Some might think the “desktop calendar” died off when the digital notepad came along. But for those who scribble notes on the fly, doodle to keep the mind active, or just need a place for a quick reminder, a URL, email address or phone number, desk mats remain an important home office accessory.

I’ve used all sorts in 33 years spent working from home. I’ve had blank “month at a glance” calendars. I’d write the dates in the upper corner of each square then jot deadlines or reminders. I’ve also used the blank sheet style – just a big pad with like 30 blank sheets (tucked in at the four corners) that I can jot, doodle, scribble as an idea, reminder, number, or otherwise fleeting thought comes my way. A single page could go months with various scribblings keeping current – and not so current – details front of mind.

For years, I’ve used a dry erase board on my wall for my deadlines. An assignment would come in and I’d write it on the board. I still have the board, but now I use Google Tasks sync’d across my devices (Macbook and iPhone).

Another dry erase solution I use today, which I think is super cool, is Kassa brand clear dry erase board sticker roll (I’m sure 3M and others make them). It’s a strip of 5.5-inch by how-ever-long-you-want clear, adhesive, plastic dry erase material that sticks to whatever surface you want it for.

We’ve seen larger pieces on conference room walls. The one I bought (actually, my daughter bought it) is 5.5 inches wide by like six feet or so. I cut it around 15 inches long. It sticks to my desk and I write notes on the fly. When I’m done with the note, just wipe it away. Just be sure not to drag your laptop, elbow or anything else across it – as it erases pretty easily (deets: https://a.co/d/9wwypu9 – Kassa Clear Dry Erase Board Sticker Roll 1.4 x 6.5 ft Long: Includes 3 Dry Erase Markers, Transparent Adhesive White Board Film for Wall, Fridge or Desk; Create Your Own Whiteboard).

I’m a hybrid right and left brain thinker, with the memory of a sieve. What doesn’t get written down gets forgotten. Having a desk mat of any sort keeps those fleeting details or reminders from being lost to the ether. When not at my desk, I’ll often open Google Note, notepsd, or – more often – a blank email to scribble that note or reminder. But desk mats are an enduring accessory in my home office.

Dad & kids, circa 1998

This month, as the coronavirus forced millions of Americans home to work and open a brave new chapter in their lives, our family was closing one of our own. Zoe, our third of three children, completed college.

Twenty-eight years ago, we welcomed Nicole, our first child, into our home, where I worked – then, and now – as a full-time, home-based business owner. With three years of home officing already under my belt, and wife Robbie’s work as an RN keeping her at home four or more days a week, bringing a child home to be raised by both parents seemed pretty seamless at the time.

If only Corporate America got the memo about the benefits of teleworking and working from home – now called “WFH” – back then. But more on that later.

Last week, Zoe turned in her last college assignment. With that, she’s effectively done with school, just like Nicole and their brother, Zack, before her. Though Zoe left for college four years ago, this marked the final page of that chapter in our lives. With her milestone, the Zbar household was done with school.

White-collar folk forced home to telework in reaction to the Coronavirus and Covid-19 pandemic faced an ad hoc reality that never should have happened in quite that way. Telework should be planned, and its participants – from employees sent home to work to the managers who will supervise them – should be willing volunteers in the process.

This is not the way it worked out. Companies and workers faced an unexpected challenge rarely before seen – except in natural disasters like blizzards or fallout from hurricanes – and have had to make the best of a difficult situation.

Layer in kids sent home from shuttered schools and parents forced to home-school young students and shepherd high schoolers through their assignments – all while productively turning out the work – this difficult situation seemed nearly impossible to win.

Pivot to our situation. Dad was a full-time home officer. Mom was an RN, and later a nurse practitioner, who was home more than she was away. In a word, we were present. 

Jeff, Zack & Nicole

This began for us in 1991, a time when residential Internet was an expensive and slow dial-up connection, and kids crying and dogs barking in the background were a sure sign of that workplace pariah, the home officer. One cry or bark and you practically could hear the mood change from the other end of the call. Being home-based in some professional circles was bad enough. Burdening people with your home-based reality was whole-on Amateur Hour.

