Focusing when working from home

[teahouse]

I am really struggling to focus when I'm working from home (but don't want to go into work when I can stay at home and save petrol etc).

It makes little difference if I'm home alone and have the run of the house - when I work in the living room, or have my 16 year old son around when I work in the bedroom.

It's not that the work isn't interesting, it's just a lack of motivation as once I've started I'm usually OK (and in fact often struggle to stop and take breaks).

Can anyone give me some hints and tips please.

Set yourself a timer, get one of those portable over timer things, set it for 45 minutes at a time then work til the buzzer goes off. Do that through the day then have regular 15 minute breaks in between, longer at lunchtime. If you know you've got time booked in for faffing about/MNing/whatever you do as avoidance tactics, you might be less likely to do it when you should be working.

Put your shoes on rather than wandering round in socks/slippers.

Might think of some more tips and be back later.

can you set up an area as a permanent office/workspace - then you have a fixed place to go - when i work from home i set my hours as starting at 9.00am , having lunch at circa 1.00pm - back in office an hour later
you may well find that you can work much more efficiently and actually not do as many hours

Thanks for these. Sadly my house isn't big enough for a dedicated work area - sofa with laptop, kitchen table or my bed.

I'll try the shoes thing - might work (although not on the bed!).

There's your problem. If you're perching on your bed or sitting on the sofa no wonder you can't get motivated and into 'work mode'.

60cm wide. There are loads of compact workstation options out there - I really think a dedicated space would help.

As you say, getting started is often the problem. So, start by choosing one of your easier tasks first, rather than the important tricky thing that you know needs doing. I sometimes even leave the very last thing of a day not quite finished, so I know I can do 15 mins and polish it off.

Love the Ikea unit but fixing it to any wall would be near on impossible as all of mine have book cases against them - and I'm not great at DIY. But I shall see what else is out there.

I like the leaving something to finish off idea - that would help to get me started.

Just off for a huge distraction now - buying some compost to see if I can grow some veg... luckily I worked 2 days of my leave so I don't feel very guilty.

how about this small ikea desk?
we have this as dh sometimes works from home.