Eight Things I Have Learned While Telecommuting

I have been working for Confio Software for almost six full weeks now. Two of those weeks I was on the road, which means I have been working at the office for the other four weeks. And by “at the office” I mean “the spare bedroom located next to my bedroom that was redesigned by Congress (web | twitter) for me to work from”. Yeah, that’s right, I work from home. I telecommute when I am not on the road. I rarely wear pants. Or socks. I hit the job lotto back in May and I have been living the dream ever since.

But working from home isn’t all unicorns and rainbows. Especially right now during the summer when the Junior Senators are out of school (and not in camp). And to complicate things even a little further is the fact that this is also very new to me, so I don’t have a work routine down yet. But I have learned a few things about telecommuting in this short amount of time and I thought I would share them with you. You’re welcome.

It Can Be Hard To Focus On Things When Oh! Look! Shiny!

There are a *LOT* of distractions when you are at home. Right now things are a little more complex with the kids out of school for the summer, but there are still a lot of other things that can take your attention away from your work. It is rare for me to get an uninterrupted fifteen minutes to focus on any particular task. I typically have to work in five or ten minute bursts and rotate among three or four things during the day, and then at night pick one thing to focus on after I put the kids to bed. For example, tonight I focused on this blog post and a bottle of wine.

Part of my job role at Confio is to provide technical support for Confio customers. That means I can get emails at any time during the course of a day and I will need to shift gears in order to answer the email. And that means I really cannot set aside a full hour for some particular task because it is possible I will be interrupted. So, I am always trying to think only fifteen minutes ahead at most.

I addition to that, there are also product demos that I take part in, especially right now as I try to get as familiar with the product as possible. Those demos are scheduled, which gives some structure to my day, but it is hard to take a deep dive into anything at 1:45PM when you know you have a meeting at 2PM.

And let’s not forget the emails I get throughout the day that cause me to stop for a few minutes. Most of those are PASS related as we gear up for the Summit and are also trying to pull together the upcoming SQL Rally next Spring. But each time I stop what I am doing and try to switch context to something else it makes it harder to get back to the original thread.

Congress

“Hey, can you help me with this for a minute?”

Sure, it sounds like a simple enough request, but it really is another chance at a distraction during the day. The fact is that Congress and I are now working out of the same space, our home. And at certain times of the day we need each other. She needs me to kill a bug, and I need her to make sure the printer is turned on. And let’s not forget strange noises, can you guess which one of us needs to investigate them?

There are times of the day when I have meetings, and times of the day when she has meetings as well. And right now, during the summer months, those are the times when one of us needs to make certain we know if the Junior Senators are conspiring to overthrow the government. In other words, there is a lot of activity in the house these days. It is a manageable chaos, no question. But it can make for a longer work day overall.

My Spawn

No question, they are a distraction right now. They are only six and seven years old and need our attention. Sure, we could turn on the television but that really only buys us a few hours at most. They could play on their laptop, but it is the same result. Inevitably they will fight and come to us for help. Boom! Another distraction. I do my best to stop working on whatever I am doing and focus on them but I am not always able to pull that off. My new office has a nice chair and I will have them sit down and talk with them, if for nothing else just to make certain that I am controlling the conversation.

I would love to let them run around the yard but they always seem to either end up in trouble or in tears. They have become very good swimmers, but we still don’t want to leave them completely unattended in the pool just yet. I really wish I could just spend the day with them in the yard paying soccer, baseball, or dribbling a basketball in the driveway but I need to pay their bills. Confio may pay me to keep blogging, but they aren’t paying me to teach my kids a crossover dribble (well, being my kids, they won’t need to be taught that anyway).

Household Chores

In my second week of working from home I ran outside to do a quick vacuum of my pool before a meeting. I knew I had twelve minutes and that it wouldn’t take me that long. When I got done I realized that I managed to get that chore done in less time than most people take cigarette breaks. Then I started thinking about other chores that I could get done in a short amount of time. Load dishwasher, load washer, empty dishwasher, empty dryer, vacuum pool, vacuum living room, dust office, run out to get more bacon, the list just grew longer and longer.

If I was not careful, then my day could end up being ten minutes of work, followed by a ten minute chore, followed by a meeting, then answering emails, then more work, and so on. By the end of the day I may feel that I got nothing done, even though I got a lot of little things done. And I would rather feel as if I was able to knock off one or two big things instead of a bunch of little ones.

Get Off Your Arse

I could sit in my office all day. Well, not on really hot days, I would sweat too much despite the central air. But on most days I could probably sit there all day, if necessary. In fact, I have done it before. Twice actually. For a lot longer than just eight hours.