Eventually, that changed. That disdain became jealousy, that pariah became a source of envy. “I wish I could work from home,” they’d say, longingly. If only they knew that they could…

Reflecting on the past three decades, I lost nothing professionally working from the home-based workplace. Thirty-one years of home officing – 28 years with kids around – I wouldn’t change a thing. In fact, corporate America is the one that’s now getting that memo (trust me, we’re almost there).

What did we lose working and raising three kids with dad working from home? Precisely nothing. They were the center of our life’s and work’s orbits. No morning workplace routines or daily commutes that stole time from the kids. We saw them off to and home from school. No early drop-off or after-school late stay or childcare. No latchkey kids who let themselves into an empty home at day’s end.

Either mom or dad carpooled them to and from school or was there to see them off or welcome them home. Whether taking them to Mommy & Me classes or driving carpool, I was “Mr. Mom.” Ugh…

For several years, I even was weekly lunchtime “Ice Cream Man” at their elementary school.

Beyond school, we epitomized the nuclear family. We traveled together. We took crosscountry roadtrips in the family minivan. We hung out. Our schedules afforded us that freedom. I’d like to think we weren’t then what later would be called “helicopter” parents who hovered over their kids and ceaselessly inquired about every detail of their lives. I think the kids would agree.

Zoe and friend Carly shredding docs

We didn’t do this alone. Grandparents and extended family lived minutes away. Our kids learned to enjoy the company of extended family and respect the advice and counsel of elders beyond their parents.

I believe our presence paid off. Three kids graduated from college; two are on their own with significant others. They are, as I’ll boast to anyone who’ll listen, “off the payroll.”

Coronavirus be damned, Zoe graduated and is ready to chart her path.

“Graduated” isn’t quite right. I noted in the intro that last week that Zoe “completed” college. Graduation, in any formal sense, is still being planned by school administrators. Like Zoom meetings and Skype calls, commencement promises to be a virtual experience. Suffice it to say there will be no commencement, at least not soon or in any traditional sense. That’s a sad reality for millions of graduating high school and college seniors. Read Zoe’s reflections here.

Sadly, kids like Zoe have learned to pivot with the changes. But it’s who they’ve learned to be. And I’d like to think that parents at home helped set that stage. Like many of their friends, our kids are engaged with others, society, and the world around them. They travel – widely. They give a damn about the world around them and their impact on it; for the most part, ours haven’t missed voting in an election since they hit 18, even registering for absentee ballots when not home to vote in person.

Many of their friends are equally engaged.

All along, our lives have been about choices made and the freedoms those choices allowed. When I decided to quit my day job to go freelance, Robbie – the daughter of entrepreneur parents – encouraged it. When our kids came along, we were there. As they grew, we were deeply involved, not quite helicopters, but nudging them in the right direction.

As for that memo to corporate America, smart employers who have not only allowed but embraced telework, remote work, and home officing long ago realized the culture they’re creating and the loyal employees they’re nurturing.

Teleworkers work longer hours – they’re logged in earlier and logging off later, often working during those times they’d otherwise be commuting. They’re thankful for being allowed to work from home.

And that’s just the kind of employee most employers want working for them.

Smart CEOs sweat “leadership succession planning.” Do we think enough about generational succession planning? Those who appreciate this extended relationship between worker and employer, parent and kids, and kids and community, understand the role engaged parents play in the development of tomorrow’s generation. 

Are these the “non-voters” some boomers are quick to blame for political malaise or complain about like some apathetic mass affecting and afflicting the path of our country? Sure, millions of young voters stayed home in 2016. But paint with that brush someplace else.

As millions of Americans explore home officing for the first time, and millions find their children at their side, realize the opportunity this challenge has presented.

If life is a book, this is a new chapter that has opened for millions, even if it has closed for our family.

Those are lessons not found in the classroom. Some of the best lessons can be learned with kids at your side, in your home office, in the family minivan, on daily walks. If you keep looking and listening, I’d wager those lessons will keep on long after the kids have completed school.

These are lessons not lost with graduation, even if the commencement exercise was. Let’s learn it together.

When some people say they’re working from home, they should be a little more specific. I’ve had a dedicated and bona fide home office since quitting my last day job and 1989. It’s been as formal as some cube downtown, albeit the attire was a little more loose.

As technology has evolved, however, so has the definition of my “office.”

