Working from home affects how happy you feel, your energy and your vitality. A well-equipped workspace at home and good working routines are therefore important for staying energetic, engaged and vital at work. Workplace adviser and vitality expert Julia Eisele shares her working-from-home hacks, so that every working day at home feels like a party.
Your home workspace is often less ideal than your workspace at the office. That is not just about furniture, but also about light, your surroundings and your routines. The nice thing is: at home you have influence over many more things than at the office. You can easily improve your workspace yourself. By adjusting the temperature (cosy, in your warm socks), changing the light (a candle on your desk is perfectly fine) and arranging your surroundings to your liking (your favourite photos, flowers and music). And of course by improving your routines. Every disadvantage has its advantage, as the Dutch football legend Johan Cruijff used to say. The trick is to take action!
Every disadvantage has its advantage
Perhaps you recognise it: after a while of working from home, you get a stiff neck, shoulders or back. The question is how you deal with it. Do you put the responsibility on someone else, such as your employer, and wait? Then you hand over the wheel. If you choose influence, you look at what you can do yourself. Which steps can you take today and tomorrow to improve your situation a little at a time? That way, you shift the focus from impossibilities to possibilities.
5 working-from-home hacks
As a workplace adviser, Julia looked into hundreds of people's homes through online consultations. She saw lots of creative solutions, but also the same points of attention again and again. She summed them up in five working-from-home hacks.
1. How are you sitting?
After a few hours of work, you feel your neck and shoulders: pain, tension, cramp or a nagging feeling. Sound familiar? That is often a sign that the ratio between table height and seat height is wrong. If you work at the dining table on an ordinary chair, you usually sit too low. You pull up your shoulders and that creates tension. Raise your seat height with a firm cushion or a folded blanket. Even with an office chair at the dining table, you are better off sitting a bit higher than you are used to. Do you have a desk and an adjustable chair at home? Then take a critical look at the settings there too.
2. Move your body
Sitting still for long periods is bad for your health. And we sit a lot: Dutch employees sit for an average of 8.7 hours per working day, and 26% of Dutch people aged 15 and over sit for more than 8.5 hours on a working day. That is the highest percentage in Europe. CBS
Working from home doesn't help. Where you would otherwise cycle to work, at home you are at your desk in a few steps. Reason enough to get moving! Interrupt your working day a few times for a moment of exercise. Take a brisk walk, go up and down the stairs, do a few squats or have a bounce on the children's trampoline. Dance in the living room, have a stretch and swing your arms. Short breaks of ten minutes or less also give you more energy and make you less tired. Albulescu et al.
Anything that makes your heart beat faster is a gift to yourself. Want to keep it up? Make the threshold as low as possible and choose things you enjoy. That way, 'have to' turns into 'want to' by itself.
3. Light in the dark
In the dark months, working from home can be extra hard, especially if you are prone to the winter blues. Because you don't have to travel to work in the morning, you also get outside less. Light helps your body clock: seeking out natural daylight in the morning sets your clock right, and enough light during the day helps you stay alert. Hersenstichting So go for a walk outside as soon as it is light. Indoors, too, make sure you have as much light as possible: curtains open and lamps on. A good desk lamp gives you more energy all day.
4. A holiday for your eyes
While reading and working at a screen, we blink much less often than during a conversation. Research on blinking Blinking keeps your eyes clean and moist. What's more, your eye sends a signal to your body and brain: open means activity and alertness, closed means recovery. Make clever use of that. Close your eyes regularly and mindfully, and so give yourself a mini holiday.
5. Pimp it up!
How do you make sure you start work at home every day with pleasure, energy and engagement? Take a critical look at your workspace. What matters to you? Do you need overview and order, but is your desk covered in things and piles of paper? Then that is an unnoticed energy drain.
Then go one step further. Once you have tackled your energy drains, add energy boosters. What makes you happy? A bunch of flowers, a beautiful plant or a photo of your favourite holiday spot. That way you get the best out of working from home and create an environment that increases your enjoyment of work and your energy. Every day a party!
You will find more tips in 8 tips to move enough in a desk job and tips for more vitality at work.
About this article: this piece is based on a blog by workplace adviser Julia Eisele.
