Bonjour hi welcome to the session how to stay productive when working remotely
I'm Frank Boucher a Microsoft cloud advocate and I've been working from home
for about seven years and in this session what I want to do is share with
you a few tips and trick that I got along the way it's not a definitive GUID
I'm definitely not a pro but you know I've been working for a while so I got
some tricks let's get started so first it's not magic
there's no potion spell or magic pill that will make you more productive you
won't wake up tomorrow say yep I'm 200% more productive today yeah no it's not
working like that it all depends on you you need to decide to be more productive
and just like in real life you will need to put the time and effort to make it
happen it's not magic it will take time it will take effort and you will maybe
fail but don't worry I get you I will give you some tips and tricks and some
application along the way that could help you ready let's get started
so you're going to work from home so go to work get dressed I'm not talking just
about putting pens I'm talking about getting dressed getting a nice shirt
some pants some you know getting your hair done getting you know getting ready
like if you are going to the office you know even some time when I'm working
very important time I will put shoes and honestly I don't like to put shoes in my
house and my wife really don't like it but it helps me to get in the zone to
get to trick my mind and that's everything we want we want to trick our
minds so we are at the office and I know for some people they miss the commute
they miss that distinction between I'm on home I'm at I'm and now I'm at the
office so what you can do you could go grab a coffee go close to your coffee
shop grab a coffee get back home you could take
put a headset maybe listen to a podcast some music do a little tour of the block
something like that get back and when you get back to the office now you are
at the office you are at work and the trick worked the second tips look simple
but stay with me you'll see it's not that simple
make a schedule I'm not talking about nine-to-five here I'm talking about what
worked for you maybe you need your second half to take care of the kids
because you have young kids or maybe like me they are older but you still
need to watch them a little bit so you need to make a schedule making dynamics
so maybe you're working a block in the morning maybe another block at the
afternoon maybe you're working and day on the weekend so make something that
worked for you and also share it to your team and your manager and I'm not
talking just your manager because he needs to know when you're working but so
people know when they can interact with you and the hardest part about making a
schedule is respected like me for example I'm a morning guy I wake up very
early and that's where I'm at my prime so I work and then I have a block of two
hours where I'm not working that's the time for me to have my
breakfast take a shower and stuff like that but may look simple but during that
period I'm not answering text messages or email but it's hard for me because
I'm working from our global team so my team needs to know this is my time where
I'm disconnected this is the time I need for me for venting to read news and do
my little you know home stuff so what's your schedule okay you're not a machine
you're definitely not a machine you're not doing a sprint here it's not like
when you have crunch time I mean working from home because this project need to
be done this is not what you're doing right now you're working from home so
this is a marathon you need the effort you're pulling in today you will need to
put the same effort tomorrow so maybe you should reduce your pace
so it's something you can cruise a little bit longer on it sorry I hit let
the mic and you keep you need to pace yourself and get there so try to time
box it helps for me I find out that it sells a lot and don't multitask you
can't you maybe think yep I can multitask no problem no you cannot
that's how context switching and it's really bad for you for example by the
way you should turn your webcam on if it's possible for you it will helps
people to see you and it will like the comprehension when you're in meeting
will be much better this way and you know for example when I am in
meeting I could see someone really you know watching something else or typing a
lot but they're not taking notes they're probably just answering some message or
email well you're not I'm paying my meeting I'm trying to get things done
here and you know if you aren't person who's doing that then you're slowing
down that meeting being focus looking to the camera will make things happen
faster so your meeting could be shorter and everything will get done more
productively take notes it's very important to keep track of everything
you do because you will be interrupt just like in the office but the
interruption maybe your kids are phone or something else so taking notes is
very important here that's a descriptor you know an example of the notes I was
taking on pen and paper because yep pen and paper are still a thing the way
I work is I have always a top three party it could be five for you for me
what works with three top priorities those are the things I really need to be
done today it must be done if it's not done then I will bring it on the next
day so those little square at the top of my page they need to be checked so only
three because if you're trying to put ten tip ten things it won't work and
then have something where I have on schedule everything I do so I start
working on nine o'clock do this thing start working maybe someone else's
chatting with me so I will do that when I go back to work on my task I will take
