In our last article, we have put into detail just what advantages follow those who make their living in the threads and tangles of the World Wide Web. The gist of it is that there is a great degree of freedom waiting for folks who are looking to work online; they can work anywhere they want, however they want, so long as they can deliver what is expected from them.
While working on the Internet may be very rewarding, but there are also its disadvantages. We have promised to tell you just what these are in our previous article, and in this post, we are going to come full circle and tell just what are the downsides of working online.
- It\’s easy to get lazy. We have mentioned in our past article that working online often means minimal supervision in the part of your client or employer. This is because the folks at the other end of your channel expect you to maintain professional decorum and watch over yourself. While you may be able to consistently deliver decent output, this lack of supervision can easily lead you to grow confident enough to be lazy and prone to procrastination. There is no other way to resist this other than good old discipline.
- You may mess up your work-life balance. While working online can easily help you give a better balance to your work and personal life, it can also lead you to being unable to distinguish between personal and work time. Workaholics can easily fall into this trap, and be unable to shrug work off even during their downtime. To avoid this, you will have to formulate psychological strategies that will allow you to differentiate between your on and off hours. One known tactic is to dress up for work even if the work is done at home. Another is to set aside a room in your house and use it as an office that you will have to report to come the time you need to work.
- You may run into many challenging distractions. The adage, “When the cat is away, the mouse will play” holds true to people who have discovered the freedom that comes with working online. With negligible supervision in the part of your client, you can easily find yourself distracted by just about anything, and allow your work to be disrupted in the process. Focus is needed in this matter, and given the human nature, you might want to artificially keep your attention towards your work with online tools designed to extend your attention span. The kind folks at 99u has a great list of such tools that you might want to try out for yourself, and improve your productivity in the process.
- You can end up lacking in the social aspects of your life. In many cases, working online easily ends up becoming a work from home set up. Should this happen, it can be very easy for you to go for days without so much interaction with people other than those with whom you share the same roof. This may not be bad if you are the type that relish in the lack of social interactions, but it won\’t hurt to go out some more.
