Top 10 work from home productivity tips (that also reduce typing strain) - Voice Type blog Skip to main content Voice Type Pricing Learn Enterprise Trust Blog Blog Top 10 work from home productivity tips (that also reduce typing strain) Work-from-home productivity isn’t just about willpower. Research suggests environment and process matter — and you can make writing-heavy work easier by reducing keystrokes. Here are 10 practical tips, with sources. ← Back to Blog | Home 27 Dec 2025 · 4 min read If you want work from home productivity tips that actually hold up, start with this: your home setup isn’t “just vibes.” It changes friction — how hard it is to start, sustain, and finish work. This post is a pragmatic list of 10 things that help, plus a writing workflow that reduces typing load for people who spend the day in docs, tickets, and messages. TL;DR (fast answer) The strongest evidence for remote work productivity is usually “ it depends ”: role, autonomy, coordination costs, and home setup matter. A well-known randomized experiment found working from home can increase performance for some groups — but the same line of research also highlights tradeoffs around communication and culture ( Bloom et al., NBER working paper 18871 ). If your job is writing-heavy (docs, PR descriptions, tickets, long emails), one of the biggest levers is simply reducing keystrokes by using speech-to-text for first drafts. Not medical advice. If you have persistent pain, numbness, or weakness, seek clinical advice. This article is about productivity and workflow. Tip #1: Treat “where you work” as a production decision Remote work isn’t a personality test. It’s an operations problem: Where do you get deep work done? Where do you do coordination work? Where do you do meetings? Even if you’re “fully remote,” it’s okay to use multiple environments (home desk + occasional quiet place) if it reduces friction. Tip #2: Create a daily “start ritual” you can repeat The goal is to remove decision-making at 9:00am. Examples: laptop open → calendar review → 1 sentence: “Today I will finish X” 5 minutes of inbox triage, then one deep-work block Small rituals are boring — and that’s the point. Tip #3: Reduce coordination overhead (and write it down) Remote work fails when every decision requires a meeting. A simple rule that helps teams: if it can be decided asynchronously, write it down first (a short doc, a proposal, or a comment in the ticket) before asking for a meeting. Tip #4: Use “one doc per decision” If decisions are scattered across Slack, email, and meetings, you re-litigate them forever. Pick a single source of truth per decision: Notion page Google Doc GitHub issue Jira ticket description Tip #5: Make meetings smaller and more structured Two practical habits: Add an agenda (even 3 bullets). End with explicit owners and next steps. If you can’t write an agenda, the meeting probably isn’t ready. Tip #6: Use speech-to-text for drafts (docs, tickets, long messages) If you’re remote, you’re probably writing more. Drafting by voice works especially well for: weekly updates project summaries meeting notes PR descriptions / design docs Then you edit with the keyboard. Start with built-in macOS Dictation: /speech-to-text-mac If you dictate daily, a dedicated hotkey helps you actually stick with it: /voice-typing-mac Tip #7: Control notifications like you control caffeine The “productivity” issue is often attention fragmentation: disable non-essential notifications during deep work batch check-ins for Slack/email Tip #8: Add microbreaks (so you don’t pay later) Remote work often removes natural breaks (walking to a meeting room, commuting, etc.). Microbreak research is mixed, but some studies report reduced discomfort without obvious productivity loss in controlled tasks ( McLean et al., 2001 ; Nakphet et al., 2014 ). A Cochrane review notes the evidence base is limited and often low quality, so treat schedules as low-risk experiments, not guarantees ( Luger et al., 2019; PMCID: PMC6646952 ). Practical starting point: 30–60 seconds every 20 minutes 3–5 minutes once per hour Tip #9: Make “end of day” real If you never stop, you never recover. A small, repeatable shutdown ritual helps: write tomorrow’s first task close tabs set calendar boundaries Tip #10: Review weekly outcomes, not daily emotions Daily mood is noisy. Weekly outcomes are signal: what shipped? what got blocked? what created churn? What research says about WFH and productivity (a quick reality check) There’s a large literature, but it’s uneven: lots of surveys, fewer clean experiments. Two sources worth reading: A well-known experiment on WFH performance and retention ( Bloom et al., NBER working paper 18871 ). A systematic review on WFH arrangements and performance/productivity outcomes ( PLOS ONE, 2022 ). Neither implies “WFH is always better.” They do support a practical takeaway: setup and process matter . Community notes (what people say in practice) Not authoritative — but useful reality checks: Hacker News: “Work from Home and Productivity” ( HN thread ) Hacker News: “Work from home and productivity: evidence from personnel and analytics data” ( HN thread ) Keep going Remote-work workflows: /solutions/remote-work Voice typing hub: /voice-typing-mac Evidence-based microbreak schedule: /blog/microbreaks-for-typing Sources (research + primary references) WFH experiment (NBER): Bloom et al., working paper 18871 Systematic review (PLOS ONE): Working in the digital economy… (2022) Remote work talk (video): Nicholas Bloom (TEDxStanford): “Go Ahead, Tell Your Boss You Are Working From Home” Microbreak study: McLean et al., 2001 (PubMed) Microbreak trial: Nakphet et al., 2014 (PubMed) Work-break schedules review: Luger et al., 2019 (PMCID: PMC6646952) Previous Vibe coding on Mac: a practical workflow (Cursor/VS Code + voice typing) Next Ergonomic keyboard for RSI: what helps (and when voice typing wins) Related articles Ergonomics Ergonomic split keyboard: benefits, downsides, and what the evidence says An ergonomic split keyboard can improve wrist and shoulder posture — but it won’t fix typing volume. 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