WFH Setup Tips

As someone with a disability (Ehlers Danlos), I unfortunately learned the hard way that paying attention to the ergonomics of your working setup really matters. With more of us working from home due to the COVID-19 crisis, I thought I’d share some advice and specific recommendations about making sure you are working as comfortably as you can.

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First up, designate an area for working, or specific equipment for work if you only have one place you can sit. Make sure you put your work laptop away at the end of the day, so that work doesn’t blend/spill over into everything else. This is genuinely really important; check out this & further advice from Mental Health First Aid on looking after your mental health when working from home.

Having had a great many different working from home setups over the years, I have some specific suggestions depending on what options you have. Make sure you check out some general ergonomic working setup advice too.

Need to Work on a Sofa / Bed?

Able to Work at a Desk / Part of a Table?

  • Folding hypercompact laptop stands are great, like this Nexstand K2 laptop stand (and reusable for when you travel in future) or if you want one that folds flat then try Urbo Raket slim laptop stand.
  • If you don’t think you’d ever need to travel with it, then the Griffin laptop stand is a good solid & nice-looking option too.
  • Pay attention to your chair, it might not be possible to get a proper office chair but at least make sure you are sitting with decent posture. 
My wife has adopted my ergonomic travel kit for her no-notice quarantine work from home setup

Wherever You’re Working, You Might Also Benefit From…

My compact setup in my study at the start of quarantine

Want to Invest In Extra Comfort?

I hope some of these recommendations and tips are useful. What other practices or equipment have helped you work from home in a safer and more sustainable way? Please do share in the comments!

One Reply to “WFH Setup Tips”

  1. I use the same Griffin notebook stand and a QC25. If you’re running on a budget I can recommend the Anker Soundcore Life Q20 with Bluetooth and noise cancelling though I don’t use it for video calls any more since the NC is so good that I can’t hear myself talk and end up shouting at my colleagues 😎
    I also use a similar Anker USB multi-charger (I also recommend Anker products often 🙂 and since I have a rheumatic syndrome I use a height-adjustable desk so I can change my sitting/standing position as often as I can. Pro tip: don’t do it while on a call, you’ll get confused looks :-)=)
    Much to the delight of my wife and call participants I use a rebuild of an IBM Model M buckling spring keyboard. But that’s what I’m fastest with at typing. I also have an original one in the basement for sentimental reasons (can’t use it anymore since no computer has five pin DIN connectors for keyboards anymore).

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