Home Work
I’m starting to wonder if I should stop working from home, or at least cut it down.
Yes, it’s incredibly convenient to work from home. There’s no commute and I can get some other house stuff done while working.
The problem is that all the distractions that I’ve collected over the years happen to be in the same room where I’m trying to work.
This is causing a problem.
I guess it’s always been a problem, but when I’m busy enough I don’t worry about the distractions becaue I’m keeping so many plates spinning.
But, and this is the catch, when it’s a little slower…I…drift….to the other computer.
And the other computer, which is my main home PC, has all sorts of fun things on it that I can waste soooo much time on.
And I do. And because of this other things get missed.
It hasn’t happened a lot, but it’s happened, and it’s starting to get noticed. And that’s bad. So I need to nip it before it get’s worse.
So what do I do?
Should I work in the office everyday? This is the best and worst solution.
- Yes, it would help keep me focused on work because there is very little else to do in the office(other than drink bad coffee).
- I do have multiple machines to run the VM images that I need to get my work done.
- It get’s me out of the house(good and bad really).
- Creates a wall between home life and work life. This is also good as I never really ‘log off’ when I’m not working.
- Doesn’t let me start dinner early
- Doesn’t let me do a little housework if I need to
- Generally inconvenient
You know, I’m looking at the downside of working in the office all day and they’re not looking that bad.
Next idea is 50/50. Tara suggested this and I’m starting to like it.
- work in the office in the morning
- get’s me focused and is a good start to the day
- work from home in the afternoon
- I can VNC into my work machines, so no need to use the home PC
- I can work at the dinner table, no computer there(just a cat and dog) to tempt me
- can still do light housework/dinner prep
- smaller monitor, but I could live(I think)
I think the second option is best.
This week I’ll be in the office all week as I’m in training and just want to stay focused.
Maybe I’m just being hard on myself, but really, I do have the attention span of a three year old, and I’m all good when nothing else is around to take my attention. But when it does…
When it comes right down to it, I can be distracted by just about anything and I will search it out if tempted, but if I remove the obvious problems, then I think I’ll be better off.
Suffice to say I’m gonna keep this post at a lower profile than normal, meaning it won’t go out to Twitter and therefore Facebook, but I’m not going to go out of my way to hide it.
I guess I just did 😉
The things I dislike about leaving the house to work (aside from not being paid to sleep 🙂 ) are the weather, and (on occasion) other people… motorists in particular.
On the other hand, working in the office gives me access to co-workers, resources (not via RDP…) and (in my case) the absence of children (distracting to be sure).
Distractions can still follow you, and the office can present its own unique blend of distractions, but hey… that’s the price of waking up in the morning…
Best of luck!