Navigating the Nuances of Business Casual: Insights for Modern Consultants
Exploring the intricate relationship between attire and professional identity within the consulting industry, this episode delves into the evolution of dress codes in the wake of significant societal shifts, particularly the transition from formality to casualness. The discussion navigates through historical contexts, emphasizing how earlier conventions dictated that consultants donned suits to emulate authority and professionalism. As the narrative unfolds, it becomes evident that the rise of the tech sector and the subsequent cultural transformations have compelled consultants to adapt their wardrobes, fostering a newfound appreciation for comfort and individuality. We reflect on the implications of remote work and virtual interactions, where visual presentation has taken on a different importance, reshaping the standards of professionalism in the post-pandemic era. Additionally, insights from female colleagues provide a nuanced perspective on the challenges and expectations women face in professional attire, enriching the dialogue around identity and expression in the workplace. Ultimately, the episode articulates the critical balance between personal comfort, professional expectations, and the ongoing evolution of dress codes in consulting, culminating in practical advice for navigating this dynamic landscape.
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Transcript
Foreign for Humans, a podcast all about life in consulting.
Speaker A:You're with Ian and Mike, and in each episode, we'll be shining a light on a new topic that helps us get to the heart of what makes consultants happy and successful.
Speaker B:On the Consulting for Humans podcast, it's our mission to add just a little more humanity to the lives of consultants.
Speaker B:We also love to bring some of the skills and perspectives of consulting to human lives, too.
Speaker B:Ian, what are we humans going to be talking about in today's episode?
Speaker A:Well, Mike, today we're going to be talking about the relationship between consultants, their clothes.
Speaker A:Is there such a thing in consulting in the 21st century as dressing for success?
Speaker A:We're going to talk about the history of consultants and our clothes, going back to the days of formality and looking at the way we've had this shift to a more casual dress to a more casual way of dressing.
Speaker B:Great.
Speaker B:And we're going to talk a bit about matching culture and identity.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:That way that we try to dress for our environment, dress for our office colleagues, dress for clients.
Speaker A:We're going to get some insights today as well, from the other 50% of the planets, the one that, unlike you and me, Mike, weren't born male.
Speaker A:We're going to talk a little bit about what that might mean for women.
Speaker A:We've got some perspectives coming from our colleagues Tish and Moffe.
Speaker A:And then finally, Mike, we're going to talk about the kind of mistakes that people get warned about when they're preparing for a consulting job interview and maybe try and turn those into some rules for success.
Speaker A:If you're going to mix with humans with clothes on in your consulting life, which I surely hope you will, then what should you be looking out for?
Speaker A:There's plenty for us to talk about.
Speaker B:Right, well, plenty for us to talk about and a topic I feel absolutely confident about addressing today because you can't see us.
Speaker A:Excellent.
Speaker A:Naked from the waist down.
Speaker A:No, maybe not excellent, Mike.
Speaker A:Before the show, we were looking at articles that we found in a few different places.
Speaker A: And back in: Speaker A:Here.
Speaker A:It says that life in the old days, and you and I are well qualified to talk about the old days.
Speaker A:Life in the old days used to be relatively straightforward.
Speaker A:People would show up at work wearing formal clothes.
Speaker A:And in general, the smarter the better, the more status the better.
Speaker A:And in traditional offices, in traditional consulting offices, the people at the top of the pyramid would be found in a suit and people wanting to emulate Those at the top of the pyramid would also be found in a suit dressing for the job that they wanted.
Speaker A:And that meant emulating this very formal style.
Speaker A:But that was then, right?
Speaker B:It was then, Ian.
Speaker B:And I remember it was fascinating because at the this time, back in those good old days, I could go back further, but I won't that we very much had a look for consulting.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:And my move into IBM and IBM consulting was no different because boy, IBM absolutely had a look.
Speaker B:And so it was interesting when we get to that nuance about how do you look a little different?
Speaker B:Because it was hard to say, but as you said, you dressed for success.
Speaker B:And we had a real easy rule of thumb when you're going to client sites, you dress just a little bit better.
Speaker B:Now, when you were going to Louis Vuitton, that was hard to do.
