Professionalism- stupid?

[JimC]

Can someone explain to me why professionalism (suit, tie, nice shoes, good posture) is not completely pointless and independent of everyones true personality?

Basically, what does wearing nice clothes and obeying small social laws (like keeping your elbows off of the table) prove? You sometimes can't get a job if your not dressed properly, but why? What the hell does a professional work environment prove? How does it affect production? How does it affect skills?

My friend was denied a job at an IT business because he had a dirty car, no joke. He is great with computers too, and has a degree. The boss explained to him that "this is a professional environment" and that his car would bring down the impression of the business.

This whole concept of acting professional seems utterly pointless to me. Nobody is comfortable in a business suit, and you can be clean, responsible, and disciplined without all of this stuff. Why do all of the models in magazines have nice suits? How does your clothing show "we get things done, we are skilled"?

[ThoughtAddict]

I work with a very successful lawyer. At times, he is with clients who will notice the details. Other times, he and I will spend hours drafting a document without seeing another living soul. I've learned about professionalism from him. It basically comes down to one simple thing:

Image has power.

When he and I aren't going to see anyone else, it's very casual. We make wisecracks, wear jeans and comfortable shirts, don't bother with the details. The next day, it may be a deposition with other lawyers and witnesses. In that case, he's in a nice suit and I'm dressed as an assistant. I mean that. Literally, I dress trying to fit the image of "assistant".

The effect is that people will let me slip under the radar. If I was wearing a suit, they'd respond differently. If he wasn't wearing a suit, they'd respond differently. Lawyers will often confide small bits of information to me that they'd fight to keep from him. They see me as harmless.

In a recent case, the attorney I work with was trying to get people to back out of a lawsuit. He wanted to convey that the client was willing to spend every dime to win. He invited along two of his associates and they wore suits that, combined, were worth more than I make in a year. It sent the message.

That said, image isn't worth much if you can't back it up. It gives an advantage, but won't win you the whole game. In the case of your friend, the firm might have had that as the factor that tipped the sides between him and another candidate. These things happen. Image gives some power in that it makes people expect you to be a certain way. It plays on assumptions. Inherently, there isn't anything to it, but when you're dealing with people.... real people who make assumptions based on appearance... well, it matters.

[JimC]

Thanks. That makes a lot of sense.

But trace back to the origin of this. The only reason people's opinions are influenced by appearance are because of just that. Good appearance in the media is used to represent professionalism, so people see a man with good appearance and they attach professionalism. It's an increasing cycle.

It's very sad to see that people will spend thousands on a suit just to look skilled, when you could use that money to actually improve the quality of work.

I know exactly why professionalism is envied, perhaps it this was a rhetorical question in hopes to change people's logic and motives, to stop the prejudice from both consumers and suppliers, in hopes to change the world yet again. Haha.

[Ree]

The image of success attracts business as well. Let's take lawyers as an example in this case. I am not a lawyer but I work with them quite a bit. One female lawyer who has become a pretty good friend of mine recently bought a BMW 745 il. She told me that the thinking is that a potential client looking for a good lawyer is going to consult a lawyer who already appears to be successful. If you seriously needed some legal representation, would you consult an attorney whose image is that of a slacker or not-so-successful? Same thing with dressing properly and conducting oneself properly. The image is the thing, and the image needs to be that of success!

[JimC]

I know that is the intention! I understand all of that!

I'm trying to say that it's not a good thing. Just because you dress nice and have a nice car doesn't mean you are actually successful. I would hire the slacker guy in bad clothes if he had better skills and was more qualified, and it would pay off too. He would also probably be cheaper, because he wouldn't raise his prices to pay for all that extra fancy stuff to look professional. I don't mean to start another topic, but take a look at Google vs Ask. Which one is better? Which one has higher quality products? Then ask, which one has the commercials and spends all the extra money to make themselves look better?

I know professionalism helps business a lot, and can make you look more qualified, but it shouldn't be that way.

[Shamou]

"Image is a powerful tool and projecting the right kind of image, be it personal or corporate, is vital for success.

Business Power is a hierarchy. To get power in business, you must project a high degree of authority, credibility and professionalism.

The conciousness of being well-groomed and well-dressed, will itself, heighten your self-confidence and self-respect. "

Dolly Kee
Image Power - Consultant/Director

Image is power... the power to influence... the power to impress... the power to be respected... and the power to have a leading edge...

Your image speaks even before you do... and people will judge you mostly on your image... maybe it should not be this way... but that's how it is... so we can adapt and get the advantages... or rebel... and pay the consequences...

