Dress for success in the new tribal workplace

HOW to dress for success in the new tribal workplace.

“Chris and Mark model our new-season hoodies in grey and, er, dark grey...”

THE Italian and French can always tell you’re not one of them by the way you dress. Equally we can always spot a German (shorts, black socks and sandals), a Russian (micro bikinis and high heels — and that’s just the men) and an American (runners, fanny packs and baseball caps).

Even the de rigueur dress style worn by digital natives is a uniform. To the untrained eye it looks like everyone is using the same mix of T-shirts, jeans and runners, however, Queena Kim, from American Public Media’s Marketplace program, took to the Silicon Valley streets with an expert to deconstruct the valley’s dress code. Like countries and workplaces, Silicon Valley is full of tribes — engineers, designers, product managers, salespeople, entrepreneurs and VCs (venture capitalists). Each tribe has its uniform. For instance, a hoodie signals young talent, a zippered V-neck sweater a VC and T-shirt but no jeans and basic sneakers, an engineer.

Pamela Golbin, chief curator of the Musée de la Mode et du Textile says, “The art of dressing every morning becomes, whether consciously or not, a declaration of stance, aesthetics, consumption, beliefs and class, identifying us a member of a particular tribe.”

Companies have tribes. The bigger the company the more the dress signals how close to the chief you are. Forget power dressing. People at the bottom can tell who you are not just by your clothes, but what by sort of car you drive, whether you have a parking spot, how close you park to the executive-only lift, the size of your office and, more importantly, how close to it is to the chief.

The concept of power dressing came from John Molloy’s 1975 bestseller Dress For Success. In his updated books on men and women dressing for success he comes to the same basic, depressing, conclusions. As one reviewer wrote: “women (and men) fare better in conservative companies with no casual dress. They must dress in conservative men’s colours in natural fibres, primarily wool, and must have a very upper middle class look.”

Smart companies try to say “we want our employees to bring their whole selves to work with them”. Around town the war cry is to do with innovation and creativity. Just to prove it companies let you dress down once a week. As Sydney professor Stan Glaser says of casual Fridays: “They’re giving them the guise of individuality when it’s just another form of regulation. They are trying to pretend it’s a signal of democracy but it’s not.”

Things get harder at the top end of town. And it doesn’t matter if that town is London, New York, Melbourne or Sydney. Just like the Italians and French, the real power people can always tell you’re not one of them by the way you dress. For men it’s simple: dress like Daniel Craig, Cary Grant or Sean Connery for your next board presentation.

Research says that the darker the suit, the more authoritative you appear. Only black shoes, never brown. White or light blue shirts and plain ties. Avoiding hula dancers on at least the front of the tie will help. Black socks are good. Happy socks are bad. Hair on the head is good. Hair on the face is bad. Pinstripes are good for men and women. Accessories, particularly in Asia, say a lot. Kmart sells really good watches for $20 but Omega and Rolex are better. You can buy a pre-worn Omega Speedmaster or Rolex Oyster Perpetual for less than $5000. For women, a rarely used Cartier Tank is about $3500 or, to make a very subtle statement, a vintage a Jaeger LeCoultre Reverso is about $10,000. You can buy new gold knot cuff links from Brooks Brothers ($95) or if you’re a bit light on the classic curve or silver knot from Cuffed.com.au ($25). Big jewellery is bad. Small is good.

“Whereas men have been able to rely on an easily recognisable uniform — the suit and tie — women have no standardised garment to hide behind,” Golbin says.

Robb Young’s Power Dressing: First Ladies, Women Politicians & Fashion traces powerful women’s dress styles back to Egypt’s Queen Hatshepsut, the first woman pharaoh. Hatse, he writes, “sat on her throne bare-chested, wearing a shendyt kilt, a false-metal beard and a head dress resplendent with a cobra-headed ornament”. She probably wasn’t a big chance for the Westpac board.

Men and women climbing to the top in big organisations suffer from the same problem. The men and women who will judge you will make up their mind about whether you are a winner or loser in milliseconds. The sad fact of life is the more you are like me, or what I consider myself to be, the more I will like you. Evolution has taught us to use cues like facial bone structure and dress to determine very quickly if you are part of my tribe.

That’s not great news for individuals but, as the British Psychological Society recently pointed out in its summary of the science of first impressions, people who make more eye contact are perceived as more intelligent, faster speakers are judged to be more competent, the same job candidate in formal wear will be more likely to earn a higher salary and win promotion, smartness and the appearance of wealth brings influence and smiles are a sign of social status. Finally if you are a risk-taker, Harvard’s Silvia Bellezza says breaking out a little like wearing colourful socks or red heels can say you are competent, smarter or have higher status IF people think you are doing it on purpose.