11 Essential Tools You Need to Work From Home

Now more than ever, Americans are working from home. A survey by Gallup found that 43% of employees work from home at least occasionally, and that trend continues to grow every year.

A study by Quartz found that in 2017 over 5% of Americans work from home full-time. That’s a whopping eight million people.

While remote work is more popular than ever, it still comes with challenges including:

• Feeling isolated or disconnected from team members
• Lack of motivation or productivity
• Poor time management
• Lack of work-life boundaries
• Distractions from pets and kids

These issues can be especially challenging for those who are working from home for the first time. This guide will break down the essential tools to help you work from home.

Many employees find that they have an ever-changing to-do list, which can make task management difficult. Luckily there are several software programs that can keep the whole team operating smoothly. Here are a few:

Monday.com

Monday.com is a platform that has various templates your team can use for workflow and project management, or you can create your own custom templates.

Jira

JIRA offers features like kanban and scrum boards as well as customizable roadmaps. JIRA also has reporting features that let you analyze your team’s performance.

Google docs

Google Docs is a great option for teams on a budget or straightforward projects. Your whole team can track changes and leave comments on important documents to ensure everyone’s on the same page.

Sometimes it feels like there just aren’t enough hours in the day. Plus, when you’re working from home it can be hard to keep track of your time. These employee time management tools can help you stay on schedule:

Evernote

Evernote is a great system to help you stay organized. You can create to-do lists, take notes, and search PDF documents for the information you need.

RescueTime

RescueTime is the software for you if you find yourself getting easily distracted. It can block non-work-related sites, track how you spend your time and provide reports on how you can improve your time management skills.

Pocket

Pocket is an app that lets you save articles and websites all in one place, that way you can spend your work hours focusing on work knowing you’ll be able to read your favorite articles later.

In addition to these tools, it might also be worth investing in some quality noise-canceling headphones. Being able to tune out your work-from-home distractions can go a long way to help you concentrate on the task on hand, saving time and increasing your productivity.

In an office setting, you can just go up to your coworker and ask them a question but this is impossible while working from home. Maintaining quick and efficient communication while working from home is critical, and relying on emails won’t cut it. Sometimes an instant message can be best for a quick response, while sometimes a virtual face-to-face meeting is necessary. Here are some internal communications tools you can use to stay connected:

Slack

Slack is an instant messaging tool that will allow all of your teammates to easily communicate. Some features include direct messaging, group channels for company updates and you can integrate Slack into other tools, like Google Docs that will send you notifications when documents are updated.

Zoom

Zoom offers the most participants at any one time when compared to other apps and services of a similar nature. The enterprise-level plan can accommodate up to 500 people, while the free plan can accommodate up to 100. The number of participants can be increased to 1000 with an optional add-on.

Fellow.app

Fellow is a meeting note app where teams gather to have productive team meetings and meaningful 1:1s, build collaborative meeting agendas, record decisions and keep each other accountable.

When you work remotely it can be easy to fall into a habit of working 24/7, and spending all your time inside the same four walls can begin to feel overwhelming. If you want to be a productive team member it’s vital to take care of yourself. Here are some apps that can help you avoid burnout with meditation, mindfulness, and activity tracking:

Calm and Headspace

Calm and Headspace are great options to help you make time for your mental wellbeing. Both offer features like guided meditations and breathing exercises to help you relax.

ActivityTracker

ActivityTracker is designed to get you up an moving. It will keep track of your daily activity, like how many steps you take and will remind when it’s time to take a break and move around.

Working from home comes with many benefits like a flexible schedule and no commuting costs. However, you’ll also need to find ways to balance out the challenges of working remotely. But if you use these essential tools to help you work from home you can stay focused, motivated and connected.