Still Working From Home? End Your Day with a Jump-Start for Your Morning

Even small steps move you forward!

Working from home is still work, which still causes stress. Set yourself up for a productive day by planning ahead the day before.

When you are being pulled in 324 different directions, it helps your productivity to feel organized and in control. It’s hard to feel in control, however, when you are fighting that first fire of the day while overwhelmed by yesterday’s leftovers. Here’s what to do at the end of the day so you’re ready to face the next morning with confidence:

Tidy up your physical space

• Whether you have a dedicated location or are working on the kitchen table, before you leave the “office” for the night, take a few minutes and declutter your desk.
• Gather up the pens and paper clips.
• Clean up coffee cups and food wrappers.
• Toss no-longer-necessary notes and unimportant correspondence into the recycle bin.
• Slap sticky note labels on any paper items you are still working with so you remember why you need them.
• Then file everything where they should go, or if that’s not an option, at least stack everything neatly.

Tidy up your virtual space

• Check your email one last time and respond to messages. “I’ll get back to you tomorrow” is a perfectly legitimate response which lets people know that you received their email so they don’t have to send another.
• Delete everything you won’t deal with tomorrow. If you didn’t already read that industry news message, you won’t read it tomorrow either.
• If you really can’t make yourself delete an email, stick it in a folder so it’s not taking up space in your inbox.
• Then close your email program. In the morning, try focusing an hour or two on a project before you reopen your email. You may surprise yourself on how much you get done when you’re not being distracted!

Tidy up your priority list

• Figure out what you have to complete before the end of day tomorrow.
• List your tasks by priority and remind yourself what “priority” means to you. Does that mean projects with the soonest deadlines or those with the greatest income potential?
• Ballpark the estimated time for each task so you don’t over-commit yourself.
• Expect the unexpected and save space for that.
• If there is too much to do in one day, bump the least important tasks to the next day.

Sure, you may not always be able to tidy up perfectly before calling it quits, but all habits have to start on Day One. When you feel like you are always coming from behind, it just adds to your stress levels. Starting your day organized and prepared to work makes you feel confident which boosts your productivity. Who doesn’t want that?

If any of those 324 different directions you’re being pulled have to do with updating your website or managing your search engine optimization, then one of your priority list tasks should be to give Sprocket Websites a call. Let our team take on that work so you can get back to your work!

Photo by Victoria Borodinova from Pexels

This article is an update to “3 Steps to End Your Day in a Way That Jump Starts Your Morning” dated 8/4/2014.

Breanne BannonBreanne Bannon

Breanne is a Content Writer, Social Media Marketeer, and Sales Associate for Sprocket Websites.

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