Most people out there look at running a company or working from the comfort of home as a blessing. And granted, this work arrangement does offer countless benefits that make it worth it. But all these perks come with a corresponding set of challenges stay-at-home parents and entrepreneurs need to tackle on a daily basis.
Of course, if we conducted a survey, the problem that would probably climb to the number one spot would be time management, or more precisely, the inability to perform it effectively when family and professional lives are so closely interwoven. Well, let’s take a look at a couple of neat time management tips that should help all home-based employed parents solve this common problem and reach their full potential.
Set yourself up a secluded home office
This is one of the absolute essentials for making your work from home work. Granted, you want to stay home and make yourself available to your family whenever possible. But, some line of separation needs to exist to make both your private and professional life successful. So, be sure to allocate one part of the house only for yourself and set up a productive, comfortable, and distraction-free home office. Also, be sure to get the best possible office equipment to make your time there well-spent and get back to your family faster. All of your household chores should be scheduled for after you finish the work here.
Invest into your personal wellbeing
No amount of care you give to others matters if you hurt yourself in the process. But, how to stay safe and healthy in the COVID era we live in at the moment? Well, for a start do your best to attend all the seminars and perform as much of your task online. Second – start working out since regular exercise has a very positive influence both on physical and mental health. In this case, we suggest that you set up a gym at home. Finally, use every opportunity to relieve anxiety and stress in whatever way you see fit. Working out, therapy sessions, or hanging out with friends are all good ways to charge your batteries.
Use apps to streamline chores
We are, of course, talking both about your professional and private life – failing to efficiently go through the challenges of one area will inevitably spill into the other. Fortunately, this problem can be solved by using some of the myriad tools designed to make your daily chores much easier and more enjoyable. For instance, the parenting app Mumli allows you to get in touch with other parents and find answers to some usual and less usual parenting questions. The choice of productivity and time-management apps is even more extensive so you have everything you need to get the job done in the easiest way possible.
Schedule your tasks when you are most productive
Waking up every day at 5 AM to plow through your professional obligations will be worth very little if you are unable to work effectively so early. All of us have a certain period of the day when we are able to work productively. If you want to have any success, you should schedule the bulk of your most demanding tasks for this specific period. That doesn’t mean you don’t need to wake up early. These spare hours can be used to do the laundry, prepare the materials for the tasks ahead, drive your kids to school, and so on. In other words, use this time to clear tasks that would distract you when you get to serious work.
Set realistic goals and prioritize the tasks
You absolutely can’t’ afford to aimlessly wander through your tasks without any urgency or purpose. So, break down your workload into small, measurable, realistic, and time-constrained tasks and sort them out according to their importance – the tasks with the highest priority should be dealt with first and only then you should proceed to the chores of the lesser importance. Using some Pomodoro technique or some other time-management strategy will allow you to work at optimal efficiency while also getting enough time to work out, design your home office, or do whatever you like to do while resting from work.
Use batching method to get through the chores faster
If you are unfamiliar with the term, batching refers to doing similar tasks (usually the ones that happen at the same place) in some particular period. This is not multitasking and we don’t recommend it since very few people are able to do several tasks at the same time. But, if you are, for instance, already in the kitchen, you should try to do all the chores you have here before moving on elsewhere. This level of efficiency requires very tight scheduling and a reasonable amount of planning so make this your new past-time activity before going to sleep. You will be more than grateful to yourself tomorrow.
Wrapping up
We hope these few tips give you a general idea about the methods you can do to marry your family and job and excel in both these areas of your life. Running your company or doing any kind of job from the comfort of your home is possible only if you put a lot of effort into separating these two worlds and learn the art of effective time management. It’s not an easy task but it more than pays off.
About the author: Mike Johnston is an experienced blogger and editor with a background in digital media and the web. He’s produced thousands of pages of original, engaging content for numerous online publications throughout his career. Mike’s specialties are business and technology, but he also often writes about travel, lifestyle, and work-life balance.