed, have lunch, relax in this time and continue working afterward it will freshen up your perspective and give new ideas. 

Never ignore the need for a break. It is important not only for you but also for people around you all that pent up frustration and anxiety needs to be let go of to get a focus on the task at hand. 

 

Run baby run!

Prior to any ideas that you get reading this, it is just to capture attention. Exercise is the key to focus and self-discipline and both these qualities walk hand in hand. Exercise keeps your body healthy and minds fresh, how so? There is an entire science behind this. When we exert ourselves in certain or exercise we increase the intake of oxygen hence increasing the run of oxygenated blood from lungs to all parts of the body and especially the brain providing the brain with fresh ideas and enhancing focus keeping yourself healthy too. So bottom line exercise helps with focus. Now the app might not measure calories burnt, for now, but it allows you to have sufficient time for yourself. 

Read how Staff Timer App is promoting Work-Life balance.

Stay ahead of the curb

Now this here is a tricky one: remember the sleeping issue? This is where it comes in handy. Sleeping early or even in time gives you a great advantage. You can start your day early and the 8 hours of your work can begin at 9 if you like giving you ample time in the evening to be with your family and friends and spend time with your loved ones.

Although we have mentioned it previously it is important to understand the effects it will have on your day. Start your day early login and start your StaffTimer App to get through to the pending tasks first thing in the morning. This will leave you with only the major tasks or urgent tasks. 

Testing Project ABC


Get productivity back 

In a  Gallup survey of 7,500 full-time employees reported burnout and an additional 44% felt burned out also. 

Now the biggest challenge is to get the quality without initiating the burnout. This is highly unlikely if there is no way to measure productivity or results. Luckily the Staff Timer App measures the mouse clicks and keystroke all the while showing an idle percentage so that the user and the employer are on the same page. This is how you stay productive throughout the project or day. 

 

Communication is the key

Most issues happen because of lack of communication of clients with the team and team lead with the team itself, so all it does is create uncertainty and tasks start getting pushed away and the lack of transparency and the absence of the team lead front causes issues and serious slack. Staff Timers App’ 2-way in-app audio communication resolves this issue with constant and instant feedback so there is no lagging and everyone is focused on the work that has been assigned to them. 

So these were a few techniques that could actually help you during these distressing times, remember we all are frustrated about the monotony of our routines and since we all feel locked up but there are ways to counter any self-harm thoughts.
Recording ScreenThere are help centers and anon chat rooms designed especially for this. If you feel too much work just stop and relax. Take a day or two off, relax, sleep, walk bare feet on the grass to make yourself feel better, and always remember we will get through this.

Staff Timer App understands that during 2020 a global recession will be in effect and the situation is not getting better anytime sooner not at least for these 12 months. So to facilitate the business community we now offer free services for 7 days. With this impending recession, one thing must be considered above all others that remote working is the future. It is our job to make it essentially easy and do-able, 56% of the total companies are already working from home.