It is not uncommon in team sports to see a discrepancy in how teams perform when ‘at home’ versus ‘on the road’. Often, the home crowd encourages their team while distracting the visting opponent. A team in an outdoor sport might perform better in the climate of its home city. It could simply be a case of the visiting team being worn out from a long road trip. To list all the reasons explaining this difference is a task for another day.
When I badly injured my ankle in the winter of 2014, I worked from home twice a week to ease the burden on the injury. For the first time as a professional, I had the opportunity to compare how my performance changed when ‘at home’ to how I performed when I was in the office. Since I’d heard so much about the productivity gains many enjoyed while working at home, I anticipated at least a minor increase in my own output.
Boy, was I off. The increase wasn’t minor - I suspect my productivity almost doubled. Being at home meant no more distractions. There were no chatting colleagues, no unannounced interruptions, not even the odd fire alarm. Instead of traveling almost an hour to get to the office, I limped downstairs and sat on the couch. I enjoyed the first couple of weeks ‘from home’ a great deal and thought about how to best make my case for working from home on a more regular basis in the spring.
After about a month, though, I came to a realization. In sports, a team who plays far better at home than on the road is not a great team. Instead of doing the hard work to understand why performance levels drop off in hostile environments, these teams make excuses for their mistakes and fail to learn from setbacks. When the chips are down and the team has no alternative but to perform, these teams cannot be relied on to execute.
I saw the thought pattern in my own situation. Sure, working more from home might see me get more done on a given day. But this was not my job. My job was to find ways to make myself just as productive when in the office. If I wanted to take a step forward in my career, I needed to stop blaming the environment around me and find ways to do the same work no matter where I spent the workday.
When I finally healed, I returned to the office full-time. The changes I made were mostly minor. Instead of worrying about interruptions, I accepted them as part of my job. I made sure to respond to each colleague as the knowledgeable adult I wanted to become rather than the petulant child dictating my inner dialogue at the time. If the noise level became distracting, I took my work to another room or plugged in a pair of headphones.
Does this mean it is never the right move to suggest a work from home arrangement? Of course not. The best sports teams want to play at home because home is where they perform best. The problem isn't being good at home or even preferring to work there. The problem is when poor performances are blamed on the environment. This is not a winner's mentality.
A successful team does their best no matter where the game is played. The same logic applies in any job. Excuses about the environment don't belong in the workplace so leave them where they belong - at home.
Until next time,
The Business Bro
