The entire world is witnessing the impact of Covid-19 in different facets of life. The outbreak, lockdown measures led to being confined to 4 walls of the home and work from home (WFH) now has become the new normal for many. This has disrupted our daily routine effecting our lifestyle – healthy habits with schedules going all over.

With social distancing and isolation the only preventive solution to curb the spread of Covid-19 virus, organisations across the world let their workers work from home. This new model of work-from-home has also led to significant economic disruptions as there is uncertainity about how much and how long the impact will last.

Thanks to technology and availability of digital formats and tools many organisations and employees adapted and gradually implemented the new model of WFH as a reality.

While it’s too early to say what future holds for organisations, tech giants Facebook and Google have asked their employees to keep working from home till year end. India’s largest IT service firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) went a step ahead and is ready to discard its 20-year-old operating model and leapfrog into the new mode of work from home. TCS with 4.48 lakh employees globally (including 3.5 lakh in India) has already announced that under a new model of 25/25 upto 25% of its employees will need to work from its facilities by 2025 and that every employee can work without spending more than 25% of their time in a TCS office.

I have been working from home since last 8 plus years now, but this WFH for me is a different experience. Just when the lockdown was announced, I posted some tips for Work for Home and in maximising #productivity and managing #MentalWellbeing. What works for me:

1) Choose a comfortable but productive space to operate from.

2) Ensure to have your basic infrastructure ready – remember you will not have the luxury of having the admin and IT support to physically assist

3)Get ready as you would do while going to work regularly. You may avoid the heels & shoes but do dress up

4) Make your job-list and to-do-task. Ensure to add personal work in the list and keep atleast 60 minutes of free time

5) Regularly connect with your team /associates / clients to check on things and assure

6) Request family to step in your home office area only if it’s fire situation and not to show some random video

7) Resist the temptations of getting up to check on the things at home randomly

8) Avoid making random calls just because you feel lonely near your “new #homeoffice”

9) Take regular short breaks, hydrate and take care of #MentalHealth

10) Maintain DND – do not disturb your family, pets, neighbours and most importantly Do NOT Drink at work hours..but do keep yourself hydrated to manage your energy level to think faster and also be agile.

Anup Sharma (@TweetsAnup)

The author is a StoryTeller who loves his Old Monk.