Speaker A:But otherwise we had the rise of the tech sector that got in the way of this idea of formality.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:That you and I both remember.
Speaker A:We're going to work in the 90s, encountering people working in tech, people out of Silicon Valley, jeans and hoodies and black turtlenecks.
Speaker A:I mean, that stuff was never written about in a memo to all staff.
Speaker A:But it was understood, right, that there are going to be some clients where when you encounter them, you, you might need to go down to their level of casual rather than up to your level of formal.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:I remember walking into a client's site, this was a client in the, let's just call it the entertainment business.
Speaker B:And they would actually cut off your tie if you forgot and wore it into their office.
Speaker B:So they definitely did not want what they called any strings around the neck.
Speaker B:But this idea, like you're talking about, Ian, of nobody gives you this written.
Speaker B:Well, some firms had written dress codes, but nobody actually coached you about that quite so much.
Speaker B:But it was very much understood as vitally important.
Speaker B:I remember getting the big kind of wake up call about how important this is in one of the first super high level meetings between Apple and IBM for a big deal.
Speaker B:There had not been much of an interaction between those two.
Speaker B:And interestingly, walking into the room on one side is, as you say, a bunch of people in black turtlenecks.
Speaker B:Walking into the other side is a lot of people in gray and dark suits and white shirts.
Speaker B:The interesting fact is all the Apple people had dressed as IBMers and all the IBMers had dressed as Apple people.
Speaker B:That's how important everybody saw it.
Speaker A:Excellent.
Speaker A:If only somebody shares an email beforehand, right?
Speaker A:So, Mike, we used to think a lot about this and we used to try and think proactively about how we would match our clients.
Speaker A: But then in: Speaker A:But post the pandemic, this widespread switch to remote working really, I think upended work dress codes altogether.
Speaker A:And I saw colleagues from the shoulders up and I could only guess what was going on with the clothing below the, I guess you'd say below the breastbone.
Speaker A:And even then, I think we saw people in their home environment.
Speaker A:They're not necessarily bothering to put on a collared shirt, sometimes wearing a hoodie, certainly for sure, I guess wearing sweatpants and slippers or slides or whatever.
Speaker A:And I'm pretty sure that if the cameras were off, like if there was not an actual conversation taking place, people might even have been under the duvet in their pajamas or heaven knows what.
Speaker A:So I think we've had this big generational shift now from we always care about how we show up to work and it's always a topic through to there are only going to be selected moments in the day when you start to pay attention to how you look.
Speaker A:And it's in a different context.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:We're thinking about how we look on teams calls and on zoom calls.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And it's funny because we did a lot of remote working a couple decades before.
Speaker B:And so this was always if I'm going to be working on a hot desk in an office somewhere, if I'm going to be in my office.
Speaker B:And how I dressed in my office depended a lot on where my office was in the world at the time.
Speaker B:And if I'm going to have clients come visit in the office.
Speaker B:So even when some of our offices had moved to casual Fridays or had moved to more casual in general, everybody always had that suit hung behind the door.
Speaker B:I had one colleague, an engineering consultant who worked in California.
Speaker B:And Tom was really good about having a good notification system.
Speaker B:A lot of heads up because he was kind of emergency brought in consulting.
Speaker B:And he would very quickly move from his surfboard and trunks to his suit to move into a client call.
Speaker B:And over time, he said that got easier and easier.
Speaker A:I can remember talking about different disguises that we all had.
Speaker A:There was a colleague of mine who, like you were saying, had clients in a tech and media business.
Speaker A:He had what he called his convergent media disguise.
Speaker B:Nice.
Speaker A:He had a zip top pullover and he had his piercings.
Speaker A:He didn't just wear them on the weekend, he had them there in the.
Speaker A:In his office locker.
Speaker A:And I also, if I knew I was going to be hanging out with clients of a very old school, British, stuffy engineering type, I had my engineering disguise where I put on a slightly tweedier looking coat and I'd wear my Institute of Mechanical Engineers tie.
Speaker A:So we've always been aware of the benefit of shaping how you look to try and be compatible with a culture or with a place or with a style.
