ASLU 011: How To Manage Distractions When You Run Your Business From Home
In Episode 11 of the And She Looked Up Creative Hour, we continue on with our May theme of working from home.
Whether you’ve been working from home for a long time or you’re just starting out, you’re all too well aware of how many distractions there can be.
Today we’re going to talk about some of the most common work from home distractions and share some tips to help you manage them so that you can be both creative and productive!
Listen To the Episode
Here’s a direct link to Episode 11 or you can listen via the player below:
some of the most common “work from home” distractions:
Some of the most common distractions we all face when working from home include:
Who we share our home with: roommates, children, partners, parents, pets! All of these can offer up welcome and unwelcome distractions.
Household chores. When you work in an office or offsite space you can’t see the laundry piling up or the dirty dishes in the sink or the vacuuming that need to be done
Clutter & Mess. Being surrounded by clutter or mess either in your workspace or within view of your workspace can drive you to distraction
Noise. You have very little control of the noise outside of your home (and sometimes even in your home) - from sirens to landscapers and construction work to garbage removal and street cleaners you might find your “quiet” little neighbourhood is a hive of loud activity during the day. Then there’s televisions, home renos, video games, kids fighting and dogs barking that might be right outside your office door or next to your kitchen table.
Demands on your time. While you’re used to having demands on your time in an office from employees, clients and superiors, when you work from home you’ll probably find pretty quickly your friends will also want more of your time during the day!
Procrastination. We all struggle with procrastination to some degree in our professional lives but when you work for yourself, there’s nobody but you to hold you accountable!
Planned distractions. These are a different kind of distraction - one that you actually plan for because they’re good for your mental and physical health!
distractions from those we share our home with
This is probably the most common distraction you’ll face when working from home and it’s one of the hardest because there’s times where playing with your kids or walking the dog or saying yes to your partner or roommate when they ask you if you want to watch a movie are things you really want to do! But there’s work that needs to get done so you can get paid!
Set Up Regular Office Hours
Setting up specific times where you start and end your day are a great way to put some boundaries in place and protect your time. This does not mean you have to work from 9-5!! Your work day might start at 5am and go until 7:30am. At 7:30 you might close up shop for a few hours every day to get your kids fed and off to school or have coffee or breakfast with your partner before they leave for work. You might start back up from 9:30 and work til 2:30 when it’s time to end your day because you need to pick up your kids or walk to the dog or go do errands. But if you look at the hours you’ve just put in, you’ve done an 7.5 hour day!
Not a morning person? Don’t have kids? Going to school? Have roommates that are around during odd hours? Rejig your office hours to fit.
Once you’ve got a set start and end to your day, it makes it easier to let your housemates know when you’re working and when you’re free to spend time with them. It also makes it easier to let clients know when you’re available to work with them.
Childcare
If you find that time when the kids are at school just isn’t enough to always get things done, or you’ve got pre-schoolers at home, consider childcare. It doesn’t have to be full time. Knowing that you have 1 or 2 full days all to yourself where you can dive into bigger projects can be a lifesaver!
Set Up Easy to Recognize Boundaries For Small (and Big) Children
In the episode we mention a few different systems some moms we know use to manage kids (and sometimes adults) while they’re working.
The stoplight system is an easy visual cue for small kids. A green circle on your door means they can come in any time, yellow means “I’m busy but if it’s urgent, knock” and red means that unless they’re bleeding, they need to problem solve on their own.
You can also try an audible system by setting up alarms on a child’s ipad. Different sounds means it’s time for different activities like lunch or a walk with mom or dad or it’s quite time where they play on their own while their parent does work. Make the blocks small and manageable for you both and alternate fun things with less fun things.
Give them a chart with activities to do in small timed chunks. Some activities can be fun like playing an educational game on their tablet while others might be chores they can do unsupervised like making their bed or picking up clothes. For every fun item they do, they have to do one chore or more serious task. But they can choose which tasks to do when.
All of these are great systems to keep kids busy while you get some work done.
Household Chores
There’s a time and a place to do household chores and it’s not while you’re concentrating on a client project or working on your next big canvas.
Make a hard rule that household chores are done outside of the office hours you’ve just established. If you share your house with other people, make sure that they are also doing their fare share of the chores. This includes partners, kids and roommates. Sit down for a house meeting and draw up a chart of who does what and when. Your kids chores can become part of their systems we just talked about. Your partner can do their chores whenever they like as long as it fits the schedule.
If you are reluctant to delegate chores because things don’t get done the way you like, you need to get over that and relax your standards a bit. As long as the chores are getting done on time, that’s what’s important. Otherwise you’re being your own worst enemy!
If you live alone, all the chores are on you, unfortunately. But that’s only fair - you’re the only one making the mess!
