Starting last week, our organization – and many others across the country – has initiated the directive to “Work from Home” (#WFH) as a measure to support the national directive on the #MovementControlOrder (#MCO). And just like for many others out there, this is a new and unfamiliar experience for me, personally – especially on this massive scale, impacting virtually all of our colleagues and contractors too.
To ease the transition towards this new way of working, here are some reminders I prepared, primarily to keep myself disciplined and in check, and also as a reminder to all my fellow WFH colleagues out there.
1. Have Integrity: This is not a holiday
2. Request for cooperation and understanding from members of your household
3. Discipline Yourself and Be Responsive in Communication
4. Find & Create Conducive, Productive Working Environments at Home
5. Get Organized: Create Daily Work Task Checklists
6. “Embrace the Suck”: That’s Life, Make the Best out of it.
Bismillah..
1. Have Integrity: This is not a holiday
We need to remind ourselves that this is most definitely not a vacation. Yes, we are working within the comfort of our personal homes, but there are still professional regulations and codes of conduct for us to follow – for some of us, this also includes minimum working hours.
Remind ourselves: At the very least, our salary and livelihood depends on our integrity to fulfill our responsibilities to earn that paycheck.
For my fellow Muslim colleagues out there, this is no small matter. Our negligence in upholding integrity and professionalism in this aspect here could very well result in our rizq (provisions in the form of our income) being deprived of Allah’s blessings (barakah), maybe even unlawful / haram – and consequently, this could vey well result in our du’aa (prayers and supplications) not being responded to. Prophet Muhammad ﷺ said:
إنَّ اللَّهَ طَيِّبٌ لَا يَقْبَلُ إلَّا طَيِّبًا، وَإِنَّ اللَّهَ أَمَرَ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ بِمَا أَمَرَ بِهِ الْمُرْسَلِينَ فَقَالَ تَعَالَى: "يَا أَيُّهَا الرُّسُلُ كُلُوا مِنْ الطَّيِّبَاتِ
وَاعْمَلُوا صَالِحًا"،
“Verily, Allah the Almighty is Good and accepts only those (deeds) which are good (i.e. pure). And verily Allah has commanded the believers to do that which He has commanded the Messengers.
So the Almighty has said: “O (you) Messengers! Eat of the tayyibat [all kinds of halal (legal) foods], and perform righteous deeds.” (Surah Al-Mu’minun, 51)
وَقَالَ تَعَالَى: "يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُلُوا مِنْ طَيِّبَاتِ مَا رَزَقْنَاكُمْ"
and the Almighty has said: “O you who believe! Eat of the lawful things that We have provided you.” (Surah Al-Baqarah, 172)
ثُمَّ ذَكَرَ الرَّجُلَ يُطِيلُ السَّفَرَ أَشْعَثَ أَغْبَرَ يَمُدُّ يَدَيْهِ إلَى السَّمَاءِ: يَا رَبِّ! يَا رَبِّ! وَمَطْعَمُهُ حَرَامٌ، وَمَشْرَبُهُ حَرَامٌ، وَمَلْبَسُهُ حَرَامٌ، وَغُذِّيَ بِالْحَرَامِ، فَأَنَّى يُسْتَجَابُ لَهُ؟
Then he (ﷺ) mentioned [the case] of a man who, having journeyed far, is disheveled and dusty, and who spreads out his hands to the sky (making du’aa and) saying “O Lord! O Lord!,”: while his food is haram (unlawful), his drink is haram, his clothing is haram, and he has been nourished with haram, so how can [his supplication] be answered?
(Hadith Narrated by Muslim)
2. Discipline Yourself & Be Responsive
Just because bosses aren’t within your physical proximity doesn’t give you an excuse to compromise your work ethic, professionalism or quality.
For our team, since we use WhatsApp as one of the primary tools for instantaneous group communication, it is impractical to instruct “phones off” during working hours – but at the very least have the integrity and discipline not to waste working hours doing non-productive things such as social media, YouTube, and leisure reading on WhatsApp, and so on. We should especially put the conscious effort to be mindfully present during your online meetings and teleconferences. Just because you are “in” the virtual conversation, no one can tell if you are actually doing anything else – even if you switch on your webcam for others to see. (I know people who have developed the skill of keeping a straight pokerface while watching sitcoms and comedies.)
While this may seem “obvious”, I feel this simple reminder needs re-emphasis because even when we were IN the office, I notice many colleagues who are guilty of this even in physical meetings. Now even more so of a risk.
I need to emphasize also a very important aspect of professionalism which often gets overlooked: communication responsiveness. The only way Working from Home can be effective is that we are extra vigilant and disciplined, to be contactable and RESPONSIVE in all our communications on the electronic means our companies have provided for us – in our case, via Skype for Business – especially during peak office hours (10am – 4pm).
