The vast majority of developers I
know work from home; probably because
I know a lot of indies. That said, even
developers who work on applications for
large companies can find themselves in
this situation in a time when working from
home part time is becoming increasingly
common.
The hardest part about working from
home is the near endless distractions
you’re bound to encounter day to day,
so whether you are working full time
or just spending a few hours here and
there on an app outside of your day job,
I’d like to offer some advice for staying
focused.
TURN OFF UNNECESSARY
NOTIFICATIONS
Chat programs like Skype are great,
especially if you need to communicate
with a team, but they can also prove problematic
if you have friends trying to hit you
up for a chat during the work day. Skype
(and many other IM programs) give you
the option of turning off notifications, both
visual and audio, for all of your contacts.
You also have the option to only enable
notifications for certain contacts. I found
that by only have notifications enabled for
colleagues during the work day, I was able
to avoid getting distracted.
GET A PROGRAM LIKE CHAPERONE
Chaperone is a free program for Mac
that lets you set up tasks. For example
one of my tasks is “Answer emails.” For
this, I set the name of the task, the time I
need to spend on it (in my case, 30
minute blocks) and the program(s) I use
during the task (Thunderbird). For the 30
minutes this task is running if I spend
longer than 30 seconds outside of
Thunderbird I get a warning message. It’s
a small thing but it can really help you stay
focused, especially when you can see time
remaining. It’s a lot easier to keep on
going when you see “5 minutes left” than
it is simply staring at a seemingly overwhelmingly
full inbox.
TRY AND AVOID FACEBOOK
I break this rule a lot, albeit only for
about 20 seconds at a time. It’s an obvious
one, but something not a lot of people
(like myself) manage to stick to. Facebook
really is a huge time suck, especially if you
are in the midst of procrastinating.
Removing it from your toolbar can be
helpful, although if you are a frequent
visitor simply typing “f” in the address
bar will prompt the full url. Still, if you
must visit Facebook, try setting your
newsfeed to only show posts from friends
you really want to see and not everyone
on your list, if you have a lot of friends
this will make your visits to the site
exponentially shorter.
IF YOU CAN’T TAKE BREAKS, TRY TO
MIX UP YOUR WORK
If you can take short breaks throughout
the day, that’s great - but if you can’t I
find it’s easier to stay focused and productive
by mixing up what you are working
on. For example I find I get more down by
spending 2 hours coding, 30 minutes
doing emails, 30 minutes doing “art” (in
my case I use the term loosely) and then
another hour coding than if I had spent
the whole 4 hours straight writing code.
ONLY LISTEN TO MUSIC YOU KNOW
I sometimes listen to music when I’m
working, but I choose songs I know (or
alternatively, music without vocals)
because I find that listening to a new
song, if it’s good, will distract you as you
want to take in the lyrics. I recently suggested
this to two friends of mine, neither
of whom had previously considered this.
After each tried listening only to music
they knew (or no vocals) they both agreed
it did have a positive impact on their
focus.
LIMIT OUTSIDE INTERFERENCE
One problem many people have
when working from home, especially
after working in an office, seems to be
that friends and family, housemates, etc.
can sometimes think that because you
are working from home it’s OK to call you
for a long chat during the day, stop by
unannounced, or simply start talking to
you as you are right in the middle of a
line of code. It’s very important to make
sure those around you know that just
because you’re home, you’re still working
and they need to respect that.
KEEP YOUR FILES ORGANIZED
It’s so easy when working with lots
of files to get a really, really messy setup
going. I find that by keeping my files,
especially on my desktop, nicely organized
it is a lot easier to get motivated and stay
focused. It’s just like how working with a
clean desk is mentally a lot better than
working amongst a pile of papers and
clutter.
BREAK BIG TASKS INTO SMALLER
ONES
If you get overwhelmed just thinking
about all you have to do, that’s a good
sign that it should be broken into smaller,
more manageable tasks. This is true
whether you are writing a 5,000 word
essay or an inventory system for your
app; smaller tasks are more manageable
and they give you a more frequent sense
of progress and accomplishment, which in
turn help you focus on the next task.
Although many of these things
are obvious, it never hurts to remind
yourself of them from time to time. It’s
very easy to forget but over the course
of a week or two sticking to them will
save you hours.