If resources allow, hire somebody to clean for you. If you worked in an office, there would be a cleaning crew that would come in regularly to make sure the work environment was pleasant for everyone.
If you’re en exceptional multi-tasker, you can do some of the “set it and forget it” chores like laundry or loading and starting the dishwasher. Both of those can run without much effort on your part while you keep working.
Clutter & Mess
Clutter and mess can be a real distraction when it’s in your workspace or in view of your workspace. It’s hard to work at the kitchen table when there’s a sink full of dishes in your direct line of sight or if walking past your office door makes you shudder because of the clutter on your desk.
Take five minutes at the end of every day to try and put things in their proper place so your desk or workspace is clear. Every weeks or after you wrap up an significant project take an hour to do a deeper clean: file important items, clean your tools, put away supplies you no longer need, wipe off all the surfaces and clean the floors.
If you work in the kitchen or your bedroom, take 10 minutes at the start of the day to wash the dishes, clean the countertops and declutter or make your bed, hang up clothes and declutter surfaces that might distract you if they’re in view.
Noise
This is a tough one!
If you’ve established your office hours, you can ask the others in your house to respect those hours by doing things that are quieter. Headphones can be used while playing video games or watching screens, music can be kept to a low volume, people can retreat to their own spaces during those hours (hopefully with doors they can close).
Outside noises are beyond your control and our best recommendation is: get a good set of noise cancelling headphones! This will also help with noises in your house or if you share a home office with your partner!
Demands On Your Time
This is the mother of all distractions whether you work from home or not! So let’s start with ones that are specific to working from home:
Friends and Family
When you start working from home you will probably notice very quickly that friends and family who don’t work from home won’t really understand what it is you’re doing and will think you’re available to go for coffee (or lunch, dinner, drinks, shopping, the movies etc), to have a long chat on the phone or chit chat back on forth on messenger platforms.
And because these are people you care about and enjoy being around, you’re going to want to say yes. Especially because working from home can make you feel quite isolated sometimes. Or, you may know you have to say no but, you don’t want to hurt their feelings.
Again, respect those office hours you set up. Don’t feel bad about saying no to when it’s office hours. Simply say “I’d love to but I’m working until 2:30 today”. And then offer up a time to connect outside of your office hours - and mean it! A true friend will respect that.
However, you don’t want to be the person that’s always saying no due to work - you do have to respect your own closing up shop time and make room for others in those off work hours.
Phone Calls and Emails
If you wanted to, you could easily fill your entire day with responding to emails and taking phone calls. And you would get nothing useful done. They can be terribly distracting and keep you from focusing on the deep work you need to do to finish projects
Set aside certain hours each week where you are available to take phone calls and only book calls during those slots. You don’t have to say no to calls when somebody requests one. Simply respond with “I’d be happy to chat - I have time available on Monday or Wednesday between 9 and 11. Let me know which of those works best for you.”
Email also works well with time blocks. Check your emails 2-3 times a day at the same time each day. Only respond to what’s most urgent and file the rest to respond at a later time. You might choose to set aside an hour or two every 2 days where you sit down and respond to less urgent emails.
Not all emails require a response and some emails are better handled with a phone call. Sometimes one five minute call can eliminate 20 back and forth emails over the span of several hours.
turn off notifications
Turn off all those little pings and bings that distract you throughout the day. Turn off your email notifications, social media notifications, etc. You don’t need to drop everything to reply to an Instagram DM or an email or even a phone call. Set up a code with your family for emergencies that they can text you if they need you right now. Everything else can wait for a few hours.
Traveling To Meet Clients
Traveling to meet clients can take up a tremendous amount of time depending on where they’re located in relation to you. You can easily spend an hour + commuting to have a 30 minute coffee meeting. There are so many other ways to chat face to face now: skype, zoom, facetime. Today’s climate of social distancing is a great opportunity to move those clients over to a more high tech solution.
If you must travel to see clients try to be as efficient as possible and book multiple meetings or package your trip with other errands. Consider transit so you can reply to emails or do other easy phone tasks while you’re en route. If you’re driving, take the time to listen to that business e-book you’ve been meaning to read or catch up on your favourite podcasts.
People Who Want to Pick Your Brain
The more successful you become the more people will ask you if you have time for a cup of coffee so they can “pick your brain”. We’re big believers in networking but we also believe in protecting our time.
If somebody wants to pick your brain they should come to you - you get to call the shots! Suggest a cafe or restaurant that you can get to in 5 minutes. They should also be picking up the tab so that coffee or lunch should be on them! Do some research on them and determine if there is anything they could help you with so it’s a reciprocal meeting with true networking opportunities.
