A Realistic Guide to Setting Up a Home Office for Remote Work

The sudden implementation of global lockdown realized how quickly the IT sector moves to remote setup when needed. 

Setting up a home office for remote work may be a big adjustment, and right now, many employees are experiencing it. Although remote work has its challenges, it can be positive for your job satisfaction and productivity if applied correctly. Plus, let’s be honest—working in a physical office isn’t always ideal either! 

Working in their own space can make remote employees happy and productive. Even if they have limited space, time, or resources, they can set up a home office for remote work that looks great, feels great, and helps you produce your best work.

Some companies permanently provide this option for their employees and the “fully remote workplace.”

The three main elements that we think are keys to set up a home office for remote work are:

• Teams
• Tools
• Processes

Let’s discuss the best remote work setup components in detail:

1. Teams

The first and most effective element for a successful remote work setup is the “team.” It is good to have a team that can perform work by itself in a small environment.

We mention some points to form a powerful team :

Hire trustworthy people

When the hiring process begins, try to get as much information as you can. You can also talk to their previous clients to get feedback about their work and behavior.

Rely on work-from-home champions

Hire candidates who agree to work from home because it saves your money.

Promote self-management

Team members need to manage their time, workload, and other challenges. So choose a member who is an expert in self-management.

Encourage self-motivation

While reaching for a big goal, self-motivation plays an important role. Pick those candidates who feel self-motivated to achieve their goals and enjoy the flexibility of a remote work setup.

2. Tools

You can easily arrange meetings in a physical office environment, but it is a little bit tricky in a work-from-home setting. You will need some tools for teams to come together.

We have mentioned such “tools” that can help you to step up your teamwork:

Slack

Use Slack to bring team communication and collaboration in one place so that your remote team can get more work done and stay aligned from anywhere.

GitHub

It helps to automate and improve your workflow. It promotes collaborative coding for developers to build software. You can create, share and sell apps on Github.

Zoom

Zoom allows you to set up video conferences, live chats, webinars, screen sharing, etc. With the Zoom app, you can start or join a meeting.

Google Meet

Google Meet allows you Messaging, meetings, tasks, docs. With the help of Google meets, you can set up an online appointment with up to 100 members for 60 minutes.

Trello

The visual work management tool allows the team to plan, manage, and productively celebrate their work. 

3. Processes

A good “Process” provides a good direction to get things done the right way. The processes should be flexible enough to follow. 

Here are some points that you can apply to keep your team proactive.

A culture of shippability and support

Allocate a few days each month to your developer in maintenance and keep the rest for product enhancement and release. That helps you to give rhythm to the team’s work.

Weekly meetings

Weekly meetings are essential because they help the team to learn something new.

You can also discuss roadblocks and questions for upcoming weeks or barriers from last week, provide demos, and keep the group engaged.

A culture of responsibility

Every employee of an organization feels a sense of ownership for the outcome of the project.

For creating a culture of accountability, discussing updates every week can be an excellent way to understand the project’s progress.

Future of Remote Work

The trend for future work is towards the Hybrid model and Hybrid work culture. The hybrid model combines both in-person and remote workflows, which intends to provide flexibility of working remotely while maintaining the affinity and communication made possible by a physical office.

Since the beginning of 2021, the total number of remote job postings has increased dramatically. January-May of 2021 had nearly 1.2 million postings. That’s around 400,000 more than January-May of 2019, and almost triple the number of postings in January-May of 2020.

economicmodeling.com

According to the survey conducted by Upwork, around 77% of teams will have virtual employees by 2028. 

According to Gartner, approximately 74% of CFOs will permanently shift their employees to remote office setups.

Setting Up a Home Office for Remote Work

Working from home is not for everybody. The thought of getting out of bed, not needing to dress up may sound easy at first, but it is a lot of distraction for some people.

Luckily, this section of our article is here to help you enhance the tools and equipment you need.

By effectively setting up your remote office, you’ll be on the path of achieving work-from-home victory!

Why should one set up a home office for remote work?

In this post-pandemic situation, working remotely at home, being socially distanced from colleagues is not a choice but is necessary.

For members of geographically scattered teams, setting up a home office for remote work is the solution. Adopting new tools is essential.

However, it’s also crucial to support those tools with a proper structure and clear work guidelines to maintain productivity.

Importance of the best work from home office setup

Remote office setup can be challenging. It is vital to resist the desire to sit anywhere; instead, set up an appropriate remote home office with equipment that supports your health.

Advantages of remote office setup

There are some significant advantages of remote work, which we will look at in this article.

• You can get admittance to a pool of potential talent all over the world. 
• It saves transporting time and cost.
• Fewer office interruptions and higher autonomy can increase the productivity of your virtual employees.
• It cuts costs because you can pay according to work done.
• It provides more flexibility; employees can work according to their suitable hours and customize their remote office setup.
• It helps to get a job for disabled people.
• You can hire full-time or part-time employees according to the project’s needs.

Home Office Setup Checklist

Learning remote office setup for maximum productivity is essential.

Here is some work-from-home office essentials checklists you need to boost your productivity and preserve your health at the same time.

1. Identify and create your ideal workspace. 

For remote office setup, pick a quiet place away from distractions. Ideally, a separate room can help you create a clear delineation between “work” and “home.”

2. Get good work from home equipment.

The equipment you need for the best remote office setup is a chair, table, WiFi, sufficient lighting, calendar, stationery, and plants.

Arrange your remote work desk to accommodate your laptop, diary, water bottle, pen stand, etc.

3. Choose the lighting

Lighting can have a vital impact on the comfort of your workspace.

Your remote office setup should not contain fluorescent light because it causes drowsiness. Natural lighting is perfect for your eyes. 

4. Keep plants in your home office.

Pick a plant for your remote office and let it share the sunlight at your desk.

According to some studies, the presence of plants has many benefits, including lower stress levels and reduced air pollution.

5. Store your professional work documents separately.

In your checklist, this is one of the important things you can do. Setting up a home office for remote work can easily mix up your office documents. Keep your official documents, business receipts, client files, essential records, and documents separately to avoid mixing.

Final Words

Even if the world returns to normal, the IT industry has changed drastically. So, invest in strategies that can help you pivot on demand. If you follow the three elements mentioned above, you will adjust according to the world’s needs.

If you want the right tools, effective processes, and resources and want to extend your software team inexpensively, Contact us at info@invedus.com