What’s on My Desk: Nicola MacLeod of Remsoft
Nicola MacLeod has figured out how to get work done from home. A workspace with a streamlined aesthetic and a touch of local nature help her focus and get into the productive flow.
We stopped by to check out her space and find out what her thought process was behind putting it together.
What sort of work do you do from home?
I think because I’m in a marketing role, because I manage the social media presence for Remsoft, you couldn’t just leave at 5pm and walk away on weekends. I’m always checking in on stuff so I do a lot of that from home. I sit on a few boards and committees as well so any work I do for that. I also do some freelance work, some writing work. I just finished up a project on a textbook so that was all done from here.
What kind of atmosphere have you tried to create with your workspace?
The motivation for me to work is highly contingent upon how long I can keep my attention on the task at hand and I think if I create an environment that’s very aesthetically pleasing, I feel good about sitting at my workspace and working and it just makes it easier as opposed to sitting on a crappy desk.
I took a psych course in high school and the only thing I retained from that psych course was a unit we did on study habits and work habits and how you shouldn’t mix your environments so if you are studying for school or working you shouldn’t do it on your bed or in your bedroom because that is a place you should condition yourself to sleep. The same way your living room should be somewhere you condition yourself to relax. I try to create a space that is my work zone so I can associate work with sitting there. When you’re doing freelance stuff it’s hard to motivate yourself to find a spot in your apartment when there’s so many distractions. This space is for the purpose of work and there’s very little distraction there.
Does it work?
Yeah it works for me. I like that it faces a wall, that way I’m not distracted by things around me. I am able to sit down and zone in on what I’m doing and work for in hour-long stretches and kind of forget that I’m in my apartment surrounded by hundreds of other things I could be doing.
Was there anywhere you found inspiration for what you did with the workspace or was it just your own?
I’m all about Pinterest and the internet, so definitely lots of looking at things online and drawing inspiration from other workspaces but it’s kind of a combination of different styles that I like and stuff from different places. Some of it is stuff I splurged on because I wanted and some of the other stuff was very affordable. My desk and chair are from Canadian Tire and everyone is always shocked when they come in, they’re like ‘I love this, where is this from?’ Canadian Tire. There’s always places that have home decor but not necessarily in the style you’d think of yourself as fitting into. I don’t think of myself as a Canadian Tire person but if you’re a bargain hunter, you will find what you want at the price that you want.
I like the Swedish style of furniture … It’s like the very minimalist, Scandinavian, northern European, Swedish look I like. But then kind of jazzed up with a few touches. I always have wildflowers on my desk. Kind of pulling different elements together into a space that I’m comfortable in and I’m able to focus in. You’ve got to create that space in your life.
Do you get in a different mindset than you would in an office space that you’re not in as much control of?
I definitely do my best work in quiet. I’m not the type of person who can even listen to music or have the TV on or have a podcast playing. I need silence and focus so because it’s in my own home I can control my environment and that’s important to me.