But that’s not good. So I need to get up and stretch. And as soon as I get up, I’ve lost focus. And did I mention those chores? Yeah, what better time to take care of the pool than when you are getting up from your desk and walking around. Funny, but at previous places of employment I really could sit down for hours on end and never move. But while at home I find myself wanting to get up a lot more frequently. I’m like a fat kid in a chocolate store, I cannot be still.

But getting up is a good thing, and I recognize that it is needed. So I have learned to live with the interruptions as a way for me to get up every now and then. I may complain about doing so, but I know it is needed. If nothing else it helps with the eye strain for me to stop looking at the computer screen.

Drop And Give Me Twenty

OK, I will be honest here. I wrote a book that had a whole chapter on nutrition and exercise and yet I am not taking my own advice right now. I keep telling myself that I will start “tomorrow”, but that day hasn’t come yet. I think it is because I still feel awkward about not working my arse off for Confio. Just about every free moment I have is spent trying to make Confio more successful, and I would feel bad if I spent a few moments on myself. But I know that I need to get some exercise.

Part of this has to do with my routine, and I simply have not worked any exercise time into my daily routine. And part of that reason is because my meetings can happen at any time of the day. Confio is located in Boulder, which is two hours from Chez SQLRockstar, which means I can have meetings right through lunch which is my typical workout time. And did you know that it is hot in the summer at lunchtime? Who wants to go for a run then? It would be better for me to run early in the morning, or later in the afternoon, but the Junior Senators are around and I feel bad about leaving Congress alone with them for that time.

Bottom line is that I need to set aside some time each day for me to get a workout. I am going to try to do this in the morning, between 9 and 10 AM. Even if I can only ride my new bike for 30 minutes, it is better than doing nothing. Ideally I would run for about an hour or so each day, but that is not always going to be possible.

Different Times, Different Energy

While at TechEd last month Brent Ozar told me that I should keep a journal for the next six to eight weeks and keep track of how I felt during the day. The goal was to find the times of the day that matched to a particular need. For example, perhaps I feel most creative during the morning. Then I would want ot set aside my mornings to do most of my writing, and perhaps schedule meetings for later in the day.

Two things killed this theory. The first is that I still don’t know what time of the day I am most creative (although I do believe alcohol is a factor) and the second thing is that I really don’t control my meeting schedule right now. If a client wants to meet at 8AM, then I’ll meet at 8AM, I am not really in a position to defer the meeting until a later time.

But I know that it is important to maximize my time by arranging activities accordingly. And I also know that the body and the mind are not always in synch. For example, your mind has more motivation at the start of the day than the end, but your physical body is better at the end of the day and not the beginning. That’s why going for a jog at lunchtime is a common thing; you still have motivation for a workout and your body is ready for some exertion.

Same thing with writing, attending meetings, doing demos, answering support emails. At different times of the day you are going to be better suited for handling these tasks. You don’t really know what those times are unless you start tracking them, and then the idea is to set your daily schedule around those times. That way you can operate at peak efficiency.

I have already learned that I do my best writing at night, which is when I do my most drinking, so I tend to have my meetings during the day. I also tend to be more social during the morning than the afternoon, which is when I usually have the most meetings. And I tend to have lunch when I am hungry between 11AM and 1PM, but haven’t figured out when to go for a jog yet. Make sense? Probably not. That’s OK though, I am a trained professional.

I Can Never Go Back to Working For the Man

I was watching Return of the Jedi last night. Near the start of the movie, Lord Vader lands on the new Death Star and informs the Commander that the Emperor is not happy the station is behind schedule. The Commander complains that he needs more men and Vader then informs the Commander that he can use that excuse himself when the Emperor arrives shortly. The Commander just about wets himself and says “we shall double our efforts.” So, in the course of one minute after his arrival, Vader is able to get this guy to work twice as hard through nothing more than the fear of someone else showing up.

Two things stood out to me as I watched that scene. First, no way was the Death Star a union job, otherwise that Commander would have told Vader to go pound sand. Second, it reminded me of a place where I used to work, where fear was the motivating factor for most people to get work done.

The only thing I have to fear now is myself. And that is not just because my boss is on vacation. No, it is because I hold myself to a very high standard. If I am not pulling my own weight, I let myself know about it. The last thing I want to think about when I go to sleep is “did I *do* anything today?” If I cannot answer that question, then I get mad at myself and I wake up the next day determined to pick up the slack.

This is truly a dream job, and an incredible opportunity for me. I have specific tasks to accomplish. I am part of a team that has a very clear and defined goal. No one is going to micromanage me except for myself. No one is making me perform tasks out of fear; fear for my job, fear that I will not be allowed to advance, fear that I will not be given a fair bonus. Each day I look back and do my best to chart my progress. I reflect upon something I have learned, or something I have created. It seems so far removed from the corporate politics that I have been used to for my entire professional life that it is surreal at best.

I can never go back to that life. Well, I would if my family needed me to do so, but let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, OK?