They say “work” is a thing, not a place. The thinking is that work can get done regardless of where the worker finds himself. In the office, a coworking space, a seat at Starbucks or on a jet. Or the home. But does it have to be a dedicated “office”? Increasingly, the answer would seem be Maybe Not.

When I headed home to work in 1989, I set up shop in the second bedroom of our first rented townhouse. As we added kids to the family, each successive apartment or home had one more room than the number of kids and married couple in the home.

At that moment in technology’s arc, I was tethered to the office where the desktop computer sat. No laptop or portable device freed me from my desk.

Untethered technology, like laptops, smartphones (even the early Blackberry), and tablets, unleashed the worker from the office, even the home office for independent contractors and freelancers. Nowhere is anywhere. The Anywhere Office.

But some offices have their moments to shine. That includes nuanced and niche spaces in the home.

My home office is driven by my mood. Monday mornings, I’m in the bona fide office – desk, chair, desktop. My mind is focused on the deliberateness of work. It’s where my moments are most productive.

By afternoon, or on those days when I don’t need the focus of that space, and as my day moves from writing to calls or project details that can be performed anywhere, the home becomes my office. It could be the couch in the den, or the kitchen table.

My latest satellite office is in the living room, about 20 feet from where Robbie works on her laptop at the dining room table. It’s open and airy, cool beneath a ceiling fan and bathed in the sunlight coming from the patio behind me. With my portable phone in hand, I’m as productive as in almost any other space in the home.

Typically, by the evening, my laptop and I will have moved to the bedroom. 

One home, at least five different “offices.” That doesn’t include the patio. It’s the panacea of every home office protagonist. “How cool,” they enthuse, “You can even work from the patio.” I’ve never been able to focus there. So I don’t even try to fake it.

All these offices are great, but mostly because my work reality allows them to be. Our kids are grown and almost flown, so we don’t have infants to grade schoolers demanding my attention or making a ruckus. The dog isn’t a noise machine; now 11, Stella’s usually content to lie by my side.

In the early days, my remote office would take me, my Apple IIc computer and printer – all tucked into a plastic laundry bin – to hotels or road trips for work assignments. (Note the open window and balcony overlooking Daytona Beach, and the casual attire from this make-shift office I cobbled together back in 1993 for an assignment for Advertising Age magazine.

If work is a thing and not a place, where you place yourself becomes where you find yourself, your laptop, your wifi – and maybe your dog.

This isn’t just another article about telework, WFH, or people rushed into remote work in their new home office. It’s about a cry for help from a home officer. Many first-time remote workers, when forced to work from their existing home offices, find it’s not the right space for them. Clutter has overgrown the workspace and a cleaning out is in order.

Lee wasn’t a first-timer. He’s worked from home for years. Yet this long-time friend and talented nature photographer messaged me recently about needing some help decluttering his home office. A life’s and career’s worth of comics and technology books, LP albums, obsolete tech hardware – along with the current computer hardware he uses for his IT work and digital photography business – had swamped his space. So much so that it had sprawled from his office into his grown-and-flown kids’ bedrooms. It was a cry for help from a man overwhelmed by the detritus of his home-based workspace.

What could he do? Lee was hoping for the soft touch of a scalpel. Instead, we decided to break out a meat cleaver to carve away years of accumulated stuff.

– Commit your time and tackle one category at a time. So much to take on, where do you start? Distractions and culling take time and require deliberate focus. I suggest people set aside at least two days, starting early and working ’til you can cull no more. Depending on how much you need or commit to clearing out, you’ll need to commit to something, anything – your choice – and stay laser focused. Lee wanted to tackle books and albums at one time. We decided he’d Choose Albums. Focus. Tackle. Complete. Move on.

– Be ruthless and dedicate to making the hard decisions. This is no easy task and it won’t go quickly. Buy high-strength lawn bags. Bring a garbage can to the front door. Whatever can’t be donated (see below), ditch. You’ll come across all sorts of stuff you’ll want to keep, toss, reminisce over… Like some closet organizers say when tackling your clothes, if you haven’t worn (in this case, seen or used) it in a year, ditch it. If it’s something that’s available online, ditch it. If you’re not emotionally bound to something, ditch it. (get the drift?)

