Comment by fergie | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fergie | Hacker News Reader

I've tried these 3 things:

1) Having my own office:

   PROS: no disturbances

   CONS: (even) more expensive than you might think, especially once you
   factor in heating/internet/coffee. Kind of boring with absolutely
   nobody to talk to and nothing going on. Can be a bit weird to invite
   people over.

2) Working from home:

   PROS: easy to get to work

   CONS: more distractions than you might think, especially if you have a
   family with small kids, because people tend to treat you as if you are
   "at home" rather than "at work". You really need to have a dedicated
   space in your house to even consider this. Some expenses (internet,
   electricity, general upkeep) are not be tax deductible since you are
   at home. Not super good for mental health since there is no real need
   to leave the house for days on end, and all your stressful work stuff
   becomes associated with your home.

3) Working in a coworking space:

   PROS: Nice space, (some) cool people, meeting rooms, a degree of community

   CONS: Easy to be "alone in the crowd". You need to make a concerted
   effort to make friends, and have people to eat lunch with.

I do work from home and am father of two small kids (3 and 1 years), both kids and my wife are stayign at home.

From the begining we set strict rules: my office is off place: nobody except of me can go inside, kids are taught that when I am inside I am not home and they just can't see me. I am also not going inside my office outside of my business hours.

With those rules in place it feels like having office outside with minimal commute.

Same. It's good to set up certain rituals - a hug, kiss on the cheek. Whenever 'leaving' for work and 'coming home'. It helps when drawing the line on some gray area things, like going to the bathroom and grabbing a sandwich.

This is great advice. How long have you had this arrangement?

Since our first kid was born, so for them it is just natural way of life.

How do you get around the problem of not leaving the house? I find that the biggest reason I go back to co-working is that it gives me an excuse to walk to the metro station and just be in the open air.

I always had hobies: I used to be into live music A LOT: I went out to gigs like 5 or 6 times a week, then there was always some friends around, wine tastings, mountain hiking or random trips on weekends. I have small kids now, so I dont go out very often but there is always hiking on weekends and I spend one day a week on my wine farm.

Some people prefer working completely alone, some people have the discipline to avoid all the distractions at home, but for those who don't, coworking spaces are a pretty good compromise.

My experience with working from home: suddenly you're doing all those household chores that you're always putting off. There's certainly some advantage to that, but it's funny how it works.

> My experience with working from home: suddenly you're doing all those household chores that you're always putting off.

I don't understand this. There are certainly benefits (being in when parcels are delivered for example), but the extra hour a day of not commuting (the average US commute is tiny!) gives you time to do chores, not to mention the extra time while you cook lunch where you could empty the dishwasher or whatever, much better than queuing for an overpriced sandwich for trader joes.

People aren't that rational. Lots of people are very good at finding excuses to put off work. Find reasons to put off household chores, or use household chores as an opportunity to put off something else they should be doing.

Some people have the discipline to ignore such distractions and stick to their work, but not everybody does. I certainly work better when I'm near others who do similar work, so that's the work situation I look for.

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