Quickbooks online edition

The top reason individuals fail to adapt to working remotely is they don’t recognise the need for good quality organisation and robust self discipline.

I have been working remotely for more than six years since I first discovered Quickbooks online an 'on demand' small business accounting software online system and was inspired by the fact that if you can perform accounting on the web then why shouldn’t it be practical to do other important types of work remotely?

Whilst working remotely has substantial gains there are numerous traps that people easily fall into which convert into problems that cause cuts in work output and reduced morale. The most cited reason for reductions in productivity in remote employees is disturbance and it is a established and well known fact that it can take a employee up to 0.33 hours to return to their original productivity level after experiencing a disturbance.

Deeper insights reveal that individuals who are continuously affected by disturbances are more likely to be susceptible to reduced memory ability and are prone to developing mental health issues in old age. We exist in an over communicated time and it is critical that you know the issues this causes before you begin working remotely. Whilst working remotely you have to do everything feasible to mitigate the risk of being disturbed.

Here’s how I do it:

1, Get a routine, make sure that everybody knows it and obsessively maintain it!

Good examples are a consistent time of day when you review or compose and reply to mail and make or receive telephone calls. Before I began working remotely I used to get up to a couple of hundred electronic mails over a period of twenty four hours. Now I think I am unfortunate if I receive more than 4. To ‘restart’ my electronic mail experience I altered my e-mail address and obsessively took precautions to shield the details being passed on to anyone. I then made sure everyone who I gave my e-mail address to, to use it with special care. I also created an automatic reply that swiftly told anyone sending me mail at what time of day I would be attending to mail and if an item must have my urgent consideration to mark it as ‘Urgent’.

2. Get rid of alerts.

Disable absolutely everything that can send you a visual or audible alert. This includes mobile and
conventional phones and forms of alerts from e-mail such as on screen pop ups, audible warnings, display changes to your inbox folder and of course facing a window. Get a door on your office and put up a ‘do not disturb’ sign on it.

In 'Remote Working Part 3 – Top tools and tricks' I will reveal my favourite tools and software.