.

[JimC]

Yet people look down on other types of prejudice? How is this any different?

Your only confident because feel that you fit in with the other fake professionals.

It doesn't always pay off, as with the example I showed before. There are tons of companies that are far better and don't use this kind of behavior to promote themselves. :/

[Shamou]

Originally Posted by JimC
Yet people look down on other types of prejudice? How is this any different?

It is different because you can do something about your appearance… but there is little that you can do it you have a different colored skin… or are not so quite nice looking… or are simply awkward…

You can change clothes… but you can’t change how you were born…

Your only confident because feel that you fit in with the other fake professionals.

What makes you think that they are fake… they may just know that if you want the part… you must look the part…

It doesn't always pay off, as with the example I showed before. There are tons of companies that are far better and don't use this kind of behavior to promote themselves. :/

I suppose there are… in which case… you just go out and work for them..

.

[Jill]

Jim, I agree with you completely!

But Thoughtaddict and others make some good points. Unfortunately, there's nothing much we can do about people like that but play their game.

Of course, people who want to come work for me can wear whatever they want, but even with that, I would still hope in their interview they would at least attempt to put on something semi-nice as it IS an interview for goodness sakes!

[silicon toad2000]

I think a majority of employers would hire people based on talent if they had a sure way of identifying talent. Talent is a difficult thing to spot from a resume and an interview.
On the other foot there are things more important than talent. The impact, direct and indirect, that the new person has on the other staff. If you hire someone who is very talented and 20% more productive than anyone else applying for the job, but their demeanour and professional mannerisms detract from the other staff's productivity, say 20 other staff become 5% less productive, then that talent us worth nothing to you.
Also employers often have a huge pile of applications to fill only one job, you have to cut all but one of them out somehow... even if it is just a vibe they get in the interview.

[ThoughtAddict]

Professionalism does reflect certain skills. The guy wearing well-polished shoes at least cares about detail. He's probably got a certain degree of respect for himself. Yes, this can all be faked, but I think there is a correlation there.

I'm not saying that it is a good thing. Some of the most brilliant people I know despise suits. They prefer jeans and a t-shirt. But you should be able to play the game when it will suit you.

I saw a TV news-type story about appearance. They took a person and dressed him as a bum and had him ask for change for bus fare. Then they took that same guy, cleaned him up and put him in khakis and a dress shirt and had him ask for change for bus fare. You can probably predict the results.

Yes, it is probably just another form of prejudice. But it doesn't appear to be going away. As Shamou said, "we can adapt and get the advantages... or rebel... and pay the consequences..."

[RT Wolf]

Image does not only have power, it is important for evolutionary reasons. For women, attractiveness turns out to be everything, and men of higher status probably dressed a certain way, too ("no sheep skin for me, lion's fur for me!"). Back then, it was a pretty simple calculation: A better looking person (not just in terms of clothes, but things like facial symmetry and height (for men) and clear skin) would be better genetic material for your children.

Unfortunately, we still have that bias towards attractiveness. People constantly assign better qualities to better looking people, including higher intelligence, higher friendliness/sociability, higher status, more honesty. Like most heuristics, though, this can lead us down some bad alleys sometimes. Guess why con men and women tend to be good looking; because it helps sell them. They also often tend to "dress for success", if you will.

Basically, what I'm saying is that, image does have power, but it's important to realize that this is not just some social meme that someone cooked up to make your life miserable; this is an evolutionarily important truth.

[Brutha]

When you go to an interview to some business person with low quality clothing that could mean two things:
a) You think you are a rebel, because you don't play by societies rules.
You probably make some sort of trouble because you will challenge your the status quo also in other areas.
b) You are totally clueless about what you should do in a situation like that.
That means you aren't qualified for the job.

Their might be some IT startups where you can do a), but it won't work in most companies.

[Shamou]

I believe that the following anecdote will demonstrate the power of "image" and preconceived notions...

A research firm published the photo of a pretty girl in two different magazines and ask the people to evaluate how beautiful they thought she was on a scale of one to ten... one being ugly as sin... and ten being extremely beautiful...

Now, in both magazines they used the same picture... except in one magazine they named the model Danielle and in the other one they called her Gertrude...

As expected... Danielle was believed to be way more beautiful than Gertrude... even if it was the same picture in both cases...

Perception is power... we must learn how to use it if we want to be successful...

BTW- My sincere apologies to all the Gertrudes who read this post...

.

