subject: How To Achieve Work-at-home Self-discipline [print this page] When you work away from home in an office, there is always going to be some form of discipline that has been set down by the management as well as fellow employees. But when you decide to work at home on your own you will find that there simply are none of those restrictions set in place. In fact you will discover that there is far more freedom than you are normally use to in a more structured environment. So without the ability to self discipline yourself eventually your work is going to suffer. This is why it is important to achieve work at home self discipline.
The first thing you need to do is to make sure that you set aside certain hours of the day that will be used for working. You will need to inform all of your family members as well as your friends of what these hours are and ask them to honor those particular hours. For family members, it might be a good idea that you post your working hours somewhere easy for them to see. If you take a lunch break at a particular time, you might want to include that in your working schedule so that they are aware of that free time that you have set aside and that you are available then.
Make sure that you list all of the activities that you need to do each day and list them in the order of their importance. This can be done either the night before or when you first get up in the morning. No matter what the duties are that you have listed, you should try your best to get all of them done by the end of the day. Otherwise you will find yourself falling behind quite quickly.
Although it is true that interruptions and distractions can't be avoided all the time it is important that you try your best to keep these down to a minimum. It is important that you are able to stay focused on your job in order to be productive. Again it is important to stress to both family members and friends how important it is that they try and avoid contacting you during your scheduled work hours.
Since you generally will not have an immediate supervisor to assess your work, it is important that you learn to assess it yourself. By doing this you can figure out where you need improvement and figure out different strategies to improve where you can. The most important thing you should probably assess is how quickly you get your tasks done. If you discover that certain tasks are taking you too long it is always a good idea to try and figure out how you can find a way to improve your speed.
It's always a good idea to set a specific time for doing some of the daily tasks you might have to do each day like checking email, opening mail, bill paying and other paperwork that needs to be done. If you do these things at the same time each day you'll be surprised at how much time can be saved.
Make sure that when you have to leave the home for anything that you try to do all of the errands and various appointments either in the mornings or in the afternoons. Don't try and spread them out throughout the day. Doing them all during a set time of the day will cut down on unwanted distractions.
To keep refreshed make sure to schedule yourself time off from your job on a regular schedule. You need to do things that will make you feel rejuvenated in order to be successful at self discipline and your job.
