Five Ways to Stay Productive Working from Home

Whether you are an entrepreneur or a freelancer, as a mom it can get hectic when it comes to balancing home stuff and work deadlines.

Working and establishing my business from home has not been a walk to the park. While I would love to say that it has been easy and that I stay productive all the time, the fact is I would have off days when all I want to do is watch the latest K-Novela or Netflix hit or chill with my husband and my daughter.

While I do allow myself to have breaks, staying productive is still on top of my goals and here are the five different things I do to stay on top of everything in my business.

Five Ways To Stay Productive as a Work From Home Mompreneur

1. Create a Daily Routine to help you set up the day ahead

Yup, I am not kidding. This is perhaps the most effective way to approach staying productive while working from home.

Building your weekday schedule of what time you start your day and what you will do next is helpful. As a snapshot here is my usual schedule:

• 6:30 AM: Wake up

• 7 AM: Clean the house and help my daughter prep for school

• 8 AM: Walk my dogs and do my daily yoga practice

• 9 AM: Bath time and check my phone (as much as possible, I only allow myself to check my phone around this time)

• 10 AM: Start work by checking emails and some biz project management

• 10:30 AM: Start with my work to-dos

• 12:30 PM: Lunch and 1 hr break

• 1:30 PM: Check my emails before going back to work

• 2 PM: Continue with work to dos

• 6 PM: Final email check before wrapping up for the day

Create a schedule that you can stick to and this will help you get into the habit of your routine making it easier for you to stay productive.

2. Lessen digital distractions

And by this, I mean your mobile phone. As an entrepreneur, it can be oh-so tempting to always glance at your inbox or your Instagram. But make sure to limit this distraction as much as you can. There are apps that can help you lessen the amount of time you spend on your phone or help you lock up your phone for when you need to focus.

An app you can take a look at is Forest.

This is also applicable at night and when you wake up - you want to limit your mobile usage to help clear your mind from distractions and make it less tempting to check. You can set the time when you won’t get any notifications on your phone (I don’t get any notifications from 10PM to 7AM except for calls - just in case of emergencies).

3. Set a designated workspace or home office

This realization came to me when I was six months into building my business. Before I would just work in our living room area or in our dining table. But I realized that it didn’t put me in the mood to start working because it wasn’t a space intended to be used for work.

By having an area designated as your workspace or work area, you are conditioning your mind that you will work once you sit down in that area.

Still don’t have that designated workspace, why not check my board out filled with workspace or home office ideas?

4. Create a to-do list

Whether you are a service entrepreneur like me or you have a business, having a to-do list is vital.

Listing down what you need to accomplish and planning your days beforehand can come in handy. It will let you see if you are rushing to do things in a single day or if you can spread out the work across the week. There are many different apps you can use to help you create your to-do list but my go-to since I was in an agency is Asana.

I have it both on my desktop and mobile, to help me have a glimpse of what I have to do ahead of time.

5. Schedule breaks

This is often forgotten and I have personal experience with this too! When I started building my business from home, I often start my day at 8 AM and wrap things up at 10 PM (sometimes even at 12 AM)!

I felt so drained after that I re-evaluated how I approached how I was hustling for work. So now, I make sure to schedule breaks between the work I do (usually lunch, for coffee, and checking my daughter’s school stuff) and also end work latest at 8 PM (which usually happens when I work on my blog like today).

You might be wondering if breaks are really essential and I am here to say that they are. They are if you want to stay productive and not burn out. You need to find that balance when you work and when you play - which is beneficial in the long term for your mental health and your business too.

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Hi, I’m Denice!

In 2019, I decided to leave my corporate job as the Digital and PR Manager for a globally known brand to start my own business. My goal? To help service-entrepreneurs thrive through a holistic Social and Pinterest approach.

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