Listen to the podcast version: 7 Rules of Work
How times have changed. As we are all in the livinCOVIDaloca ordeal, most of us also find that for the first time, we have to work at home and share the home office space with our housemates- be it your spouse, your siblings, your kids, your flatmates, or your friends. We might be used to seeing them work from home every now and then but everyday? Man, that’s a totally different ball game.
You can say that probably you can work from your room most of the time. That’s good and well for you. But how long can you do that for? And in some cases, you may not have a choice at all but share the space with your housemates.
If you are in a shared work space situation, here are 7 Rules of Work to maintain a harmonious relationship with your housemates and to keep your sanity when working from home:
Rule #1: Have assigned workspaces.
You don’t always want to be setting up or fighting over the nicer space in your shared work space everyday. If you fight over who gets which space, do a raffle. And so it’s not unfair, do a raffle every week or more often as needed. Word of caution: mommy or daddy might override if they are involved.
Rule #2: Agree on the same time for breaks and lunch.
It’s important to have breaks to hydrate (this is one thing I always forget), stretch, rest your eyes from staring at your device, eat and socialize. Having regular times also ensures that the tea/coffee/juicer machine is used mostly during the break and not throughout the day, which makes it less distracting for everyone. Tip: If you need to snack outside of the agreed break times, try not to eat food that makes a lot of noise such as chips, chicharon, cornicks, kropek and the like.
Rule #3: Inform your companions way beforehand on when you will have a call and take calls in a separate room.
This is so that they will (hopefully) be mindful not to make any noise when you’re in a call. Taking the call in a separate room will at least confine the sound of the call and not distract the rest of the people in the house.
Tips: 1) Please still use your headset/earphones while in a call and don’t do speaker phone unless you’re absolutely sure that the sound will not bother your housemates. 2) Inform your housemates if it’s a normal call or a very important call- depends on how your housemates are but this can either help a lot or backfire. You decide! 3) Don’t shout when you’re in a call- the microphones in the mobile phone, headset and laptop are actually very sensitive. Just use your normal talking voice.
Rule #4: Wear earphones if you want to listen to music or watch something during work hours.
This way each person can concentrate on work and not get distracted. On music, do take note that not everyone can work while listening to music, not everyone has the same taste in music or maybe not everyone is in the mood to listen to music at that moment.
Rule #5: No singing or dancing during work hours.
This is to avoid distracting the rest of the household. Unless of course, there are small kids in the household or if you are a professional singer or dancer, then that’s another story.
Is there a dramatista in the house? Someone who likes to emote and reacts quite strongly to almost everything? Or someone who swears a lot? That can be annoying and distracting. Kids can be exempted here (not to the swearing!). But if it’s an adult, I suggest Rule #6 to have a swear or dramatista jar and fine that person every time he/she has an episode.
Then you can use the money for drinks or to order food delivery. Now that I think about it, I might be guilty of this. I hope my colleagues don’t start fining me once we’re back in the office, lol.
Rule #7: Have fun and enjoy each other’s company.
Play games during breaks, have daily themes or challenges, whatever that can lighten the mood. In gloomy times like this, we need to radiate positive energy. Don’t forget to cherish this time spent with your housemates.
Take it easy on each other, make sure you check on how each one is feeling and talk. It’s funny sometimes that the closer we are proximity-wise to each other, the tendency is to communicate lesser. Get more personal and open that dialogue. We’re all in this together.
When this is all over, we all will hopefully look back at the memorable quality time that we all got to spend with each other. Have you tried any of the rules or do you have rules to add? Share them in the comments!
Stay healthy and safe!
Listen to the podcast version: 7 Rules of Work
