Design for Productivity: How to Create a Healthy Environment in Your Home Office

Nowadays when working from home is becoming the new normal workplace, rooms and other parts of houses are turning into home offices. As the actual work offices were built with ergonomic considerations to ensure healthy and safe places to do daily jobs, it should also be the same level of importance when you create your home office. You should not ignore the essence of making your home workplace or space to be not only conducive but also a place where your health is also primarily considered. In this article, you will know about how to design your workspace that will lead to productivity and how to create a healthy environment in your home office.

Use ergonomic furniture

The first thing you need to ensure your home office will be healthy is to have ergonomic office furniture. The primary things are your working desk and chair. In selecting your home office table and chair, your body shape and size are important factors before buying them. The desk should be accurate to your height when in a sitting position. It is important that you can move comfortably and see to it that the strength of the table can carry the load of your desktop computer or other equipment you are going to place there. For chairs, it is advisable to buy ergonomic chairs that are fitted to your body shape and are flexible to prevent back pain.

Install a comfortable lighting

Lighting is also an essential element not only for the design of your home office but also for your safety, especially in your sight. Good lighting in your space or room will keep your eyesight from any harm or damage. Poor lighting will cause a serious problem to your eyes. Your home office should have both a task and general lighting for proper illumination. Make sure that they are without glare, excessive brightness, and shadows. It is suggested that a computer monitor be placed perpendicular to your windows to avoid glaring. Some are using blinds to keep the glare minimized.

Choose a space with proper ventilation for air quality

To maintain the healthy environment of your home office, air quality must be prioritized. Having proper ventilation and temperature will keep your space safe and comfortable for working. HVAC equipment or also known as heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, is very important to be installed depending on your needs. There are many types of HVAC equipment that you might consider to make your home office well-ventilated and maintain good airflow for a healthy respiratory system. Some were utilizing their home windows where natural air will be accessible. That is why many home offices are placed near windows not only to make them environment-friendly but also it is aesthetically appealing.

Do safety body working positions and habits

Part of a healthy environment while working at home is to do necessary physical working positions and habits. There is a lot of advice about ergonomics to maintain physical fitness while sitting and facing the screen. For instance, you have to maintain a good posture like sitting properly by keeping your back straight, shoulders square, and your feet must be flat on the floor. To refresh your body, you pause for a while and do some stretching and moving to prevent muscle, nerves, and motion injuries. Also, don’t forget to apply the 20–20–20 rule in using your computer. This means that for every 20 minutes you need to keep your eyes away from the computer monitor and then look somewhere 20 feet away to relax your eyes.

Ensure the technology and devices were properly installed and used

Lastly, a healthy home office environment has space where technology and devices are properly installed and used. Electrical wiring should be organized safely so it is important to apply the right cable management as well as proper loads when using extension wires and outlets. As much as possible, the devices that you are going to use for your home office work are not too outdated that might cause accidents as well as delays for your daily tasks due to poor performance. You may also want to look for the latest design ideas for laptops, desktops, printers, simultaneous translation equipment, and other devices that will make your home office good-looking and inspiring.

Conclusion

As our society is now transitioning to a new normal set up especially in workplaces from face-to-face to an online work-from-home manner, it is now essential for most employees to create their home offices. However, it is also vital that this home office will be healthy and safe so designing it requires ergonomic ideas to prevent any serious problems. Therefore, to create a healthy environment in your home office you need to use ergonomic furniture, install comfortable lighting, choose a space with proper ventilation and temperature, do safe body working positions and habits, and finally, ensure that the technology and devices were properly installed and used.

Originally published at https://facilethings.com.