– Don’t Get Distracted. Leafing nostalgic through comics or books once important enough to visit a bookstore, or putting loved LPs on the turntable, slow the culling to a glacier’s pace. Sure, put an album on the turntable as background music. Whether working or powering through a decluttering project, music is soothing. Either way, stay focused on your task at hand.

– Catalog stuff for sale or keeps. Lee had three crates of vinyl albums, a bunch of CDs, and just as many cassette tapes. He also has a Spotify account. I suggested he research whether there’s a market for old cassettes (I suspected not), and catalog the CDs and especially the albums in prep for selling them online. A pretty savvy ITer, I suggested Lee put his catalog of vinyl and CDs online for sale. There’s a market out there, especially for once-and-increasingly popular albums, at least once commerce returns. Cataloging also will help him Like all those songs and albums on Spotify, so he doesn’t have to give up his music when he gives up his library.

– Give it Away. Stuff you won’t keep or can’t sell, donate to a worthy cause – a charity, a group home, or other not-for-profit or organization. Get a receipt; donations may be tax deductible. Again, you might be storing donations until stay-home and other isolation orders are lifted.

Pro Tip: Do NOT store that stuff in your home office. Once you’ve committed to getting rid of it, move it to the garage, another bedroom, or someplace else that’s not the place where you’re trying to see real results. Don’t dampen the mental rewards of your success by keeping a bag of donations in your home office. Even if suffering the ire of your significant other, get it out of the home office.

“I am slowly going through sections of my office,” he said, “and I am getting rid of my history.”

Want to see more of Lee’s work? Check out his Facebook and Instagram.

Creating your new home office by clearing the clutter can be cathartic to the soul and empowering to your productivity. Clear it all away and find your new home for your home office.

A week later, Lee had a few comments to share about the process, a slow process, he admitted. He developed a plan to go through the room in sections. He bought a batch of containers to sort out his photography gear and electronics. Then he committed to get rid of things that he has no value for now.

Going through file cabinets, he got get rid of a load. “It’s a slow process,” he said. “I have 40 years of stuff to sort, save, sell or toss.

Imagine tens of millions of laptops sent out beyond the corporate hive. Or just the five, 10, 5o, or 100 that you’ve provided your loyal team so they could telework effectively from their home offices. Then imagine the untold sums you’ve spent hiring teams and licensing software to create a protective web against hackers, phishing, malware, ransomware, and other threats.

Then, some unwitting member of your team opens their laptop to log on to a web conference – and your (and their) privates are open for the world to see. Open for hackers to hack, Chinese programmers reportedly to embed nefarious code, or even – maybe a bit more playfully and personally painfully – coworkers to peep in on the privates your people reveal. If it doesn’t frighten your CEO, corporate counsel, or self out of your senses, you’ll be very comfortable in the video conferencing world.

A video making the rounds shows a team chuckling at the expense of an unwitting coworker whose camera’s rolling – and who’s stark naked (nevermind that someone posted the video to the web. That’s another story for HR and social psychologists to ponder).

We’re surrounded by threat actors from across the county and around the world. But they could be right down the hall or wherever your team calls home.

Remote work is a scary place, exposing vulnerabilities deeply tied to the workplace. That’s before we open the laptop.

I was on the Small Business Advocate radio show this morning discussing smart web conferencing. We shared some tips. Those, plus three tips, can protect you, your team, your company, and your clients from what the lens might reveal?

– Cover your lens. When was the last time you looked at your lens and assumed the camera was off? Whether paper, Post-It, or protective sliding shield, cover the laptop and desktop lens when not in use. When done, make sure the software is off and shut down.

– Be aware. Everything you say, post, show of yourself or in the background of every video, is now for public consumption. Even worse, claims that some programmers embedded code in popular web conferencing apps in order to steal video, audio, or shared content from the stream, could be vulnerable or compromised.

– Repeat after me, “There’s always somebody watching.” In the 2001 movie Ocean’s 11, Andy Garcia’s character warns that in his hotel, “There’s always somebody watching.” It was a warning to would-be thieves; 19 years later, it’s pretty prophetic.

As an aside, Zoom and other apps let you post background images to liven things up. If you use them, just make sure they’re appropriate

It might have been funny to see that team’s coworker in the buff. It will be less so if it’s you, a teammate – or your company’s or a client’s proprietary info shared for all the world to see.

