“The economy is in the dumps. People are stressed to their limits. And the environment continues to suffer from our excesses. If those with compatible jobs worked at home just one day a week, U.S. companies, individuals, and communities could over $350 billion a year and the environment would be spared thanks to the equivalent of taking six million cars permanently off the road. What’s more, our savings in oil would total almost 80% of our annual Iraqi imports,” says author Kate Lister in a promotional email pitching her book Undress For Success: The Naked Truth About Making Money at Home (Wiley, 2009).

The book, and the companion web site at Undress4Success.com, are places for employers, employees, freelancers, and entrepreneurs to get inspiration around working at home. I had the chance to email Kate by email about the book she co-wrote with Tom Harnish and about her theories on working from home.

Q: What was your “aha” moment about working at home?

When a mattress flew off the car in front of me as I traveled to work on the Sure-Kill Expressway one morning. Well, that was the final straw anyway. I simply could not stand the whole business suit and pantyhose scene. I grew up in a home-based business and always knew that’s where I’d wind up.

Q: What would you consider some main qualities a woman must have in order to successfully work from home?

Discipline, discipline, discipline. While there are plenty of distractions in a regular office setting—co-workers stopping by, coffee breaks, birthday parties, water cooler chit-chat—the workplace culture keeps you in check. When you start working from home, you face different kinds of distraction—household chores, the sofa—only now, there’s no one to keep you in check but yourself. You need to find a way to stay focused. And you need to train your family and friends that just because you don’t leave the house in the morning, you do have a real job and you really are working.

Q: What would you consider some main issues a woman must consider before working from her home?

Be sure your family and friends buy into the concept. No, you can’t run their errands, come out and play, and have dinner on the table when they get home. You have a real job!

Q: What are some common (and avoidable) pitfalls that someone working at home might fall into and how would you recommend avoiding them?

Someone once said “the nice thing about having your own business is you get to work half days; you just need to decide which twelve hours.” The same could be said about working from home. When your work is right there, it’s sometimes hard to turn it off. There’s alway one more email to read, one more phone call to make, one more text message to send. One teleworker we interviewed for Undress For Success—The Naked Truth About Working From Home told us she actually resorted to climbing in the car at 6pm, driving around the block, and returning home to mark the end of her day.

Q: What is the downside(s) of working at home?

For some, loneliness is an issue. We’re social creatures, after all. That’s why you see the coffee shops filled with people working on their laptops. One coffee shop owner we interviewed said his business has been transformed by the work at home movement. He’s actually remodeled twice to make more power outlets available.

Q: What is the one major takeaway you’d like people to get from reading your book?

There are legitimate home based jobs and business opportunities out there. If you want to work from home, we can help you make work what you do, instead of where, how, or when you do it.

How do you feel about working from home? Do you do it? Want to do it? Love it? Hate it?