Having a home office comes with great benefits. You don’t have to deal with the daily pressures of regular office environments. However, one thing stays the same: you’re overall productivity can be affected by your surroundings. To help you ensure your space is clean, here’s a home office cleaning checklist that can help.
1. Consult the Professionals
While ABA consulting isn’t necessarily the first thing that’ll come to mind when creating your home office cleaning checklist, it can help make working from home easier, especially if you have children with Autism. Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can benefit from the evidence-based treatments of ABA (applied behavior analysis). ABA teaches children new skills to help them become more independent, improve their communication skills and relationships, and address challenging or maladaptive behaviors. The good thing with ABA therapy is the professional can come to your home.
One of the most notable advantages of in-home therapy is it is comfortable for you, the parent, and the child. Once you sign up for the in-home therapy, a professional ABA therapist will conduct the sessions in the comfort of your home. You’ll get to reduce driving time that would otherwise take up a significant time of your daily routine. So if
You also won’t have to purchase therapy supplies for the in-home sessions. The therapist will use toys and supplies your child already has at home. Almost anything can be used as a reinforcement item in ABA treatment, including snacks, toys, social praise, etc.
The therapist will use each session to gauge your child’s likes. Reinforcement tools play a key role in this type of therapy. These tools help to teach skills such as peer interaction, play, and communication and reinforce positive behavior. Since most troubling behaviors tend to occur in the home, changing them in a familiar setting is beneficial.
In a clinical setting, behaviors like defying instructions for everyday duties or misbehaving with siblings during playing may not occur, which can negatively impact a therapist’s assessment. BCBAs conduct evaluations to identify the causes of problem behaviors and create intervention plans to address issues as they arise. This presents several possibilities to identify and assist in changing troublesome behavior.
An ABA therapist also watches how the child interacts with the rest of the family in real time during in-home sessions. This way, the therapist can give you feedback on the various strategies for developing parent-conducted therapy outside of sessions. You can pay for in-home sessions for toddlers, teens, and adults with Autism. However, the best candidates for ABA therapy are younger kids (ages 2–5) who primarily spend their time at home. A BCBA develops a treatment plan customized to a child’s requirements at home, enabling therapy to begin in a comfortable setting.
2. Have All the Facilities Organized
Working from home isn’t just convenient; it can also make you more productive. That said, things can quickly change if your home office setup is a mess. Aim to make the space more organized as part of your home office cleaning checklist.
Start by purging the paper. It’s easy for paper to clutter up your workspace. You feel like every document is important and will come in handy in the future. However, this type of reasoning can make you end up on a reality show like Hoarders; it’s a slippery slope.
Plus, you can always scan any paperwork you believe is important and store it on the cloud. This way, you’ll free up valuable space and can access what you need whenever you want and from anywhere in the world. So, before paper takes over your space, use the System of Three: shred/toss, file, or act on it. Put all your important documents in a color-coded filing system if you maintain a physical backup.
Another great home office organization tip is designating a printing station. Set aside a space that’ll house the printer and the relevant supplies. If you’re lucky to own a wireless printer, you don’t have to place it on your desk; use the feature to the fullest. You can put it in a cabinet or any other space in your office that makes sense. This way, you’ll free up your desk space for other important items that can help improve your productivity.
You should also consider adding open shelves, especially if you don’t have any closets. It’s a great way of making an empty wall space more functional. You can add things like plants, books, or decorative pieces to the shelves to add a touch of visual interest.
Considering you’ll spend most of your days in the home office, you’ll generate substantial waste. Planning for waste management in your home office cleaning checklist is a good idea. Paper waste is easy to deal with; you can shred it and put it in your regular trash bin. However, for biodegradable waste like fruit and vegetable waste, tea and coffee filter bags, coffee sediments, biscuits, stale bread, and egg shells, consider enlisting the help of a bio waste management service.
You’ll also want to think about where you’ll relieve yourself when you need to go. While bathroom trailer rentals may offer convenience, they don’t come cheap. According to Martha Stewart, they start at $1,000 but can run you up to $5,000 daily. If absolutely necessary, go for a portable restroom instead. However, you can significantly reduce the cost by using the one already in your home.
3. Control the Temperature
When you work from home, you can design your workspace to suit your requirements and working preferences. You will, however, be without some great workplace perks, such as free air conditioning and coffee. While not enjoying the free beverages won’t be detrimental, working without the office’s air conditioning can negatively impact productivity. When the weather outside becomes hot, dealing with a stuffy home office can make things quite uncomfortable. When you consider traffic, noise, and air pollution, opening a window might not be the best option.
