How do I adjust going back to the Office?
You receive a memo from your manager or HR that the company is now planning to end its work from home setup.
You’ve been sensing this for a while now. The opening up of the economy, the vaccination rate, the decline of infection rate. You know deep down that its bound to happen but you were still shocked when you received the memo.
Here are 5 things you can do to back on track to help you adjust to this old work setup smoothly
1. Start waking up early
A lot of us started waking up later than we used to. Remember when you used to wake up 6am, take a quick morning run, have breakfast, shower then start driving or commuting to work?
That all went away when you started working from home. Majority of office workers started waking up later than they used to and that affects the body clock.
Your body clock is a natural biological rhythm that manages your body’s processes. It tells you when its time to wake up, time to sleep and other body functions.
When you started to work from home, that body clock slowly adjusted to your new setup. You might have been waking up 1 or 2 hours later than you used to and that slowly over time adjusted your body clock!
If you suddenly wake up like you used to before you worked from home then you’ll definitely feel more tired and groggy. This new change confuses your body and is protesting to this new change.
What to do?
If you manage to caught wind of this return to work memo, chances are you can still manage this change!
Every evening, try your best to sleep 15 minutes earlier than the time you’re sleeping right now. At the same time, set your alarm clock 15 minutes earlier. Do this for several days until you reach your desired wake up schedule!
2. Plan how you’ll get yourself to work
For those who are fortunate to have their own private vehicle, getting to work may be as simple as turning on a navigation app on their phone like Waze or Google Maps. The main challenge for those who have their own cars is to know what your new travel time would be.
After several months of working from home, new road conditions may have been implemented by local government units and this will affect your travel time to be shorter or longer. A neat trick that you can do is to use Google or Waze’s estimate.
But for the vast majority who use public transportation it is important to know in advance if there are new rules and regulations. Is your old public transportation bus line still available? is it viable to use the train line?
What you can do is to try and do a dry run on a weekend just to see how it goes. See how long it takes you to get to your workplace. The last thing you want to happen is to show up late for work on the first day everyone else is back in the office!
3. Responsibilities at home
Did you adopt a cat or a dog in the last few months?
Regardless of the pet you have at home whether you got them recently or are staying with you before then, will definitely also be adjusting when you go back to the office.
Cats and Dogs are creatures of habit, these paw friends are routine based and follow these routines on a daily basis! If one day you suddenly disappear from home, these will cause tremendous stress for your pet.
What to do?
base on an article from Alberta’s Veterinary Medical Association, there are 6 things you can do to help reduce the stress with the routine change. 3 of which are below:
Dry Runs — practice leaving the house so your pet gets used to you leaving the house. Do this several times preferably at the time you will eventually leave the house.
Get rid of anxious energy — pent up or excessive energy in our pets will not be good when they adjust to this new change. You don't want to go home after your long day at work just to see your furniture or pillows chewed up. Exercise your pet to release that energy and they’ll be less anxious while you’re gone.
Reinforce your new time schedule — like I said, animals are creatures of habits. When you play with them or feed them on a specific time regularly in the past, they would expect that same routine tomorrow! alter the time you feed them and play with them to be consistent with your new schedule.
Doing two or more of these things will go a long way in providing a healthy transition for your pets.
4. Make a checklist of what you need
Forget about whatever policies you may know of before forced community quarantines or forced work from home setups were implemented. In most parts of the worlds, employers are mandated by the government to implement health and safety measures
New rules maybe adopted by your company from as simple as that removing communal pantry’s water dispenser to having totally no cafeteria to minimize risks.
Things you may need when you’re back in the office
- Personal toiletries — bring your own set of toiletries from alcohol sprays, soap and tissue
- Packed lunch and snacks — cafeterias and local restaurants may not be 100% open and it might still be best to avoid crowded areas. Do your groceries in advance and prepare simple home cooked meals that you can bring to work
- Water Bottle — that communal water dispenser near the pantry that the whole floor uses? that may not be there anymore. Make sure to bring enough water to last you the day
- Extra PPEs(i.e. facemask) — when you work 8 hrs. or more in a day, your personal protective equipment may get torn, damaged or soaked in moisture. Bring 1 or 2 extra facemask or whatever PPE is required by your employer or local government
5. Positive Mindset Training
A lot of the employees who were forced to work from home due to the pandemic my feel that the work from setup is very beneficial to them. Working from home brings them closer to family and friends. Employees may also feel that this gave them control over their time than before and who can argue about this.
Changing one’s mindset and accepting that you’ll be going back to the workplace is one of the big things one can do to smoothly transition back to the office. Like any big changes the only way to move forward is to accept this new change — this however is easier said than done. You may feel anger, may feel depressed and may generally be unmotivated to go to work.
What to do?
Remember when you broke up with a significant other when you were younger? Remember the cycle that you went through? the cliché - denial, anger, bargaining, depression before acceptance? that cycle is actually the Kübler-Ross Change Cycle.
If you particularly feel down going back to the office— know that its normal as you go through this change cycle
One trick I can share to you is to focus on the things you’ll gain when you’re back in the office. Think of the positive and enjoyable things that you used to do at work. Birthday celebrations of coworkers, potentially varying restaurant food you can once again get that are near your workplace, that office crush, small chit-chats about that latest movie with officemates or getting that exposure from your bosses.
Now this may vary from person to person but everyone used to have a few things they might’ve enjoyed when they used to go back to the office! Think through it and focus on positive things you’ll gain!
Keeping a positive mindset about this change will help you ease yourself back. This reduces your personal anxiety and makes you more effective at work.
There could be a lot more simple things that you may need to do to adjust back to the workplace but the key is to plan ahead to make it as painless as possible.