Speaker A:And we'll come back later on to how specific that is to consulting.
Speaker A:The other thing that you just mentioned there, Mike, was business casual.
Speaker A:So what do you remember about the first time you ever got invited to show up to work business casual style?
Speaker B:It was so interesting that business casual meant very different things to very different people.
Speaker B:And so there was always, again, that even when clients would say, you could be casual to understand what casual meant for them, casual certainly meant something different again in different cities, in different cultures, in different industries.
Speaker B:I remember, like your convergent media thing, we had a lawyer in one turnaround when we were working in the music industry in music retailing.
Speaker B:And that lawyer would literally on the Learjet, change from his New York self to his LA self and then back again as we were going through some pretty heavy negotiations here at.
Speaker B:His ponytail is either out or in, suit inside, either on or open, with jewelry at the neck.
Speaker B:Pierced ears are either in or out.
Speaker B:And it was like a complete Superman transformation, depending which way we were going across the country.
Speaker A:So it's funny, I think somebody somewhere might have invented the idea of Casual Friday with the intention that it's freeing that we have this great liberation experience.
Speaker A:I can turn up however the heck I want, but I don't know a single consultant who genuinely showed up to work however the heck they wanted.
Speaker A:We were all still trying to adopt a disguise.
Speaker A:I can think of work I did with strategy consultants who would show off a casual Friday, of course, wearing khakis and boat shoes, but also wearing a dress shirt with a wide pointed collar and French cuffs and cufflinks, because we just couldn't get into the idea that you can dress how you want to feel.
Speaker A:Now, maybe that's a deficiency of our generation, and maybe anybody who is in the first 10 years of their career rather than in the last 15 years of their career, maybe has a more healthy attitude to this and is a bit more free and a bit more expressive about how they dress.
Speaker A:But I think there's some quite deep seated insecurity that we have about wanting to look like we fit in or wanting to look like we fit in just enough.
Speaker B: And it's interesting, even in: Speaker B:Again, still that nuance.
Speaker A:Well, I'm going to challenge the business model of the publications as well.
Speaker A:If you see publications who are taking, I don't know, subscription revenue from customers who want to get on in business, then that's one thing.
Speaker A:If those are publications that are taking advertising revenue from Armani, who have the.
Speaker A:The ad on the facing page, then maybe.
Speaker A:Is it in the business pages, Mike, or is it in the style pages?
Speaker B:Well, spot.
Speaker A:And these days, is there a difference?
Speaker A:So, Mike, we've been talking about this and having a lot of fun with the idea from the perspective of two guys, right?
Speaker A:We when remembering some similar times in.
Speaker B:In.
Speaker A:In guy corporate dress history.
Speaker A:But I think it's fair to say that we're missing a large amount of the dress for work perspective if we don't get to talk to somebody from the female 50% of the planet.
Speaker A:We spent some time talking to our colleague Tish Baldez and our colleague Mafe Escobar, both of whom noticeably, I've got to say, females.
Speaker A:And we're going to hear all of what they had to say in our Luminaries episode.
Speaker A:But here's a little taste of what happened when we asked Tish and Mafe, how has this changed over your careers from the perspective of the woman.
Speaker A:In the beginning, I was very conscious.
Speaker A:That's because I was climbing my corporate career and I had always been taught it's important how you show up, how you look.
Speaker A:People make judgments how you look when you show up, if your hair is a mess, if your clothes are sloppy.
Speaker A:I'm not saying they're fair.
Speaker A:I'm not saying they're appropriate.
Speaker A:I'm just saying people still make those judgments.
Speaker C:Once someone said to me, you want them to pay attention to what you're saying and to the conversation and not paying attention to your earrings or the way you're dressing.
Speaker C:I remember my first job in consulting.
Speaker C:I went the weekend before I joined to buy clothes because I was in university.
Speaker C:I did have some formal clothes, more business clothes, but not that much.
Speaker C:So I bought a lot of things that I saw people wearing in business.
Speaker C:But then when I worked it, I felt very uncomfortable because it wasn't me.
Speaker C:So I Bought some suits that didn't suit me and I didn't feel comfortable in those clothes.