When you install an air conditioner with the help of an AC installation service, you’ll have complete control over the temperatures in your home office. Adding this to your home office cleaning checklist will make it easier to focus on your daily tasks since you won’t be distracted by the rising temperatures, which can leave you feeling fatigued even if it’s just lunchtime. You’ll also realize you’re much happier with your home AC than at the workplace.
You’ll always find someone complaining that the AC is too low or too high. You can’t please everyone. Plus, the majority rules in a large office environment. You don’t get to fully enjoy the benefit of having an air conditioning system.
Fortunately, having your own syst3m for your home office will allow you to avoid all the workplace drama because you don’t need to satisfy anybody else. There is no need to take polls on whether people are hot or chilly. You just adjust your home office to the settings that are most comfortable for you.
4. Clean the Pipes
Cleaning the pipes of your home office is a must-have on your home office cleaning checklist. For this task, you’ll benefit from enlisting the help of professionals. The drains in your home take on a lot. The interior of your pipes will inevitably become coated in household debris, which can cause drainage issues. Professional pipe cleaning will remove all the buildup to improve drainage.
In addition to removing waste, the pipe cleaning procedure aids in the discovery of minor plumbing problems that you may have missed for months. Your plumber will run a follow-up camera check after the cleaning to ensure the pipes are fully cleared by the hydrojetting treatment. The accumulation may have obscured any little cracks or leaks, but once it is gone, the plumber can more clearly identify them. This way, they can tell you if you need to schedule fixes like well pump repairs.
In general, calling your neighborhood plumber is not a pleasant experience, but calling them at two in the morning is much more frustrating. Annual pipe cleaning services can help you avoid having to make a costly emergency plumbing repair. Of course, the cost of the emergency response won’t cover any necessary pipe or upkeep repairs, such as cleaning up raw sewage that may have gotten into your yard or house due to an obstruction.
An emergency plumber consultation costs vary from business to business and state to state. Having your plumbing system properly inspected and tested once a year will help you avoid the damage and added expense of an emergency plumber. Maintaining clean pipes will open up your home’s main sewer line, allowing easy flow to the local water source.
If your home uses a septic system, it’s a good idea to schedule an inspection with local septic tank companies. The last thing you want is to get a whiff of a foul smell from your septic tank when you’re in the zone and getting things done. Don’t take any chances.
5. Have a Legal Failsafe
Just because you have a home office doesn’t mean accidents can’t happen. Yes, the space may be familiar, but it still poses some risks. For example, slips and falls are common in all settings. You can injure yourself by tripping over a rag, pet, or trash cans.
You can also sustain injuries due to a non-ergonomic workstation. If you have just started working remotely, you likely don’t have a dedicated workstation, let alone an ergonomic one. This may cause you to develop injuries over time from not having a chair that offers proper back support or staring at your screen for too long and too close.
Your employer is still obligated to observe a culture of safety when you’re working from the comfort of your home. So, as part of your home office cleaning checklist, hire an accident attorney so you can get fair compensation when you suffer injuries on the job. These professionals will help you ensure you get the compensation you deserve.
6. Know How to Reorganize
There may be a time when you decide to move to a bigger home to better accommodate your new home office. When this happens, ensure you hire a commercial mover. Taking the DIY route with a regular move may be okay. However, considering your home office is, in simple terms, your livelihood, you don’t want anything to go wrong.
Moving heavy-duty office equipment is no easy feat. Without the relevant experience, you can damage them, causing you to spend more money getting replacements. Professional movers, on the other hand, have the necessary knowledge and resources to execute a seamless move.
They’re skilled in packing and moving items from one location to another. They’re also equipped with the tools to pack and transfer your office supplies without a hiccup. The best moving company in your area will also offer insurance if your belongings are misplaced or damaged.
7. Take It Slow
As you assemble your home office cleaning checklist, remember to take it slow. It’s a new experience, so you don’t have to get it right on the first try. Do what you can now. You’ll gradually get into the groove, and soon, you’ll be the one giving your fellow colleagues tips on how to create a home office cleaning checklist.
It’s also important to remember that while working from home comes with conveniences, like the reduced need for a commute, which means you’ll rarely need vehicle recovery services, it often makes it harder to maintain a work-life balance. You can be in your office until midnight and not even know it, especially if you live alone. Set up measures to ensure you only work for as long as required. If there are other people in the home, you can ask them to remind you when they see you’ve been in the home office for too long.
Working from home will indeed free up the time you would have otherwise spent commuting. However, that doesn’t mean you should spend it cleaning up your home office. You can always enlist the help of professional cleaners as part of your home office cleaning checklist. This way, you can use your free time to do other more enjoyable things. For example, you could spend valuable time with family or watch your favorite Netflix show.
