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The topic of the “working from home environment” is and remains important for many employees. In our last article “Opportunities and Challenges Working From Home“, we presented both risks and opportunities that arise from working from home and highlighted possibilities. Now, in the second part, we would like to go a step further and give tips on how to reduce and prevent possible mental stress during working remote.

Maintaining contact with colleagues

A particular challenge in the homeoffice is to maintain contact with colleagues. Human beings are social creatures, and everyday work in particular thrives on content-related and social exchange. Virtual work and meetings via Zoom and Teams eliminate interpersonal communication in particular. The facial expressions and gestures of the other person are therefore much less visible and communication is often limited to the exchange of content. Personal contact quickly falls by the wayside. For new employees in particular, this can pose a problem in establishing deeper contact with the team.

What helps?

Joint virtual coffee breaks can help here. In most cases, a 10- to 15-minute exchange is enough to gain an initial impression of the other person and his or her well-being. If you have the impression that colleagues are overworked, it often helps to ask them if everything is okay.

Regular meetings can be useful to stay in touch and exchange ideas. The camera should be turned on in online meetings, as this establishes proximity, facilitates non-verbal communication and reduces misunderstandings. A nod of agreement can already help the other person. Don’t be afraid to ask other employees for advice or help – as we all know, four eyes see more than two.

The team spirit can also be strengthened in leisure time by initiating joint dates with the team. Whether it’s shared hobbies, such as sports, or just an after-work beer. Private contact with colleagues can significantly improve teamwork. To find out who has similar interests in the first place, internal profiles can help people get to know each other’s private hobbies and preferences. This lowers the inhibition threshold to approach employees for joint activities.

Friendly digital tone

A few rules of conduct also help in correspondence to facilitate cooperation and avoid stressful situations. Complete sentences signal to the other party that sufficient time has been taken to reply to an e-mail or chat message and convey appreciation. Exclamation marks can be perceived as yelling and should accordingly be used sparingly. Emojis, on the other hand, are a good tool, especially in correspondence, to convey one’s own mood or to signal when something was meant ironically – so feel free to use them. 🙂

Dealing with one’s fellow human beings

To make it easier to deal with roommates or family while working in the home office, it helps to signal that you are not available during working hours, e.g., with a “do not disturb” door sign. Especially if children live in the household, it should be clarified early on who will be available as a contact person during working hours.

Avoiding and balancing stress

Stress cannot always be avoided, but dealing with it in the right way is important (passive/carrying vs. creating an active balance). There are various ways to do this:

Work-life balance

Physical and mental balance should not be neglected in any case. Social contacts also need care in order to maintain them and to be able to perceive them as a support in stressful phases of life. There is nothing better for body and mind than to go out into the fresh air and exercise, but even a look at the greenery already has a calming effect on our brain. Stress originates in our head. We should take warning signals and feelings seriously, and emotions such as fear, worry and sadness should not be taboo, after all, each of us has felt these emotions at some point.

A healthy work-life balance also includes taking breaks from work, which should be used for our own recovery. Therefore, these breaks should not be used for household chores or other tasks.

Check work organization

Excessive demands on the work tasks, scope of work or the content part, should definitely be communicated, as otherwise the impression can be given that everything can be done well. Therefore, it is worthwhile to reflect again and again on one’s own structured organization of work processes. Basically, it helps to consciously stick to working hours and to create structures. These can be facilitated by regular breaks or rituals.

Create a pleasant working environment

The working environment should be designed as pleasantly and ergonomically as possible; working should be comfortable and fun.

Focus on positive aspects of work

Focusing on the positive aspects of work life is also a good strategy for boosting self-confidence and reducing stress. In doing so, it is important to make yourself clear: What am I good at? Which tasks have I mastered satisfactorily? To this end, feedback can be actively sought from the team and superiors. Challenges and new tasks do not automatically have to cause fear; they can be an opportunity to learn new things and develop further.

And don’t forget: praise your colleagues and show them appreciation – nothing motivates more and improves the working atmosphere so much. 🙂

Responsible for the content of this article are Lena Jager and Lina-Louise Kaulbach.

Kategorie: Topic
Schlagworte: Arbeitsorganisation, Arbeitsumfeld, homeoffice, mentale Belastungen, Stress, Tipps & Tricks, Work-Life-Balance
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