Member-only story
Working From Home Tanked My Productivity
Here’s how I reclaimed it
Not long ago, I wrote several viral stories about productivity. At the rate I pumped out material, I considered myself an authority on the subject. Yet, a year or so later, my output plummeted even though I had gained two hours per day in free time thanks to my pandemic work-from-home schedule.
Writing always has its ups and downs, and I had done a solid job of making it work between my day job and family responsibilities. But when I no longer had to commute, I found myself with chunks of extra time to write but little motivation to do the work.
It took me eighteen months to accept that more time doesn’t mean more productivity. In that year and a half, I had squandered about 800 hours.
If that had been the only downside of my newfound creative time, I’d have carried on without changing my routine.
But it got worse.
Not only did I fail to exploit my additional free time, but my writing output declined by almost 75% compared to the pre-pandemic era. After a long and honest assessment of my results, the culprit of my woes became apparent, and it should serve as a warning to anyone who thinks they could achieve more if they only had an extra hour or two per day.