Reflecting on my professional experience even before the MCO, I have witnessed many people who jut aren’t bothered on responding on e-mail, Skype, or phone communication, and this includes leaders, managers, even those who are specifically accountable to respond to you.
Poor rate of responsiveness can be either due to :
A. Deliberate ignorance / Apathy a.k.a. “mengelat” – to evasively escape any form of responsibility whatsoever
B. Indecisiveness – a lack of courage to provide a response out of giving the ‘wrong information’, or simply a refusal to respond of confidentiality
C. “Too busy” to notice your communication
Sure, by default, we act as professionals and take the route of “sangka baik” / “husnu dzon” / “have positive thoughts of others” and assume it’s possibility C. But after clear-cut evidence such as repeated e-mails, obvious “blue double ticks” on WhatsApp, and immediately closing your Skype chatbox as soon as they read your message, we can definitey rule this out.
If the issue was indecisiveness, incapability or confidentiality (Possibility B) then be a good professional and just honestly inform that “I don’t know” or with all due respect, “I cannot provide the answer”. Don’t leave people hanging, delaying others’ tasks, and leaving them in the dark. Just give us a clear direction – painful or offensive it may seem – but we are bound to be professionals, accept it and Alhamdulillah we can move on.
But when you don’t respond, then we will go on to Possibility A: Deliberate Ignorance, which is classic showcase of poor professionalism and – to me – a lack of integrity and honesty. I have always believed that a bad response is better than no response. I would rather have people reject my requests and outright state their refusal to cooperate, instead of people just ignoring our communication attempts. At least, honest rejection allows us to make immediate alternative decisions.
Though it may sound trivial, simple things like responsiveness can go a long way towards Nurturing Trust with others in the organization and a demonstration of your Ownership in organizational success. So far, second week in, it’s working out pretty okay and there’s definitely some improvement over last week, but insha Allah we still have room to improve.
3. Request for cooperation and understanding from members of your household
In recognition of #1 above (This is work, not a holiday), one of the things I recommend we need to do is to have a transparent, honest communication to ASK the members of our household to give us the space and support to perform our work tasks, especially during those required office hours.
Because some of us full-time office workers aren’t at home most of the working week, our sudden continuous presence in the household on a daily basis may result in our family members “forget” that we are really working, and there is a tendency they might subconsciously take advantage of our presence in the house all day and expect us to do spend excessive time to do favors for them, entertain them, or perform extensive house chores during office hours, detracting us from our core responsibilities.
Request for their cooperation and support; don’t just “expect them to understand”. Let them know when is “working time”, “luch time”, and so on. Let them know what kind of short burst tasks are acceptable for you to entertain.
Sure, this may be difficult at first (for us to say, and the receiving party to accept) and perhaps might even initially trigger some tough discussions – but better be upfront and honest about it now, instead of holding it in and gradually causing tension and ruin the relationship throughout the MCO period.
I also find this a powerful tip as a “work-life balance” internal switch. As we are at home and may sometimes have to “ignore” or even outright “reject” requests from family members to spend time with them – especially during online meetings – this may trigger feelings of guilt or irresponsibility. That certainly happened to me too, but after this clear-cut declaration and demarcation, it was easy to switch.
Remember – everyone within your household will most likely be “trapped” with each other for the next 2 weeks, so it’s best that we iron out all the expectations as transparently as we can, so we can live in harmony to strike that work-life balance as a family.
4. Find & Create Conducive, Productive Working Environments at Home
Prep your home environment to be conducive to your productivity: at the very least, take the time to prep have a nice, uncluttered working space with reasonably good ergonomics to be able to work during office hours.
But not everything works for everyone. I for one, cannot work effectively on a sofa, bean bag or cross legged on the floor. Find the ones which assist you towards performing your job more effectively, even when it comes to “workstation tidiness”: I heard a productivity tip that a tidy workspace cultivates productivity, and a messy workspace can cultivate creativity. Since my job task as a process engineer in a project team leans toward productivity, a tidy workstation is way more conducive.
There are lots of other useful "Work From Home" productivity tips we can look up online. One particularly interesting one that I recently tried to implement is to wear formal work clothes, even if you are at home. In addition to gearing up your mindset properly geared to the working mood, this also serves as a practical step to condition your family members that you are actually proper "working", not just sitting around the house in front of the laptop. Especially for our 2-year old Muawiyah who suddenly has Abah at home all day at the desk and now he wants Abah to play with him all the time.
On a normal non-MCO office work day, my son knows that if I wear formal clothes, I am about to leave the house to do something necessary, which is "work". Sometimes, this does make him upset and so I have to comfort, negotiate and explain to him before he begrudgingly accepts. In that same way, wearing “work baju” here i can train him to understand that “Abah is getting ready to work now, so we’ll play later ok?” – and so later when office hours are over, I switch back to regular home clothes to signify that we can play now. Yay!
