Working From Home: 7 Posture Mistakes to Avoid at Your Desk

You can have a good chair and a nice screen and still end the day feeling stiff and tired. More often than not, the furniture is not the problem: a few habits picked up without thinking are. Here are the seven posture mistakes we see most often when people work from home, each with a simple fix.

1. Working directly on your laptop

A laptop sitting flat on the table puts the screen well below your eyeline. To see it, you push your head forward and round your upper back, sometimes all day long.

The fix: raise the screen so its top edge is at eye level. A laptop stand or a bamboo monitor riser does the job, as long as you add an external keyboard and mouse.

2. Perching on the edge of your chair

Sitting on the front of the seat means your back no longer touches the backrest and has to hold itself up. After an hour, you start to slump.

The fix: shuffle right back into the seat and let the backrest do its job. If the chair is too hard or too deep, a memory foam seat cushion and a lumbar cushion make the position far more comfortable.

3. Leaving your feet dangling

A chair set to the right height for your desk often leaves your feet hanging, especially if you are on the shorter side. You then compensate by crossing your legs or hooking your feet around the chair base.

The fix: keep your feet flat, either on the floor or on a footrest, with your knees at roughly 90°.

4. Resting your wrists on the desk edge

Typing or clicking with your wrists propped on the edge of the desk forces them to bend upwards, hundreds of times an hour.

The fix: bring the keyboard closer to the edge, keep your wrists in line with your forearms and use a wrist rest to support the heel of your palm, not the wrist itself.

5. Looking down at a phone lying flat

Video calls, messages, documents to check: a smartphone lying flat in front of your keyboard makes you look down dozens of times a day. And during calls, it is tempting to wedge it between your ear and your shoulder.

The fix: put your phone or tablet on an adjustable stand, next to your screen and at the same height. For calls, use earphones or speakerphone.

6. Facing a window or sitting with your back to the light

A window behind your screen causes glare; a window behind you creates reflections. Either way, you squint and lean towards the screen without realising.

The fix: position your desk so that daylight comes from the side. In the evening, add an adjustable desk lamp rather than relying on the ceiling light alone.

7. Staying still for hours

This is the most widespread mistake, even with a perfectly set-up desk. Working from home, there is no walk to the meeting room and no coffee break with colleagues, so you can easily sit for three hours without moving.

The fix: get up roughly every 45 minutes. A few simple ideas:

• take phone calls standing up and walking around;
• refill your water bottle in the kitchen rather than keeping a jug on your desk;
• set a discreet reminder on your phone;
• use your lunch break to step outside for a few minutes.

Where to start

There is no need to fix everything in one day. Pick the mistake that sounds most like you, often a screen that is too low or dangling feet, and sort it out this week. Add a new habit the following week. Within a month, your home office will feel completely different. And if discomfort persists despite these changes, do not hesitate to see a healthcare professional.