[ThoughtAddict]

Originally Posted by Shamou

As expected... Danielle was believed to be way more beautiful than Gertrude... even if it was the same picture in both cases....

I had a gorgeous friend by the name of Danielle. I was thinking of her when I read this. Then I remembered, her real name was "Ida"... guess she understood the power of perception, huh?

[unicorn]

Originally Posted by JimC

This whole concept of acting professional seems utterly pointless to me. Nobody is comfortable in a business suit, and you can be clean, responsible, and disciplined without all of this stuff. Why do all of the models in magazines have nice suits? How does your clothing show "we get things done, we are skilled"?

This is a cultural thing, I believe. Move to Norway and you will find company that agrees with you totally (the quick way of changing that reality). Over here the image of proffesionalism with suits and the rest is mostly frowned upon, and often makes people really sceptic. I used to be an IT consultant for Norways at that time largest IT-services supplier, and I remember a delegation from US IBM showed up to negotiate a contract. They showed up in their american proffesional attires, and the majority response were somebody was about to get screwed... If they had shown up in jeans I think their negotiations would have gone a lot more smoothly.

It's a total backfire to try to act proffesional over here, the general consesus is that if you don't seem authentic and natural you cannot be trusted. That does not mean that skills and professionalism is not valued, only that people think that if you try to hard to keep an image, they immediately assume you have something to hide and that you are not happy with who you really are, and maybe you have reason not to be happy with yourself, so better beware... I think you would fit right into this mindset... (But then again there is a downside to this too, not to be elaborated on now ) There is a small "cult" of business-people that tries to uphold this dress code and professional image here too- mainly top-level management, stockbrokers and marketers, but they are loosing ground as the majority consensus seems to be that things works and get done in spite of those people, not because of them.... They find more and more they have to loosen up and be more casual to get any rapport with their potential customers and workforce, so it looks as if they are approaching extinction.

This was just an input from "a little place in the middle of nowhere up north"...

[Erki]

Wow, unicorn, I never thougt you were from Norway. Norway is cool. It's in my to-go-to list too...

[Ree]

Originally Posted by unicorn

I remember a delegation from US IBM showed up to negotiate a contract. They showed up in their american proffesional attires, and the majority response were somebody was about to get screwed....

This made me laugh out loud. IBM is pretty much thought of in the USA as having begun the trend of blue suits, white starched shirts and power ties

Things have changed since the early days of IBM, for the better I think. These days we have more choices of companies to work for and do business with and some of those companies are more relaxed than others. I like the diversity

[JimC]

Thanks for that unicorn...

Perhaps my real peeves with reality are merely just reflections of the US? I have never been to another country, but moving to Europe/Australia is something that has been in the back of my mind for some time. I'm not sure where Aus stands with professionalism though.

[silicon toad2000]

There doesn't seem to be a status quo here in aus. I think some places encourage a suit, other places encourage pants and shirt but discourage a tie. I have never seen the tie thing enforced unless it's a company image issue and we're dealing closely with customers or agents. That's south australia, not sure about the consensus in other states, i'm pretty sure the same would be the case over there, you'd get a mix of some enforcing the tie, most encouraging one way or the other and im sure there would be some enforcing a no tie policy.

[llong]

It shows respect to your colleagues, your clients, and to yourself.

[JimC]

Originally Posted by llong

It shows respect to your colleagues, your clients, and to yourself.

What initially created the fact that it does this? What is the original cause of obtaining respect from professionalism? It's the chicken/egg logic that I mentioned earlier in the thread.
1 Media delivers the message that suit/tie = professional (to further their own agenda)
2 Normal people wear suit/tie to appear professional too.
3 Media acknowledges that it's a meme and continues to deliver messages.
4 Repeat 2-3

How about acknowledging someones skills to show respect? How about paying generously to those who work hard to show respect? Wearing a suit/tie to show respect is just a meme... monkey see monkey do, just like the popular phrase "Good Morning" and "How's it going", people often don't care but they say it because everyone else does, and assume it shows respect.

[Shamou]

Originally Posted by JimC

Wearing a suit/tie to show respect is just a meme... monkey see monkey do, just like the popular phrase "Good Morning" and "How's it going", people often don't care but they say it because everyone else does, and assume it shows respect.

Would you get on a commercial plane if you saw the pilot dressed like a beach bum with messed up hair... a three day beard and badly needing a bath...???

Would you trust your money in the hands of a banker who came to work in a bathing suit...???

Clothes show respect... it has been this way for thousands of years on most continents and in most cultures... and... it's not about to change...

.