Designing an Office That Will Work From Home
While working from home can be convenient, care should be taken that the workspace is as efficient and harmonius as possible. This eliminates stress and makes working much easier. It also promotes a harmonius intersection of work and home life.
Where are you going to put your office? Is it going to have a room of its own or is it going to be a corner of your living room or bedroom? The more space you have, the more free you can be in designing, but a small space can also do very well to accommodate your work materials. It can be a good idea to take measurements of your work area and/or work with home-design software to ascertain the space that you have to use. You're probably going to want to fit a decent-sized desk, lighting, shelves, file storage and wastebasket in your space, so allow for the room these things may take up.
You can work on the couch and some people do. However, it's not always the best thing for your back and posture. Your exchange hosting services chair should be designed with your comfort and posture in mind. Some people use an exercise ball as a desk seat to promote body movement and impromptu stretching. Some people prefer an ergonomic desk chair. Whatever you choose, make sure you're comfortable in it; you'll be spending a lot of time in it!
No matter how small your space is, you can find or make a desk and storage system to fit it. A desk needs to be at the proper height to accommodate your frame and at a proper width and length to accommodate your equipment. You will likely need room for at least a laptop, printer and work-related items. A desk with wings that lift out to form a larger working space can provide you with larger, fold-away space when you need it.
Even in this day and age of electronic information storage, paper is still a big part of the home office. File cabinets can be purchased cheaply and given a paint job and new handles to make them look a little better. File cabinets are also great to hold things other than paper - work materials and extra equipment can live happily in them as well.
Other things that can help you in your home office are plenty of storage for the 'little things' - pens, pencils, erasers, paperclips, etc. You don't have to get anything fancy - mason jars will work just as well as a wrought-steel fancybox. You should find it convenient, though, and easy to get at the stuff you need.
If you are dealing with little space, try vertically spacing your storage, so that shelves hold most of your working materials and your desk is left uncluttered. Consider modular shelves and storage solutions that can be stacked together in flexible patterns that change as your needs do. Items that perform a dual service - a chair or bench with storage, drawers that double as steps or shelves, etc. can maximize your space.
Good lighting is imperative and requires that you take a look at your space to see how this can be effected. There are plenty of choices in lighting fixtures for the home office these days. It must be flexible and not shine in your eyes. It should also be convenient to turn on and off. These ideas might seem like no-brainers, but it's not uncommon for someone to find the 'perfect' lamp, only to realize that it won't work effectively with their setup.
If you are going to all this trouble of designing a small space for your work life, make it attractive. You didn't escape the soulless cubicle maze just to recreate it in your own home. Have some plants around and pictures and artwork that you like. Make your workspace a place you want to sit down at.
Since you've taken the step to do at least some of your work at home, you owe it to yourself to make your workspace as livable as possible. Comfortable, properly sized furnishings, easy access to organized papers and supplies and good lighting is the start to a great office that will not make you dread the workday.
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