12 Skills You Need to Work from Home

Are you stuck in an office, working 9-to-5, and want to escape? Do you aspire to work from home but are unsure if you have the skills to achieve this?

When applying for a remote job, you have an increased chance of success if these skills are included in your Resume/CV. Remember to highlight scenarios in the interview you’ve used in your current or previous employment.

Here are 12 skills you need to work from home.

Be Self-Motivated

Working in an office and the commute forces you to get out of bed. Having a manager overlooking your work keeps you productive. When working from home, you must motivate yourself and complete work well.

If you do not enjoy the work or cannot motivate yourself in the office, this will not change when working from home. It is for this reason that applying for a remote job that you are passionate about is essential.

Strong Communication Skills

Communication is the key to success. When there is a communication breakdown, it can lead to a negative impact on productivity and team morale. You need to be an approachable person who can speak with colleagues at all levels in the business.

Be clear and concise when communicating, and become a good listener.

Most communication will occur through email, video conferencing, and messaging services like Zoom and Slack. So, being comfortable communicating on these multiple channels is essential.

Ability To Work Independently

Your work will be carried out independently while working as part of a team. Be the type of person who can work on your initiative. Resourcefulness and being a good problem-solver will be helpful when working from home.

Efficient Time Manager

Your colleagues will likely be located worldwide when working for a remote business. This complicates working on projects with other team members due to time zones, especially when the work is time-sensitive.

Your success in working from home will come down to your work routine and meeting deadlines. It’s another example of why communication is essential, as well as being flexible in your approach to work and having planning skills.

Be Adaptable and Flexible

Businesses change direction, so being adaptable will make you more employable. Become multi-skilled to adapt to a new role and learn new skills quickly. Stand out and show interest in all aspects of the business.

Strong Technical Skills

Even if your job is not particularly technical, you must feel comfortable with software and hardware as a remote worker. Most fully-distributed companies do not have an IT team to assist you with technical issues.

You must keep your computer and software up-to-date and have a fast internet connection and backup. It will help you be proficient in using the operating system on your computer and problem-solve any issues you’re having.

This leads to some recommended software skills.

G Suite for Business

Many remote businesses use the G Suite of applications to store documents and plan meetings. Being familiar with software like Google Docs and Google Meet will put you in a better position when applying for remote jobs.

Slack

It’s the communication tool for hundreds of thousands of fully-distributed companies. This is where you will communicate with your team by sending text messages, audio, video calls, and gifs. The software can be downloaded for free so, try it out and use the features.

Jira

Jira is fast becoming many companies’ development, task, and project management tools. This is where time is tracked, tasks are identified, and scrums and agile development are monitored and managed.

Many SAAS businesses use this to report product bugs and improvements. Managers can also report in real-time.

If you want to learn new skills but are unsure what to focus on, these roles are in high demand due to changes in consumer behavior.

Online Teaching

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, more families have decided to homeschool their children, so the demand for online teaching has become popular.

While schools are starting to open up, teaching online will only increase as technology improves.

Project Management

With a growing number of people working from home, businesses need someone to bring the team together online and manage projects and workloads. More than ever, having project management experience with organizational skills and being able to communicate and work remotely will be required.

E-Commerce Roles

We’ve seen an explosion of online shopping and many independent businesses transition. Developing websites with WooCommerce and Shopify are skills to have. Another area to think about learning is being a conversion specialist on e-commerce websites.

The focus for many businesses is having a fully functioning website, but converting visitors into customers is a must-have skill.

Become Multi-Skilled

Multi-skilled people are more employable, so being open to learning is a must-have skill. You do not have to pay a fortune for courses. Search YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine online.

Google has a skill shop where you can learn about their product, but it also has a ton of free marketing and digital courses. Coursera has a good-sized database of free training, from how to teach online to learning Korean.

Before you go, please check out our guide on upskilling and how to upskill to increase your chances of landing a remote job.