For this conditioning to work, this also requires a bit of mental training on my side, to resist the temptations of extended "play time" during office hours.
But of course, let’s get real. Short bursts of distractions and house chores are unavoidable – in fact, little “energizer” activities can actually be helpful to elevate our mood and boost our overall productivity. And, if you are like me, it’s almost impossible to actually sit down and focus on doing one mentally demanding task for over an hour. After all, let's be honest guys, who doesn't entertain distractions or perform non-productive activities at all in the office every once in a while?
5. Get Organized: Create Daily Work Task Checklists
Though this may come under the general banner of “productivity” in Tip #4, I feel this is so important it warrants its own separate entry: put up a daily-updated work task check list to be done, especially at the start of the day before we get into the “firefighting” momentum.
Without people coming by our workstation to trigger adhoc requests or create a sense of urgency for the tasks, it can sometimes create the illusion that there’s “nothing happening” and may inadvertently result in a feeling of inactivity or complacency. On the other hand also, when so many different simultaneous online conversations are happening at the same time, we might get disoriented on where we should zoom in our current efforts.
I find that in order to keep focused on my deliverables, I need to break down my tasks into practical, measurable steps. For example, instead of putting a blanket “Submit report”, break it down to really detail tasks such as “obtain project background from project engineer”, “perform simulation case 3A”, “re-assess commercial estimate basis”, “reconfirm data with operations”, “attach assumption in Appendix”, “forward to senior for review”, etc.
Another side-benefit of doing this from a mental health perspective, is that totally Boss feeling of looking at what you have accomplished at the end day. Once you cross out the daily tasks you are supposed to perform and look back at the achievement milestones you have, you can’t help but feel that dopamine boost in your head and positive effect on your morale.
And just like it is effective in the real office environment, it is also a good idea to get in touch with your work mates early in the week for a short “huddle” to update everyone else what we are doing for the week, so we clearly inform each other and where applicable can hold each other accountable to their respective work arrangements.
6. “Embrace the Suck” – That’s Life. Let’s Make the Best out of it, and Make it Work.
Look guys, I admit: as an Engineer, I'm old school - I am at my best productivity in the physical office. I alwas prefer reading reports and reviewing drawings in hard copy. As a personal rule, I always resort to face-to-face communication first to discuss or resolve anything as the most efficient way possible, and personally I have always hated the inefficiency and potential miscommunication of electronic communication means such as e-mail or Skype. And being the cheapskate that I am, I admittedly always appreciate the unlimited free supply of drinking water.
But we can't have that now. And there's no use fighting it, being upset about it, or using it as an excuse – that’s life. So in light of this restriction (and how it also affects other aspects of our life), this is where I apply a principle which is widely known in the US Military slang as “Embrace the Suck”: Accept the situation for what it is, stay positive, and make the best out of what is available.
Things aren’t “ideal” now, they may even be difficult, but they could certainly be worse! Complaining and whining about things beyond our control never resolved anything – so let’s focus on what we CAN do. Keep our heads up, keep it pro and deliver like a champ.
I just realized that this description pretty much describes organizational Cultural Beliefs called “OWN IT!” and i could have just resorted to that. But I thought I switch things around to keep things fresh. We are #WorkingFromHome after all.
Closing thoughts
If we all play our part to keep the pandemic at bay - follow the quarantine and hygiene guidelines - I am optimistic that within the next few weeks, this pandemic will pass as another historical "phase" in our history and we resume our normal lives, insha Allah.
And at the end of the day, when the dust has settled, the outcome of these "work from home" measures will certainly reveal if our organizations are "ready" or effective to implement WFH policies in the future, even without the presence of pandemic outbreaks.
A few years back, I remember one staff asking our Human Resources VP about the possibility of our organization to implement a WFH concept. Her response is that “in order for it to work, there needs to be a certain level of trust”. And so here is our chance to prove that we can make it work: if we all put an honest professional attitude to collectively Nurture Trust, in the same way that we need to collectively play our part patiently bear with the MCO policies to stay at home to #FlattenTheCurve and contain the outbreak.
To all my awesome colleagues, see you back at the office in a few weeks time, insha Allah – hopefully, still in shape, and healthier than ever. Please, don’t repeat the same mistake that Thor did #FatThor.
The Prophet ﷺ commanded us to instill excellence in everything that we do:
إنَّ اللَّهَ كَتَبَ الْإِحْسَانَ عَلَى كُلِّ شَيْءٍ
“Verily, Allah has prescribed (that you perform with) ihsaan (excellence) in every single thing (you do)” (Muslim)
May Allah accept and grant blessings to all our work tasks, and grant us goodness in dunya and akhirah.
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