Speaker C:So I think I wore them like twice.
Speaker C:Only I tried to put a little bit of my personality as well, because I think it's almost a way of introducing yourself and showing yourself to the world.
Speaker C:So I tend to use a little bit of that as well.
Speaker B:Ian, one thing I found fascinating is that not only have we had this post pandemic and everything, but we are still very much in an era of zoom and teams and various and sundry ways of connecting over screens.
Speaker B:So what do you think?
Speaker A:I don't know for sure, but I think I notice that people are.
Speaker A:If they're trying to brand themselves or they're trying to stand out, I think consultants and people in workplaces are following the lead of people who are talking heads on TVs.
Speaker A:If you look at people who are Talking heads on TVs, they try and differentiate themselves with funky eyeglasses or a funky haircut or a beard, mostly for the guys, I've got to say, a baseball hat with a memorable logo.
Speaker A:Is there anybody in US Politics who's made a big deal out of a memorable hat with a logo hat?
Speaker B:Can't think of anybody at the moment.
Speaker A:And that's because, of course, on TV you're seen from the breastbone up.
Speaker A:And maybe we're seeing a bit of that.
Speaker A:People paying attention to not only hair, fancy glasses with fancy frames, maybe the odd facial tattoo or piercing if you want to be super memorable.
Speaker A:Maybe also people being more aware of how they look on a screen than how they look in person.
Speaker A:If I think of anybody that's in my personal network, whoever they are, Mike, I'm going to say even you, I've seen more of your face on teams and Zoom and in screenshots on LinkedIn and social media than I have face to face.
Speaker A:And you and I are sitting right here now in the same room, and it's a complete rarity, right?
Speaker B:It is.
Speaker A:And it's still relatively rare that we are with our colleagues together and our clients together, but we think probably that they have their idea of us from photographed and videoed images of us rather than in person images of us.
Speaker A:So I don't know.
Speaker A:Are there lessons from dress and coloring consultants about how to look good on camera and what colors worked under a tungsten light and what colors work on an RGB camera?
Speaker A:I don't know if anybody knows out there.
Speaker A:Get hold of the show.
Speaker A:Tell us your thoughts.
Speaker B:And it's interesting to me too.
Speaker B:That I think the advice that I always received and I think that I always gave was pay attention to what the people around you are wearing, both in terms of clients, in terms of the offices, and be sensitive about that.
Speaker B:But now I talk to colleagues and people who got hired over zoom, people who have really hardly ever met their teams because they work remotely.
Speaker B:So I don't think they know how they dress in real life, if you will, other than on screen.
Speaker B:So this difference becomes a difference that does make a difference.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:We don't know how tall our colleagues are, whether they wear an elasticated waist or a belt.
Speaker A:It's still a minefield.
Speaker A:It's still an emerging picture.
Speaker A:It must still be a challenge for people who are coming into the industry or beginning.
Speaker A:And it's still a question being asked online.
Speaker A:As we see when we go looking online, what should I wear at an interview?
Speaker A:What are some of the mistakes that people make, Mike?
Speaker A:And what are some of the things that we can do to make sure we don't drop into any of these fashion faux pas as consultants?
Speaker B:I think some of this advice is just fundamental advice, but interestingly, some of it applies on screens, and some of it does not.
Speaker B:I will tell you one that stands out in my mind because memories are often encoded in smell.
Speaker B:A smell can evoke a memory.
Speaker B:And this has been, for me over the years, I think, a cardinal rule that applies to men and women with very strong fragrances.
Speaker B:And you actually, I think, taught me about this one time you said, when your look, when anything about you diverts the attention of your peers, of your leaders, most importantly of your clients, that's something that we got to pay attention to.
Speaker B:And one poignant moment in this was a person that I actually had to let go.
Speaker A:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker B:And I was told specifically by the CEO, that person needs to go.
Speaker B:And it was over work behavior.
Speaker B:It was a series of mistakes that had not been corrected.
Speaker B:However, this person was associated with a very strong fragrance.
Speaker B:And in my own mind, I really wanted to tear apart what had this.
Speaker B:This strong presence done in terms of either getting them more into the flow of what was being done there and working with everybody.