Also ask them in advance what, specifically, they would like to talk about and let them know that you only have 30 minutes (or whatever time frame you’re comfortable with) to chat so if they can let you know in advance you can make sure you’re prepared. If they can’t give you a specific topic they want to talk about, your inner red flag system should go off and you might want to suggest that you put off a chat until they’ve got a clear direction they’re looking to go in. You can also decide if it’s something you can discuss on the phone and offer that up as a suggestion.
Another option is to charge a consulting fee for your time. Some people will even offer to pay you for your time when they make their initial request.
Don’t be afraid to say no
No is a hard word for a lot of us to say. But don’t be afraid to use it when it comes to protecting your time. You’ll learn very quickly when you start out that if you don’t learn to say no, you will really struggle to get your work done and move your business forward. Saying no to something, means you get to say yes to things that are really important to you.
The trick to saying no is it doesn’t have to be rude or unprofessional - and often it doesn’t even have to include the word “no”. Here’s some ways you can say no without saying no:
“That sounds like a really interesting idea but it just doesn’t fit in with my plans for this quarter”
“I’m sorry, I’m unavailable this week. How about next Tuesday at 10?”
“Unfortunately, that doesn’t fit into my budget this year but if things change I’ll let you know”
“I’m flattered you’d like to pick my brain but right now I’m only doing client phone consultations. If that’s of interest to you I have appointments available on Monday and Tuesday afternoons”
Just remember: it’s on you to protect your time and put boundaries in place. Others will always want to push those boundaries. You need to stand up for yourself.
You can be both flexible and firm at the same time while also being kind and professional.
Procrastination
Procrastination. Ugh. We all do it.
We all put off things we don’t want to do. We’re both pros at it. But here are some of the techniques we’ve employed to manage it:
do the things you hate, first. You get them out of the way and you’ll feel very accomplished.
a reward system. We’re all four years old at heart and we all love treats. Give yourself a reward when you do something you hate doing: 30 minutes to read your book, a soak in the tub, a coffee at the local cafe.
keep a running task list of all those little tiny tasks you’re always forgetting to do or putting off because they’re so small. Next time you have a few spare minutes while waiting for a conference call to start or before you need to pick up the kids take a look at the list and pick something you can get done in 5 minutes. It could be making 5 pinterest pins, scheduling two posts to social media, signing that document and firing it off, replying to 3 emails… you get the idea
try the Pomodoro technique where you work on a task for 25 minutes and then take a break for 5 minutes. You can do variations on this by using apps or the timer on your phone to keep you focused for a short period of time.
Planned Distractions
Planned distractions are distractions you actually put in place to protect your mental and physical health - and thereby your productivity. It’s important to take breaks throughout the day and it’s been proven over and over again that doing so really does make you more productive:
set an hourly reminder to get up and move. Fitness trackers often have hourly alerts you can set
planned lunch breaks away from your desk: make some lunch, go for a stroll, read a book, go outside
sustained movement: go to the gym, do a yoga video on YouTube, walk the dog
Other Tips For Managing Distractions
Here’s a few other tips and tricks we use to help us manage distractions:
use a timer for tasks that you need to do but that don’t necessarily move your business forward or generate revenue: like social media, fixing broken links on your website, updating old content etc
use two different browsers: a work browsers for work related content and a “fun” browser for things that have nothing to do with work
use apps like unroll.me to unsubscribe from email clutter
batch errands into one or two time blocks per week so they’re not in the back of your head creating clutter or you’re not running out in the middle of the day because you forgot something
use a planner to track your tasks. Lisa likes to use two: a home planner and a work planner and likes the Michael Hyatt system. Melissa prefers to have it all in one with a hacked up bullet journal format. Experiment and find a system that works for you. Knowing what you have to do and when it needs to be done by can keep you on track and less likely to give in to distractions
keeping a running task list is a great way to get things out of your head an on paper so you don’t forget them. Sometimes all the mental energy we put into trying not to forget tasks floating in our heads can be a really big distraction. So write them down and get them out of your head.
Remember, you don’t need to explain when you say no. It doesn’t have to be anybody’s business why you’re unavailable or can’t do something. Yes you are accountable to clients and customers but nothing will annoy a client more than you missing a deadline because you got distracted. So protect your time!
And don’t forget - while we all need rules and structure to get things done, you are in charge and you get to make the rules. So make rules that work for you!
Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
Editor's Note: This list contains affiliate links — full disclosure is at the end of the article.
- Unsubscribe - by Jocelyn Glei
- unroll.me
- The Pomodoro Technique
- Micheal Hyatt Daily Planner - this is the journal Lisa uses
- Bullet Journaling - Melissa uses a verion of this method for her three businesses and her life
- The Bullet Journal Method by Ryder Carroll
- Moleskine Soft Cover Grid Journal - Melissa's bullet journal of choice
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