Undressing the Dress Code:
From July 2005
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Turns out “professional business image” leaves a lot to the imagination and in a dress code, a little imagination can be a very dangerous thing.
East Coast native Dr. Anthony Wheeler, professor of organizational behavior at Sacramento State University the past two years, says the current trend in dress codes can be traced to the backlashes of the dotcom era against the dark suit, white shirt, dark tie “uniform” of IBM, General Electric and the like.
Colorful, Competitive Landscape
“In the late ’80s and ’90s, all these non- traditional companies sprang up out of nowhere with the tech boom,” he notes. “Those new jobs created a highly competitive landscape. That’s when a relaxed work environment and dress code began to be a perk, if not mandatory, to lure the best talent.”
This rapid and unexpected shift forced Big Blue (IBM) to relax its infamous dress code because it could no longer compete for top-flight talent with upstarts who were perfectly happy to offer a raft of UNIX dweebs the option of working in ripped T-shirts, cargo shorts and flip-flops while playing rooftop pingpong.
And so was born the era of “business casual,” which to this day conjures up polo shirts and khakis, whether you’re in Sacramento or Bangalore, India.
Says Wheeler: “Ultimately, it’s about the corporate culture you find yourself in. I teach at a business school and I used to work at a consulting firm in Washington, D.C. Personally, I still feel more comfortable in a suit and a tie, but in some cultures that’s not going to work.
“If you show up overdressed in a creative environment, for example, you’re likely to hear, ‘What are you trying to do, make us all look bad?’”
Continued...
East Coast native Dr. Anthony Wheeler, professor of organizational behavior at Sacramento State University the past two years, says the current trend in dress codes can be traced to the backlashes of the dotcom era against the dark suit, white shirt, dark tie “uniform” of IBM, General Electric and the like.
Colorful, Competitive Landscape
“In the late ’80s and ’90s, all these non- traditional companies sprang up out of nowhere with the tech boom,” he notes. “Those new jobs created a highly competitive landscape. That’s when a relaxed work environment and dress code began to be a perk, if not mandatory, to lure the best talent.”
This rapid and unexpected shift forced Big Blue (IBM) to relax its infamous dress code because it could no longer compete for top-flight talent with upstarts who were perfectly happy to offer a raft of UNIX dweebs the option of working in ripped T-shirts, cargo shorts and flip-flops while playing rooftop pingpong.
And so was born the era of “business casual,” which to this day conjures up polo shirts and khakis, whether you’re in Sacramento or Bangalore, India.
Says Wheeler: “Ultimately, it’s about the corporate culture you find yourself in. I teach at a business school and I used to work at a consulting firm in Washington, D.C. Personally, I still feel more comfortable in a suit and a tie, but in some cultures that’s not going to work.
“If you show up overdressed in a creative environment, for example, you’re likely to hear, ‘What are you trying to do, make us all look bad?’”
Continued...
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