Just control what the world sees in the first place.

Two weeks into forced telework, what have we discovered? Hundreds of reporters have written hundreds of thousands of articles with groundbreaking insights like “choose the right technology” or “ensure you have bandwidth” or “set a schedule” or “stay connected using” (insert description of the latest video conf app here, no, not Slack, the other latest video conf app).

Crikey, what about the kids? Do I even remember algebra?!

As the New York Post wrote, “The current crisis is indeed a near-universal test case for technology-based remote working, and businesses worldwide will learn an enormous number of lessons…” The quote went on to discuss effectively communicating with employees, clients and partners, and managing employee tasks and projects, advancing complex projects without direct interaction, yadda, yadda, yadda…

So what have we learned? We’ve written here scores of times about the importance of ergonomics and the Feng shui of natural or well-placed lighting in a space with music and plants and art and dripping in zen. That’s not changed.

White-collar workers globally have been thrown into the home office like some lion’s den. There’s no “But what about…?” They can’t escape. There’s no punting in COVID-19 home officing. This is four-down territory.

Telework had to be the most anticipated (or feared), loved (or hated) workplace event (or traumatic experience) of the Information Age (or End Times). Maybe it’s all a matter of perspective. Most people who feared telework seem to have fallen (or free-fallen) neatly into their place in this new office environment (albeit one that’s been around since the 1980s). [Insert obligatory woman at table with laptop here]

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics says a quarter of the American workforce works outside the traditional office. Just last year, 81% of workers said telework might just make them happier about work.

That rosy projection was before coronavirus robbed countless millions of their daily commute and shackled them in the home-based workspace. Heck, even a White House unit working as part of the coronavirus task force vacated their workspace after someone tested positive.

Eight in 10 thought they’d be happier? Now that the rubber’s meeting the bedroom-turned-home office floor, we’re gonna whether that happiness sticks. [Insert obligatory photo of happy home officer with laptop at kitchen table. Eh, maybe not]

Home officing works.  The New York Times reported that “remote workers are often more productive, more engaged, less stressed, more satisfied and less likely to quit than their in-office counterparts. Remote workers, to their own detriment, are often more dedicated, working longer hours, and, in essence, “gifting” their time and lives for free back to their companies.”

We’ve called that the “best kept secret” among telework managers – that teleworkers work longer hours than they did when back in the corporate hive. One client used to leave home at 8am to arrive at work around 9 to 930am. Old routines die hard, so she’s dressed and at her desk at 8. Whereas her day in Miami office would end around 6 and she’d get home close to 7, she’s working well into the dinner hour.

In between log-on and log-off, gone are her lunches with coworkers and watercooler chat.

Is she happy? She likes it. But she says she misses the camaraderie and is definitely churning out more work.

So what else have newly-minted home officers learned? Here’s what we’ve learned that some of us already knew…

We all now telework. It’s the The Level Home Office. There once were two people in the workplace – those who home officed, and those who loathed, or envied, those who did. People who started as corporate drop-outs who couldn’t make it in the corporate hive. Now we’ve all been introduced to home officing with a screw-some-toe-in-the-water test. It was a cannonball plunge. We’re learning as we go.

Noise now is embiance. That household cacophany – lawn mowers, TVs, SOs, kids, dogs, tea kettles (it’s interesting how many people said they love having tea in their home office) – once made us pariahs. Now it’s quaint background noise. We’re no longer as uptight about stifling it from peers elsewhere who just don’t get it. Besides, they’d be hitting the phone’s or Zoom’s mute button, too.

The home office is any place that works. We know a dedicated space is a panacea. I’ve worked from “bedrooms” sans bed for three decades. The office door the “power tool of the home office.” But any space – a desk in the corner of your bedroom, a nook in the living area, even the kitchen table – that works for you is a space that works. It might not be a long-term solution. But people are making it work.

Don’t worry about office protocols. Remember hiding those Post-In Notes scribbled with your passwords? No need to stash them like the combo to Fort Knox (assuming you trust your kids’ friends, your housekeeper, the bug guy, or anyone else who has access to your home office or workspace). Just make sure stuff you don’t want the world to see isn’t in eyeshot of your webcam. And if you have hard copies of client or company sensitive or proprietary data, or run a home business and have to stash your business checkbook, get a desk with a locking drawer.