a note oh now it's 10:30 and I'm starting again like in the middle I help
Patrick to blah blah blah blah for his client so helps you if you have a
timesheet and this type of no really helped me when I was doing a timesheet
these days I'm using a digital version and we'll show the app in a few seconds
but it was it helps me a lot to know where I put my effort maybe I'm you know
getting distracted or maybe I'm just super laser focus yeah telling you bus
focus okay let's talk pact because we all like text right let's do it
and I'm not saying just before we go I'm not saying those are the tool you
absolutely need to be productive I'm just giving you some example things that
work with me or things that my coworker used love a lot let's get started in the
take notes things like I said penny paper still very good for me was not
great because I was traveling in lot a lot and I always forgot my notebook so
that's why I turned digital are using right now one note I find out that it's
really convenient I can have it on many devices on my phone I can share it
I can drop link images and stuff like that for me it worked very well and it's
very simple I know some a lot of my coworker use notion s oh it's fantastic
it's smart down base it's online it's not free but yet there's a free SKU
there that you can use so it's very convenient to so you know and I'm sure
there's many different others that's the two one I picked just for giving an
example now in the time tracker kind of type there struggle that I really like
these days and for a long time also use dry greenstone time tracker so what I
like about those tool is they keep track of everything and even
you know you're working then your phone's ring so you answer talking to
that client and you know when you get back to your PC as soon as you touch it
the tool will prompt you and say hey are you still working on task a because they
notice that you didn't touch your keyboard or a mouse for a little while
so right away they could enter the time from when you stop touching the computer
- right now - another maybe task B and then you continue to work on task B or
task a depending on your setting you put there so very useful very convenient
keeping track of all the little tiny bits it helps a lot if you're doing
timesheet it's wonderful if you're not doing timesheets it's great you have
details and reports at the end so you can see where you put the effort maybe
you think that a task is just taking you two hours but when you look at it you
really spend half a day in it so it helps you get improve and see where you
put your time and then it will helps you to time box maybe on the next time and
see I have a better schedule and be more productive again try putting effort we
find repeat then there is the to do or task app I really like to do Microsoft
to do it's integrated in the outlook so very simple you'll receive an email oh I
should do that but to do so he'll have a reminder maybe like next day maybe next
week it's really useful like I say a lot of time I will take these and put a note
in my OneNote because I prefer having everything in one place but I still used
to do I think it's very useful you can use many different other to-do lists I
know there's an extension in Visual Studio code there's other application
also exist and when you want a little bit more broad project management kind
of things there's Trello and get cracking boards
that are really awesome that offered dashboard where like can of a Kanban
board so those are cards you can work out that also with posted on the wall
but you know I prefer digital for the same reason when I'm somewhere else I
don't bring my wall too with me so you have those tasks those
card they are in the different columns depending the status if they are like
just introduced they aren't progress they are waiting validation from someone
else maybe they are done so you are moving the things I'm big fan of get
crackin get crackin boards because they are very
visuals you can add images I can share that with people and for me I do a lot
of github project open source project with the community so those boards could
be share as read-only and also they are sync with the task that issue in get up
so it's really convenient for me to move things around with the codes and
everything and there's different SKUs there are free and it's very convenient
I will put all the links for all those application in the description again
it's not a finish list of all the apps you absolutely need to be productive
just a few suggestions and feel free to add more if you think I forgot an
important one last thing is this is not a finite thing it's not yep I'm
productive now I'm done I could go no you always try to improve you'll always
find something where you can get better maybe there's a new app maybe you find
out that you know what morning for you doesn't work maybe for you morning work
but you need to adjust your wakeup time so don't try to put everything in once
don't try to wake up three hours earlier it won't work just you know a little bit
earlier go that way and you know I just like this don't try to put every tools
take notes everything at the same time take the time to be more productive by
answering one new things and create a habit of using it the abbot is what is
really important when you're trying to be productive getting in the zone and
doing those things again and again try to refine and get better so enjoy the
journey and having fun I hope that little
presentation helped you it was presented the first time drink Microsoft build and
I think it could also help you so that's why I record it and share it here if you
have any common questions or you have ideas leave a comment down below I'm
always happy thank you for watching see you next time