Work from home became a common way of working during this period. If this way of carrying out the activity has a series of benefits, there are also difficulties that must be solved to maintain a balance, both in the professional and personal life. Today we present you a point of view on this topic from our colleague, Marius Enea, CGS Team Leader.
What are the main difficulties that can arise in the case of working from home?
The first would be the technical issues (network connection, power failure, device malfunction etc.). Then there are some situations where you must explain something to the assistants in the work applications, and from a distance it is much harder than face-to-face. Finally, it would be the allocation of a much longer time for monitoring and motivating people, but also the urgent situations that you address with a small delay, compared to the office when I could intervene instantly.
How do you maintain your efficiency even if you work from home?
As long as you have a goal, the means by which you reach it no longer matter. Whether I work at home or in the office, the goal is the same, more precisely the achievement of objectives. I can say that I have become even more efficient. Having the PC at home, I can solve certain problems, and even if the business hours are over, the team knows that at any time I can take a “look”, and I can help them.
How do you separate your work from your personal life when everything happens from home?
Just like at the office, when I’m on schedule, I totally focus on what I’m doing here. At the beginning of WFH, I mixed them a little, in the sense that even after the business hours or in my free days I spent a lot of time on the PC checking one or the other. Along the way, I managed to easily limit myself so that after the program I could only use the computer for urgent situations or when I could not complete what I had to do on that specific day. It’s a plus here anyway because you always have the “work tools at home”. 😊
How to avoid distractions while working from home?
I chose a space where I would not be disturbed by anyone, during the whole working hours. Usually, I have no problems with noise, or neighbors etc.
What solutions for a good time management would you recommend?
As in the office, for the usual activities the time remained the same. The balance, however, leaned toward discussions with assistants, feedback, and support. I also allocated important time during this period to discussions that are not necessarily related to the job, to keep my assistants motivated. I mentioned the last part because sometimes I lose more time with one or the other and I must pull harder to recover what I have to do during the working hours. The solution here was to migrate this part to my free time.
How to adapt to work without permanent supervision from hierarchical superiors / how do you become more autonomous in the absence of superiors?
I can’t say that I became more autonomous, I had a freedom of decision until now, but I became even more responsible than before. Usually, I am a responsible person, I try to do my job so that there is no need for someone to supervise me or to leave room for doubts about my work. As before, I kept in touch with the direct superior, and I did not feel any differences when working from hom versus on site.
How do you deal with social isolation? (lack of direct interactions and socialization with colleagues)
I can say that very well so far, I have kept in touch by phone, online etc. both with the members of the management team and with the assistants in my team, sometimes for hours. Yes, maybe the interaction was not direct, but given the current situation, we can live with it.
Is it more difficult to fulfill a performance evaluation in the case of working from home?
From the position of Team Leader, I think not. The reports / indicators come as before by e-mail, we still have all the “tools” needed for monitoring even when working from home. I even managed to have a better record of the people on the team, being able to focus better on the individual
How do you maintain your motivation and positive thinking in case of serious problems that affect the way you live and work?
For any problem, there is a solution. Life and experience have shown me this, so there is no point in wasting time with negative thoughts when you could focus on finding a solution. Overall, I don’t see what serious problems could arise when working from home and how they could be different from those at the office. As the saying goes, don’t take work home or problems from home to work. Easy to say, sometimes hard to do…
How can you adapt to online communication that replaces the face-to-face communication?
Quite easily, we have the advantage of the many possibilities of remote communication that we used until now, sometimes even to the detriment of face-to-face communication. In this situation, they have even proved their usefulness, and for many it was the best excuse not to be accused of spending too much time online. Personally, I can live with that, but I always prefer face-to-face communication.