Purpose, not perfection. The people at Content Bacon run a 100% virtual web and social media content shop. They know when newbies go virtual, there are going to be hiccups, mistakes, and some laughter. Get the work done, share lessons from your mistakes, and expect there may be more. Check out their video on how they make it work (most of the time.)

“Forward-thinking businesses are watching the current WFH experiment closely to see how it plays out and to quickly learn the lessons it has to offer,” the Post wrote. “This is a time of deep uncertainty and disruption, but it is an opportunity to adapt to a new normal.”

Get Comfortable with Technology

This hasty escape to the suburbs into realms unknown has sent people scrambling from the commercial space. In fact,  many expect landlords to suffer once “normalcy” returns and employers realize they can save on rent, utilities, and insurance by sending keeping workers at home and converting to smaller, “touch down” commercial space.

Coronavirus required a fast response. Many weren’t quite prepared. To help with this swift transition of his MRINetwork team, Bert Miller sends inspirational and informative video messages over RingCentral to both the team and the network.

“They set the tone and provide leadership in a time when we need it most,” he said. “Video does a great job of maintaining some level of human contact.”

Beyond the basics of determining what video conference platforms to use and how to set up appropriate home offices, many individuals are concerned about their ability to connect with current and potential clients, and close deals based solely on digital interactions, said Tina van der Ven and Jolie Balido, co-founders of NewStar Media.

“If you’re not comfortable with videoconferencing technologies and how you will present on camera, you should start liking it – fast,” they said. Too new to you? “Enlist a colleague or someone at your home to help you set up an appropriate virtual home office, and practice using the video conferencing platforms.”

Once upon a time, downright slovenly was de rigueur for a chief home officer. Hell, still is in my office. My tanks are torn and my shorts tattered, and 5 o’clock is a daily shadow, not a quitting time.

Today, those webcams catch all (fair warning: webcams catch all). Reporters, attorneys, and financial execs used to keep a spare jacket on the back of the door. Casual clothing is acceptable, but know when a t-shirt works and a button-down or polo shirt is called for.

No need, says leadership consultant Rebecca Stanton-Reinstein. When she started working from home, was advised to create an office and dress for work. “Act like you’re at ‘work,’” she said.  Twenty-five years later, it’s still working.”

Tina’s home office now has an upgraded computer and phone – and artwork, a candle, file organizers and has been “decluttered to create a more tranquil work space.” For her part, Jolie added scented candles, lighting for late-night work sessions, a bench under the window and pair of sitting chairs, for “when I want to sit somewhere different from my desk chair, or where my kids sit from time to time.”

Two weeks in is hardly enough to see this through. When Dalia Passi’s team went virtual a year ago, they began their days with video calls and shared expectations. Eventually, they waded through a 90-day adjustment period. “After a lot of trial and error we figured it out.”

Probably the best advice – other than this article – came from Forbes, that suggested new teleworkers, “Double-down on the grace. Working from home, especially in the times of COVID-19, means more distractions. Kids home from school, pets excited about a favorite toy, the inevitable leaf blowers and other intrusions are going to invade your conference calls with situations you never encounter at the office,” they wrote.

“Take a deep breath and remind yourself (and everyone on your team) that people are doing the best they can within their given environments. A bit of grace in the face of unexpected disruptions will bring some much-needed humanity to these unprecedented times.”

Some expect telework to stick. Covid accelerated the telecommuting, “possibly for the long term,” penned Brookings. What had been slow to catch on after rosy projections in the 1990s and 2000s, “the pandemic is forcing investments [in technology and management practices] in industries where telework is possible…As a result, we may see a more permanent shift toward telecommuting.”

Those who’ve been teleworking for decades are looking out from their home offices and wondering what took so long.

What makes home offices work? They meet the needs of the worker and the other residents, either family members or roommates. They make maximum use of available space, and create space where there was none before.

My home office is one of those home offices. I’ve worked from four in my 31-year career as a freelance journalist and corporate copywriter. The first three came in the first six years of my career. One was in the second bedroom of a town home we rented back BK (Before Kids). The second was the third bedroom in our three-bedroom starter home. Then, when Child No. 2 arrived and I was kicked out of what would become his bedroom, we enclosed a third of our covered patio and built my third home office.

