Clothes & the New Professional
Clothing can make or break the new professional
Just about one year ago this month, I met with an associate in a New York City law firm. I told the lawyer that she was about to earn the easiest money she would make in her professional career. I gave her a 12-page document and indicated I wanted the document to be recreated deleting one name everywhere it appeared in the document and replacing it with another.
Two weeks later, I returned to the lawyer’s office with the intent of signing the newly prepared document. I was astounded when the associate arrived at our meeting wearing a pair of tights (not slacks, mind you, but tights) and a bulky sweater. Her hair, though pulled back, was generally disheveled. She truly looked as if she had just managed to pull herself out of bed and stumble into work.
My surprise over the lawyer’s appearance was compounded when I received the document I was about to sign. My original 12-page document had mysteriously been transformed into a five-page document. When I noted the absence of all sorts of language, the lawyer took the document from my hands and promised a corrected and revised version within15 minutes.
Nearly two hours later, document in hand, I dashed from the lawyer’s office hurrying to make another scheduled meeting. Only later than night did I have time to read the document carefully. To my dismay, I discovered more than 15 typos, astoundingly an average of more than one per page.
Do our choices in the clothing we wear to work affect the documents and spreadsheets we ultimately produce? Had my associate taken the effort to put on a suit that morning or every morning last year, would I have received a typo-free document from the get go? A body of research now concludes that a new professional’s choice of dress can absolutely affect the quality of their day-to-day output.
Embodied cognition
Last year, two experimental psychologists, Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky of Northwestern University, published a study that indicates we are informed by our physical experiences, including the clothing we choose to wear. They reached this conclusion via three separate experiments, including:
Experiment 1: Participants were randomly assigned to wear a white lab coat or street clothes. They then participated in an “incongruity task,” in which participants needed to spot what item “didn’t belong” in a set. Those in white coats made half the errors of those in street clothes.
Experiment 2: Participants were randomly assigned to wear what they believed to be a doctor’s coat or to wear what they believed to be a painter’s coat or to simply view a doctor’s coat nearby. Then they participated in a sustained “attention task,” in which participants observed two pictures and were asked to identify differences between the images. Those who wore a doctor’s coat (which was identical to the painter’s coat) spotted more differences than the other two groups.
Experiment 3: Participants wore either a doctor’s coat or a painter’s coat and were instructed to examine a doctor’s lab coat displayed in front of them. They then wrote essays on their opinion of each coat type. Participants wearing a doctor’s coat were better able to spot differences between the coats.
The researchers concluded that individuals, who saw and felt a particular type of clothing on their bodies, experienced it in every way. The clothing actually influenced the person’s psyche. Physicians are known to be careful, hardworking and attentive. The experiments revealed that individuals who donned a physician’s coat suddenly took on those characteristics. However, simply looking at a doctor’s coat did not affect behavior.
What to wear to work
For new professionals just starting work, this research has some real implications. In some workplace settings, even when corporate policy permits casual dress as appropriate office attire, new professionals may wish to dress more conservatively, especially when doing so enhances their job performance.
At a very minimum, every new professional should consider these rules of thumb:
Dress to make a good first impression. You have one opportunity to make a first impression and you will make it incredibly fast. In fact, some studies indicate that people develop their first impression of you within less than half a minute. Ensure anything you wear to work is neat and clean. Outfits should not be overly revealing or sexually provocative. In most cases, you should save jeans and T-shirts for weekend wear. Avoid sneakers, very high heels, and flip-slops.
Dress for your employer’s culture. Every organization has a culture, and employees of the organization express that culture in part through their dress. If the supervisor to whom you report regularly comes into work wearing more conservative clothing, you should do the same. If the supervisor regularly wears the most fashion-forward clothing around, you want to build an edgier wardrobe.
Dress for the job you want. If you wish to be seen as a leader in your field, spend some time today analyzing how those in charge dress. If the leading women in your profession show up at important events wearing St. John’s suits, new female professionals should seek to upgrade their Ann Taylor Loft wardrobes. Similarly, new male professionals who hope to eventually become recognized dealmakers in the world of high stakes finance should look at how people in that industry dress. If Gucci slip-ons are the norm, find a slip-on that won’t break your budget and still looks Gucci-sharp.
What not to wear
Today’s workplaces differ so dramatically that it’s difficult to create a set of universal rules proscribing what’s appropriate and inappropriate for new professionals to wear. What’s “right” for the person beginning a job on Wall Street won’t necessarily work for the new professional about to start work in the fashion industry or in high tech.
However, virtually everyone who is starting work should avoid the following mistakes:
Torn, dirty or frayed clothing;
Clothing bearing words or images that others might find offensive;
Clothing that reveals cleavage or excessive chest hair; and
Clothing that reveals a “whale tail” or a “plumber’s crack.”
One additional rule of thumb that my young associate of a year ago missed: never show up at work dressed more casually than a client. Even if you have only one client meeting scheduled during a particular day, dress for that client. If the client is likely to be dressed in conservative business attire, the new professional should follow suit. And similarly, if the client tends to dress far less formally, the new professional should do the same.
What You Need to Know
How you dress can affect your performance at work. Dress like the leaders in your industry and you may become one.
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