3 Steps to be a successful remote developer

These last weeks have been challenging, we’ve all changed our habits as well as the companies. Remote work is here to stay and, probably even after the emergency.

If you’re a developer this is good moment to prove yourself especially if you generally rely on colleagues for social support or if you haven’t decided yet where is a good place of your house to work. Working from home is not always easy, even if is great, but like other things, it takes some getting used to. So, let’s go for suggestions!

3 steps to be a successful remote developer

1. Attitude

Discover yourself. What’s your favourite moment of the day for coding? Have you ever tried to work with music? Do you like to organize your days? Are you self-motivated? And easily distracted?

There are no strict rules, everything depends on you and your personality. Music, for example, can aid your concentration by suppressing distractions.

Knowing yourself will help you to optimize your time and be more productive while working from home (with or without covid19).

Continually self-experiment. Keep doing what seems to be working and drop things that don’t.

2. Work Setting

As you’re working at home you should think about where you will spend this time (and no, you can’t do it on the couch).

Your ideal home office should be a room with a locking door, a desk, dual monitors, comfortable chair with good back support, lots of natural lighting, a room with a window and plants and, last but not least: high-speed internet.

Try to create a relaxing room and add a whiteboard and a calendar, these other elements will help you to solve your problems in a different way and be organized.

This is for sure, a good start for coders looking to work remotely successfully.

3. Avoid distractions

Working from home during these weeks, you will certainly have found that distractions are around the corner.

Your job now is to minimize them. How? The first to do is speak with your family and friends when you start to work and you can’t be interrupted.

The most difficult thing for a coder is making others understand that even if they are physically at home they are mentally in another place.

So, try to stay focused and remind that you are lucky to work from home.

Instead, if you live alone the distractions could be: social media, WhatsApp, calls… In this case, is a little bit easier, try self-control apps - like StayFocusd - that helps you stay focused on work by restricting the amount of time you can spend on time-wasting websites.

You can do it!

In summary, to be a successful remote developer: manage your time and make sure to have an organized workspace. Keep your personal life in a separate room, will be easier even when it’s time to end the day. If you start to work in every place of your house, then even hours become blurred and you will start to feel like if you are always working.

Remember, even if you’re physically working alone you’re part of a team, so ask questions if you have, be proud of your work and share your achievements - success is worth celebrating whenever a goal is achieved.

Remote workers report being happier and more productive. Stack Overflow found programmers who always work from home are about 11% more satisfied with their jobs than those who never do.

Reference: QZ

Do you have any tip for working from home? Let us know in the comments.

Happy coding!