Today, I work from the fifth bedroom in a five bedroom home.

What have I learned along the way? Space, design, a nice view, and a dose of ergonomics make a world of difference in a “meh” home office and a workspace you can call your great escape.

Here’s my home office – by the numbers…

That’s my home office. It’s actually the fourth I’ve worked from in 31 years spent working from home. It remains a work in progress – on its path to becoming the perfect man cave and a fully functional workstation.

Jeff @ work at the dinette workspace in Home Office Highway ’09.

This article previous appeared on Chief Home Officer. Cloud computing, location independence, the “Anywhere Office…” Whatever it’s known by, remote work done beyond the traditional and home office liberates millions of workers every year. Already, countless teleworkers are untethered to work. And more agile remote work strategies and policies ould free even more to explore boundless opportunities – if they knew and used the tools needed to explore this New Way to Work.

Home Office Highway explores those tools and strategies. Over the next month, we’ll write about trip preparation and lessons learned, the tools we’ll use and the applications we’ll log on to from the road.

Travel with us as we reveal how the right technology, client expectations, and family ground rules can help you work wisely from the road. So hit the highway in your RV, a minivan or the family sedan, or set up shop in a beachfront cottage or timeshare.

For many businesses, the ability to work remotely creates a key disaster recovery / business continuity solution.

Remember: “Work is not a place. It’s a thing.” It’s a big country out there. Don’t let a thing like work get in the way of exploring up close and personal.

I was talking to a client recently who was sharing details about her new work-at-home telework experience. She’s a long-time, corporate employee accustomed to an hour’s commute to work each way each day. Now that she’s working from home, she finds she’s ready for her day each morning about the same time as when she’d be leaving for the office.

Only, she faces no commute. So she’s at her desk around 8 am. Her lunches now are quicker than the hour-long lunch she’d normally take with coworkers. And her day now ends about the same time as she’d get home from the office, or about 7:30 pm.

Where are those two to three hours each day going? Straight into the employers’ time clock. And researchers have discovered, she’s not alone.

We’re gonna let you in on something. It’s considered one of the best-kept secrets among telework managers: Their employees will work longer hours than they do in the corporate office.

Often released gleefully to work from home, teleworkers thankfully ply longer hours – typically working earlier and later during what would be their commute to and from the corporate office. Those hours benefit the employer. It’s not a new concept; a facilities project management firm blogged on overworking home officers recently.

As companies seek to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, white-collar workers worldwide have been sent home from the corporate hive. Newly-minted teleworkers have told me they’re working more than they did back in the hive. But they’ve also complained that it’s been a bit of a digital slog.

What gives?

Home Internet connections, even “high-speed” services, don’t live up to the promised speeds. And unless you’re running a T-1 at home, nothing’s going to match office bandwidth. The solution, it seems, is to shrink the difference between their Internet speed at the office, and what they have at home.

The answer may be a business VPN.

Effective work is about speed and throughout. In fact, a lament of the corporate lass we wrote of above is the time it takes to download and upload large files to and from the corporate server. It’s apparently an arduous, time-consuming process.

A business virtual private network (VPN) could be the answer. For many, it has become an integral – and secure – component of their work from home set-up.

For those not versed in tech, a business VPN is a network of computers linked together to provide secure access to approved users. Access, file transmission, and data transfer are fast, secure, and reliable – just like they had back in the corporate office.

Prices start from about $40 a year. For reviews and pricing, PC Magazine recently reviewed several VPN providers.

Recent research into the use of VPN technology have lent insight into the solution’s growing use. Provider NordVPN Teams recently reported that the dramatic shift in work location from office to home has caused a huge surge in the use of business VPNs.

With statistics as recent as March 11, researchers found that the US has experienced a 65.93% growth VPN use; and mass remote working in the US has contributed towards a rise in desktop (94.09%) and mobile app (0.39%) usage.

Globally, researchers found a 165% spike in the use of business VPNs and overall sales have almost increased by 600%. Business VPN usage is up 240% in the Netherlands, 207% in Austria, and 206% in Canada.

Now, to that secret about overworking…

US has seen the biggest time extension of the normal working day – adding an extra three hours – from 8 hours to 11 hours per day – or a three-hour jump.

