Home office essentials: standing desks, ergonomic accessories and faster internet

Even if you’d thought about working from home, you were probably unprepared for the new reality but there are ways to make it easier.

Australians who are able to work from home are now being encouraged to do so, and while essential workers fighting coronavirus in hospitals, stacking supermarkets shelves and delivering supplies are the new heroes, that doesn’t mean the rest of us don’t have an important part to play in keeping the economy going.

For many, working at home may seem like a welcome change of pace.

No more cramming into overcrowded public transport, watching your house deposit raided by takeaway coffees, or even putting on pants.

While working from home also has its perils, such as the blurring of the boundaries between work and home already facilitated by technology, in these difficult times those who are lucky enough to still be working at all are hardly in a position to complain.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t make it easier to get the job done.

Here are a few handy additions you can make to your home office to help you work smarter instead of harder.

TWELVESOUTH HOME OFFICE ACCESSORIES

TwelveSouth's Curve stand elevates your laptop and makes it a more ergonomic second screen.

While it’s certainly not the only company that can deck out your new home office, the Twelve South range of home accessories share a premium design and feel that makes them a cut above the rest.

Products like the Curve can elevate your work laptop and make it more ergonomic to work from.

The Stay-Go USB-C hub provides an elegant way to keep all your cables organised and consolidates them into one cable, making it easy to disconnect your laptop if you want a change of scenery by moving your office to your couch or balcony.

The Fermata headphone stand is great if you’re using wireless headphones for conference calls, providing an easily accessible stand that can also charge your headphones or other devices as well.

OPTUS 5G HOME BROADBAND

The Optus 5G Modem is specially designed for indoor use.

The NBN has been under pressure as more people work from home on residential plans that aren’t designed for the traffic, and while the network has been working to give telcos more capacity to handle it, now is a good time to consider getting off the network altogether.

If you can connect to the Optus 5G network for your home internet needs, you’ll likely get faster speeds than you were getting on the NBN.

It also won’t cost you too much more either, at $70 for an unlimited data plan, the 5G plan is priced roughly the same as competing NBN unlimited plans.

Better capacity on 5G also means any children who are now stuck at home can also use the internet at the same time, keeping them distracted and stopping them distracting you.

VARIDESK PROPLUS 36

The VariDesk ProPlus36 lets you alternate between sitting and standing.

Your first instinct may be to invest in an ergonomic new office chair to keep yourself comfortable working at home, a more ergonomic solution could be a variable standing desk.

The VariDesk ProPlus 36 is big enough to hold a couple monitors while still fitting on your average home office desk.

Its spring-loaded adjustment system make it easy to raise and lower and allows you to set it at whichever height is best for you.

Using a standing desk can take some adjustment but once you have you can start reaping the rewards.

Rather than slouching in a poorly designed office chair all day you can alternate between sitting and standing.

Standing while you work also engages your core muscles, which can reduce back pain and also burns more calories.

It also makes it more likely your office attire will still fit when it’s time for you to eventually go back to the office after a diet of quarantine snacks and never leaving the house.