It is difficult to earn the Employee of the Month badge when your desk is the dinner table.

Your only competition for the slot is probably your three-year-old, adding crayon highlights to your business proposals and papier macheing your unpaid bills.

It is quite likely that certain elements of the traditional work space are missing, such as regular meetings, an overflowing in-tray and an eternally ringing phone.

And there are certainly other more interesting pursuits – from morning talk shows to radio interviews to all the changing faces of the Internet – that can masquerade as legitimate work and are within arm’s reach.

So how do you stay focused and productive when “going to work” allows you to sit in your pajamas until twelve and paint your toe nails during conference calls?

The Work Life Balance

When we leave for the office in a conventional working life, we often draw on a professional persona as easily as a pair of polished shoes.

There is a mindset and an attitude that accompanies the persona and the other facets of our personality and identity – as parent, partner, party girl and so on – are often pushed to one side.

A friend who is a working mother recently described the incredibly difficult first meeting with a client, following the birth of her daughter.

A very professional and focused worker, she found the process of stripping off her role as a mother and care-giver and substituting it with the efficient, effective consultant, almost excruciating.

But when the conventional office is replaced with the home office, our roles can be less distinct. If your partner is off work with a cold or visitors arrive from out of town, it can be difficult to justify staying hunched over the laptop with the blinds drawn.

As we are not “at work”, other jobs can also be absorbed into our work day, such as picking up the dry cleaning, doing the grocery shopping or waiting around for the plumber to fix the mysterious leak.

More tempting still are all of the “jobs” we consider perks of working from home, like going to our children’s sports carnivals or catching up for coffee with friends.

Staying motivated is essential, if the balance between the freedoms and responsibilities of the home office is to be maintained.

How Do You Work?

A good way to establish an effective work routine at home is to identify how you work.

Some of us are motivated to work by internal forces.

In other words, we don’t need a supervisor with a stopwatch and a clipboard to get us on task. We are naturally disciplined and are driven to achieve our own targets. We work well alone, but can be overly critical and often miss opportunities to communicate and network with others.

And then there are those of us who rely on external forces to get motivated.

We like to be given specific directions, to have timeframes and objectives that are monitored by others and we prefer feedback on our performance over self-appraisal. We are good at receiving and applying input from others, but can find it difficult to stay focused if we find ourselves in an unstructured environment.

So which are you?

Consider your responses to the following:

1. Once you have done something once, do you -
   a) tend to just “go through the motions” the next time or
   b) give it your same level of attention every time you perform it?
2. Are you known for -
   a) your creativity and flair or
   b) your attention to detail and “perfectionist” approach?
3. When reviewing all of the tasks to be completed for the day do you -
   a) get on the phone or email to talk them through with a colleague or
   b) talk yourself through them, making lists if necessary?
4. When you find yourself stumped at work do you -
   a) pick up the phone and call for help or
   b) try to work it out yourself, searching the Net or reviewing other resources?
5. Do you pride yourself on -
   a) your ability to get a good result based on a lot of input and trial and error or
   b) on getting the job done on time, on budget and to specification?
6. When work crops up on your weekend or your day off do you -
   a) find it difficult to focus and leave it until the last minute or
   b) put time aside and get it done so the rest of your day is your own?

If you found that you mostly chose the a) options, you are prone to relying more heavily on external forces to keep you on track, whereas mostly b) responses tends to indicate that you keep yourself in line most of the time.

But how can we use this knowledge to establish and maintain a productive home office environment?

Home-Style Motivation

The first thing to accept is that this is not about imitating the office environment. To do so would deny yourself all of the perks of working from home.

The key is to create a home office environment that recognises and rewards the way in which you work.

Consider some of these strategies:

1. Create a Work-friendly Space

If you are driven more by external forces, you are probably the sort of person who revels in the “open plan” office. Feeding off the banter and energy of a busy environment, you are likely to find working from home an isolating experience. To counter this vacuum, your work space needs to be filled with light and energy. Put up calendars and invitations and surround yourself with visual reminders of your work achievements. Consider placing your home office in a room that looks out onto the garden or the street and reward yourself by taking your laptop one morning a week to a local cafe.

If you are driven by internal forces, you may not understand the need for a work-friendly space, given that you are highly disciplined in your approach to work. There are still opportunities to be more effective however, and having a space within the house that is designated as your own is important. Ensure that you have everything you need at your fingertips and make sure that your communication devices are reliable and efficient, to make the task of staying in touch with the outside world more appealing.

2. Get a Mentor

If you require external forces to get motivated, a mentor may be the difference between success and failure. Relying upon positive input and encouragement, you are naturally inclined to lean on others. When the walls of your home office feel like they are closing in around you, get in contact with your mentor to motivate you through the slump. Try meeting with your mentor in a stimulating environment where you can get a dose of the “outside world” while also working on your plan for success.

Internally driven workers are less inclined to seek out the support of others. Begin by establishing a formal mentoring relationship if this makes you more comfortable. As your relationship develops and you recognise the value in devoting time to the process, look for ways in which your mentor can expand your network.

3. Establish a Routine

External force workers respond well to routine, but usually require others to establish and maintain it. Use your mentor or a trusted colleague to help you set up a plan and schedule. Use automatic reminders and weekly calls to keep you on track. Identify the areas of your routine that are the hardest to stick to, such as meeting Friday deadlines or staying on-task in the drowsy afternoon hours, and work with your mentor to establish some mitigation strategies.

With a disciplined approach to work, internal force workers revel in routine. But while you enjoy making lists, working through tasks in a logical fashion and completing status reports, you are not necessarily as disciplined in work that requires you to step outside your comfort zone. Stretch your boundaries by taking small steps in new directions. Practice cold-calling clients or drop in at the next networking function with a friend or colleague. Try to include one new experience in your weekly routine.

4. Communicate your Needs

If driven by external forces, you are a natural communicator. This means that you are comfortable expressing your needs and should take advantage of the open and honest relationships you have established. Talk with family and friends about your needs and expectations and enlist colleagues to help you stay on track. Try dedicating only one day a week to extra chores around the house and tell friends you are off-limits for phone calls between certain hours.

Communicating your needs can be difficult if you are an internally driven worker. Having always relied upon yourself for motivation, it can be challenging to firstly open yourself to others and then to absorb and apply any input they offer. But the process of discussing a work slump with a friend may inspire a new solution you would never have considered. Not only will the communication help you to improve the way you work, but will give those around you a new insight into another facet of your life.