Staying Motivated as a Work From Home Developer

Staying Flexible

In absence of external constraints, working from home frequently means that you’re the Commander-in-Chief of your work place and master of your domain…as long as your spouse or partner isn’t around, that is! :]

Having control over your work environment doesn’t necessarily mean all rules go out the window. Whether they are strict or permissive, you should have a set of rules and stick to them. It can take time to build such a list, as rules come with experience, and they can change and evolve over time.

As you might guess, there are no “good” or “bad” rules; it’s really about rules that work for you. If you feel a structured routine works best for you, go for it. If you feel like being flexible, make that the order of the day.

I believe flexibility is one of the most important rules. As I mentioned above, external events, mood and inspiration define my schedule and drive the priority and timeline of my tasks, although hard limits like deadlines can affect how flexible I can be.

Some ideas that can help you be more flexible are:

• When you can’t solve a problem, switch context. If you work on two or more projects, change to another project. You can also read some blogs or watch a video, such as one from the last WWDC. When you return to the problem, the solution quite often magically presents itself to you, and you’ll wonder why you didn’t see it in the first place!
• Don’t force yourself to work if you realize you aren’t making progress. Take a longer break, and do something else non-work-related: Call a friend, watch a movie, play a game, or choose something to distract yourself.
• Change up your working hours; some people are more productive late at night when their mind wanders and is more creative. Some people prefer the quiet focus of the early-morning hours.
• If you feel you need a nap during your work day, and it doesn’t interfere with your work, just do it! Many creative and productive people make naps a part of their daily routine.
• If you can’t take a break from work, switch up your environment: Move into another room or even outside, turn the TV on if it doesn’t distract you, or take another short break such as a quick walk.
• Do you need to keep an eye on your kids while you work? If it doesn’t interfere with your work schedule, take a break and spend some time with them; you’ll enjoy it, and they’ll appreciate your attention. You can always do some extra work in your off-hours to catch up.

Communicating Effectively

Meetings — they are typically labeled as boring and a waste of time. Fortunately, remote workers live in a digital world, so most meetings aren’t attended in-person. However, even meetings over Skype or Hangouts can be a time sink, particularly if they recur every day and take a substantial amount of time. And if your organization isn’t accustomed to online meetings, they can be frustrating as well as feeling like lost time. There are lots of ways to communicate outside of meetings that generally fall into one of two categories:

• Synchronous (phone, voice chat, video conferencing)
• Asynchronous (instant messaging, mail, collaborating tools)

You don’t have to stick with just one tool; you can use the best tool at hand to communicate effectively. For interactive discussions, use voice or video. For non-urgent questions, use email. If it’s an urgent question with a simple answer, use instant messaging.

Asynchronous messaging lets you stay on task while communicating simple questions and directions; this translates into better use of your time.

What if you’re accustomed simply to stopping by a colleague’s desk? You can’t do that now that you’re both stuck at home. And now, you’re probably afraid to reach out for fear of interrupting because you don’t know if your colleague is available. One innovative solution we’ve heard about is to have everyone in the group join a hangout or other virtual video meeting, leaving the audio muted. You can see at a glance if the person you need is working or has stepped away, just as you would in a physical office. Now you know you can “stop by” with your quick question.

Your Health

Every person assumes their health is something they’ll have their entire life — until they don’t have it anymore. Below are some great ideas to help maintain your physical and mental health.

Staying Physically Active

As developers, we spend a lot of time glued to a chair, staring at a monitor. Since home-based workers don’t need to commute, catch buses or traverse flights of stairs to get to the subway, it’s easy to spend most of the day without moving too much.

Sitting all day is a bad habit of the modern age. Bodies need to move; extended sitting can lead to serious health problems. Fortunately, it’s easy to stave off these health issues by following a few simple rules:

• When you go out, avoid elevators and use the stairs instead.
• Spend some time walking during the day.
• Do some running regularly, or get involved in other physical activities.
• Use a standing desk, moving or dancing frequently while you work.
• Go the distance and adopt a a treadmill desk; Aaron Douglas wrote an excellent blog post on that subject.

Whenever you notice your body or brain asking for a break, listen to it. Your body is pretty smart! :]

Interacting with Others

Working from home can be isolating if you’re not careful, and the current restrictions don’t help.

Derek Selander recommends making sure you go outside, or finding a group on Meetup.com to force yourself to socialize in person. Since in-person meetings are off the table, try finding — or hosting — virtual meetups to allow you to interact with others.

Similarly, Brian Moakley suggests you meet up with like-minded people in your area. Face-to-face time with other humans is equally as important as any work you do. Just do it virtually while practicing social distancing for now.

Kelvin Lau shares that sentiment: Take time to interact with other developers. It really helps you cement your knowledge and broaden your mind.

I agree with them all. Don’t you?

But what if there aren’t any meetups in your area? Take the initiative and start your own. Use your social media to try to organize a meetup using Zoom or some other videoconferencing tool.

If there aren’t enough developers in your main area of interest to justify a meetup, then make it less restrictive: If you’re an iOS developer, create a meetup open to all mobile developers or all developers in general. The cross-talk between people working with different technologies can be a terribly interesting opportunity for learning.