How to bring some delight to your day, while working remotely (Part 2).

Raise your hand if you feel like you’ve been working MORE since working from home became the new norm.

How did that happen? Well, for starters, there’s no longer a commute. So time spent listening to a podcast or a book has now been repurposed for…more time to work. And those luxurious lunch breaks with co-workers where you could unplug and socialize have been replaced with…scarfing down turkey deli slices and baby carrots during the 10 minutes in-between Zoom meetings.

For those of us experiencing this phenomenon, it can be quite draining. Honing that discipline to unplug and pursue our own personal interests is a work in progress. Don’t get us wrong, we LOVE what we do here at The Brand Stand. But like many other creatives, we get inspired and energized from learning new skills, meeting new people, and trying new things. 

But who has the time for that when we can just work more?!

With time, we’ve started to implement a number of actionable items that have fostered a sense of connectedness and creativity while working remotely. Specifically, we’ve seen direct correlations to a more creative design process for client projects and happier mindsets. We hope that you and your team will also find inspiration and value in the following examples:

01. Make the Time

Friday mornings at 10 AM are sacred at The Brand Stand. No, we don’t worship Don Norman or Paul Rand (big fans, though). For half an hour before we kick off the workday, we jump on a conference call to share one design concept each, and critique that concept together. We call it Coffee & Critiques! It’s kind of like a book club, but we talk about design instead of books and drink coffee instead of wine. The topic of conversation varies widely, from trendy websites and controversial design theories to stunning Instagram posts and our own business ideas. We also keep track of the items we discuss by logging them in a special Slack channel! This has been a handy step in our process because there have been several occasions where one of us has revisited our Slack channel for inspiration on another project. Here are just a few examples of items we’ve discussed during Coffee & Critiques!

02. Learn a New Skill Together

With all the time saved working from home, this should be an excellent opportunity to learn new skills. And we agree! There’s no end to our respective “New Skill Wish Lists.” Ann Marie has recently been fascinated with 2D animation and 3D illustration as a way to bring her designs to life. Meanwhile, Tori has been striving to add HTML and CSS to her repertoire of design skills for years. Unfortunately, it’s too easy to put off learning a new skill when it’s not tied to a project or a deadline…or a person. A few weeks ago, we found that both of us wanted to obtain all the Hubspot Marketing Certifications. It’s a 26-hour commitment that will ultimately benefit The Brand Stand’s marketing strategy. But we’d both been putting it off for weeks! So what did we do? We set a deadline, and promised each other that we would both complete the certification by that date. We go at our own pace, but check in every so often to hold each other accountable.

For those of you at home keeping score, we started on April 1st so we’re coming up on the tail-end of week #2. Check back in with us at the beginning of June to see how it’s going. DOUBLE ACCOUNTABILITY!

In addition, we’ve also started using Skillshare to check those remaining items off our personal New Skill Wish Lists. To this end, Skillshare has been a total game changer. Its repository of educational videos makes learning feel like we’re binge-watching a TV show, not a course.

03. Pursue a passion project

There are some projects that are just too big for one person. In Ann Marie’s case, she’d always wanted to launch a branch of The Brand Stand dedicated to giving back to the community. However, running a business and delivering client projects hadn’t left her with a ton of bandwidth or time to bring the idea to fruition. With help from Tori and a little extra time thanks to their remote setup, the two of them worked together to launch Lemon+Aid, The Brand Stand’s official collection of charitable initiatives. So the moral of the story is this: share your passion projects with your team! Now is a great time to bring them to life.

More Freshly-Squeezed