What is your best tip for working remotely as an software engineer?

#discuss #workstations #productivity

I am starting my first fully remote full time job on Monday. What is your best tip?

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Nice!

Top comments (12)

BekahHW • Jan 6 '22

Make time to meet your teammates and also if you're working from home, set boundaries. Make time for lunch away from the computer. Make sure you shut your computer at a certain time. When work and home are in the same space, it can be really hard to feel like you're done working.

Simon Wicki • Jan 7 '22

set boundaries

this! be it spacial boundaries or mental ones, without them I see my productivity decreasing.

Lucia Cerchie • Jan 6 '22

Congrat Emmett!
People say "I have trouble working remotely because I get distracted by dishes/laundry etc".
But---
It's ok to make these kinds of 'distractions' a 5 min break or even a reward for finishing a meeting or debugging a file. You'd do the same in the office environment (take a break by heading over to the water cooler), so why punish yourself for doing it at home?
Also: activities on screens will not be refreshing breaks. Here's looking at you, Twitter XD

Audrius Masiulionis • Jan 7 '22

Have a seperate space where you work. Be at that place during your work hours. I foud that is impartant to seperate work space and your home space, because you shouldn't mix work and your personal time.

Nick Taylor • Jan 7 '22

Ben Halpern • Jan 6 '22

My new years' resolution is "make space", and that refers to ensuring I fork off the time for myself so I'm not cramming it with good work. Like, maybe if my Friday looks "light", I don't automatically assume that's an opportunity to find ways to be hyper-productive. Maybe I just end up being "normal productive", and find time for a walk.

This isn't unique to remote work, but I think it requires being much more deliberate when the context of work and life are muddied.

Silvia España Gil • Jan 7 '22

I read some of the other comments just because I didn't want to repeat any. Also I would add that, if you leave with someone else, roomies, partners, family, let them now is work time even if you are at home.

Randall • Jan 7 '22

Stay on top of emails and Slack DMs! Concretely: if you are not immediately going to deal with an email or DM, mark it as unread. Then aim for zero unread DMs and emails.

As a remote worker, this is something I hope my coworkers do, and appreciate when they do. Don't let your inbox be a black hole.

Amy Shackles • Jan 6 '22

If it's possible for you, have a dedicated space for work that's separate from everything else. If that's not possible, try to have a system that changes your environment when you're in "work" mode and when you're not in "work" mode. This helps to cement the idea that there is a difference between time "at work" and time "at home" despite both of those times now being at home. It's a good way to try to prevent work time from bleeding into the rest of your time and to promote work/life balance.