Working hours in the United Kingdom, France, Spain, and Canada have increased an average two hours per a day.

Austria, Belgium, Denmark, and the Netherlands daily working hours have risen by an average of one hour.

Working from home isn’t easy. Factor in the alien nature of this wholly new environment, and for some, kids added to the mix, it’s a lot to master.

Yet, just because they’ve discovered a few new hours each day, these new teleworkers shouldn’t be freely giving their time away. It’s a lesson being learned early in the novel coronavirus COVID19 episode.

Hopefully, the lessons will get through – and we won’t have created a whole new wave of workaholics.

Staff are working from home under extraordinary circumstances with fears and pressures including having their kids to care of while working for you. Their children themselves are worried and confused and need extra help and support. Kids have overnight lost their freedom, their friends, their structure and daily activities. Your staff may well be caught like a deer in the headlights. Below, McDermott offers advice HR managers can pass onto staff to help them become resourceful adults up to the challenges life throws at them.

It’s perfectly predictable that our kids will experience fear and distress. It’s important to acknowledge this and explore how they are feeling – without adding to their alarm.

Ask them what they have heard and respond in a way that validates their feelings and gives them factual information about what is happening (https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/publications/looking-after-your-mental-health-during-coronavirus-outbreak).

To McDermott, little ones might try to protect you from their distress and say they are fine. But it will show up in other ways such as:

In their play, which can become preoccupied with the worries; mummies and daddies getting sick and going to hospital, people getting hungry, people fighting and getting angry with each other.

Kids might become avoidant when they are upset, not talking and withdrawing.

Behavior may deteriorate and arguments and fights start.

Kids may “regress” and start to act in a younger manner, depending on age you may see thumb sucking, incontinence, clinging behavior.

If you see these types of things you can gently explore with your kid why they think these behaviors are happening, allowing them to communicate their feelings verbally rather than behaviorally. It’s crucial to turn off all punishment signals and that you understand they are upset not bad.

Structure is Key

Get a daily structure in place for kids as soon as you can. Plan a weekly timetable of education and activities. Structure in and of itself will have the impact of calming and reassuring your kids and off course annoying them if it interrupts TV time! That structure should include regular sleep and wake times and regular mealtimes. Ensure physical activity is programmed in, even if you are isolating at home then program in family home gym activities. If you are allowed out or have a garden, tend it. The US CDC offers some tips as well.

How to Help Your Children Deal with Covid-19 Anxieties

There are no right or wrong ways to talk to your kids and support them during the current public health crisis but here’s a helpful list of ways to think about it:

Create an emotionally open and supportive environment.

Be honest and be accurate, use your government and UN sources of information (WHO, CDC in the US, NHS in the UK).

Reassure but don’t over-promise.

Validate your kid’s feeling whilst providing reassurance.

Talk at the level your kid can understand.

Control access to news channels to reduce access to frightening stories.

Kids will learn from how you behave, and they will personalize and try to protect you from their bad feelings which they will experience as very destructive.

Because of your own fears your creativity may run dry when trying to think about activities for your kids, so here’s a few links to get you started. There are loads and things online and remember you are not alone.. reach out, network, share with other adults, stay connected and meet your needs where you can!

These links are the result of personal searches and designed to get you started and remind you that you have the capacities and resources to get through this

https://abcdoes.com/abc-does-a-blog/2020/03/14/at-least-50-fantastic-ideas-to-try-at-home/

https://www.twinkl.co.uk

https://theimaginationtree.com

https://www.redtedart.com

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/joinin/about-blue-peter-badges

https://world-geography-games.com/world.html

https://www.bighistoryproject.com/home

https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/

https://www.britishcouncil.org/school-resources/find

https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/blog/2020/03/nature-detectives/

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/radio

Noel McDermott is a Psychotherapist and International Speaker with over 25 years’ experience in health, social care and education. An impactful workshop leader, he delivers bespoke training on a range of social care, clinical and human rights ethics and issues across multiple sectors. He is the founder and CEO of three organisations, Psychotherapy and Consultancy Ltd, Sober Help Ltd and Mental Health Works Ltd. Noel’s company offer at-home mental health care and will source, identify and co-ordinate personalized care teams for the individual.

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