- Turn off interruptions in the AM. Focus, focus, focus. You have the most mental energy in AM and it is gradually depleted as the day goes by.
- Keep a log so you know what you worked on. Doesn't have to be wordy, just enough so you can tell what you did.
- Put something in the log at end of day so you know what the next thing you are working on is. Example: "Working on error in timestamp()." You don't want to expend energy trying to remember what you were working on, you can just jump right in.
Buys real over/on ear headset. No one wants to hear your bad audio through some AirPods.
Use zoom and get a (silly and cheap) team domain and everyone forward their name as a sub domain to their slack meeting room so you can get in a video chat with zero friction.
If one person is remote then all team activities are remote even if everyone else is in the office (remote first team). That means everyone needs a real headset at their desk.
- Logitech BRIO
- Spend a lot of money on a good monitor (whatever you think is the limit, double it)
- Spend even more money on an awesome desk chair (Herman Miller Aereon for me)
- If you don't already have one, get a big big desk. Simple, no drawers, but one that you can have a little bit of clutter without it becoming impossible to work on. A simple $50 ikea desk will do.
- Decent over-ear headphones (I'm rocking some Audio Technica whatever whatevers)
Audio recording is good through the Brio, visual quality is great. Decent over-ears means you aren't disturbing people around you (if they exist). Overall I would recommend developing the mental discipline to work out of your own place. Its just so much better than awkwardly sitting at some random coffee shop with some horrible little seat that hurts after 45 minutes.
Social/behavior:
- Always be online/available during your hours of work, i.e. don't fuck around. Seriously. Don't necessarily always be online on chat things (Slack, Rocket.Chat, whatever...) but actually be doing work most of the time when you're either working from home/working remotely.
- Early on, develop a reputation for being very quick at 1) building new stuff, 2) debugging problems, and 3) iterating on existing code. Usually people have some kind of niche, and unusually people are good at all 3. Be that unusual person that is good at everything, if possible.
- Raise concerns early on, don't feel shy because you're behind a monitor. This will earn you respect of your higher-ups that kind of expect to be informed of whats going on.
Just for fun: Here's 2 pics that show my setup. Works for me, might not work for you: https://imgur.com/a/vD8Toge
Anyways have fun & get work done! :)