Speaker B:And what detracted from that so clearly attracted.
Speaker B:So one forever rule is, so the first time I'm coming together, person to person, with clients.
Speaker B:The first time I'm coming together with my peers.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Let me keep that in mind.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:You want to be poignant, but not pungent.
Speaker B:There you go.
Speaker B:Well done, Ian.
Speaker A:So we've talked about dealing with distractions.
Speaker A:We talked about dealing with aroma and fragrance.
Speaker A:What other tips have we got?
Speaker B:Well, one that I think is fascinating and it encompasses a number of things.
Speaker B:And I'm thinking specifically about people that I've seen coming for job interviews and doing that and people who have really made themselves uncomfortable by their dress.
Speaker B:And I think one of the reasons it sticks out with me is because I remember doing this many eons ago.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Once upon a time, I only had one suit and it was my first interview out of university and it was the middle of the summer and it was, you know, boiling hot and I wore that one wool suit and it was a tragic mistake.
Speaker B:Still got the job, but I did melt.
Speaker B:And I find this in crazy things, in shoes, in clothing, where people are clearly making an effort to dress for success, if you will, but that, that dressing for success clearly hindered their state of being during the full day of interviews and cases.
Speaker A:I think that's a good sign that you've overshot.
Speaker A:Sign one that you've overshot is, are you just way more formal?
Speaker A:You're more than, more than one, much more formal than everybody else.
Speaker A:And the second one, is it making you uncomfortable?
Speaker A:And that might mean how tight fitting your collar or your belt is.
Speaker A:That might mean shoes wear shoes that you feel comfortable in that you can kind of sit and stand and move around in without it being agony for you.
Speaker A:As a, as a gentleman of the middle aged persuasion, I can say that in clothing choices, Lycra is your friend.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:But again, if it becomes a distraction to you, the discomfort is so acute, you're not going to do a great job, you're not going to be at your ease, you're not going to be.
Speaker B:Doing your best work, flipping that a little bit on its head.
Speaker B:And I guess there's also that idea that says we can take comfort, we can take our own.
Speaker B:Hey, that's who I am, it's how I am.
Speaker B:And, well, I'll take a shot at one of my offspring who says, this is the way I dress.
Speaker B:And I think, all right, that sounds like a naive thing.
Speaker B:However, I have encountered this.
Speaker B:So I want to say that there's something to be said for authenticity.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:There's certainly something to be said for a personal brand.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And we'll talk more in luminaries about sometimes there's something to be said for standing out in particular cases, but you don't want to stand out for your overdressing and you don't want to stand out for your informality.
Speaker B:By casual, we mean a style of Clothing, not the state of your clothing.
Speaker A:Not your state of mind.
Speaker A:There's a school of dressing that's dopamine dressing.
Speaker A:Dressing for absolutely how you want to feel for the day.
Speaker A:I think if you're at home, I think that's just great.
Speaker A:We're being conservative here, Mike, but I think we're being conservative with a forgivable rationale, which is let your work drive the choices that you make.
Speaker A:Because if you're comfortable and if you're at ease and you could be authentic when you're thinking and writing and talking and dealing with your client, then all of those things will probably go well.
Speaker A:If any of those things is overconscious and is a distraction either for you or the client, then we should probably try and smooth it away.
Speaker A:Especially when we're on screen, Especially when we're there in person.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:For people who are struggling with this and going, okay, this is Mike and Ian.
Speaker B:You're giving us the far ends.
Speaker B:Informational interviewing is your friend that chance to get in situ, get in and among the kinds of people that you're looking to work with and to find out then in real time how they dress.
Speaker B:And that's a great question to have on those informational interviews.
Speaker B:Who can you tag and connect to?
Speaker B:And there's, as Ian said, so many of us are all available on so many media channels now.
Speaker B:You can get some ideas even without necessarily being right there and present.
Speaker A:Excellent.
Speaker A:And Mike, we're nearly up on our time here and I want to just say a quick few words about what we'll be talking about in luminaries.
Speaker A:Like you said, we're going to be digging into some of the psychology and some of the individuality and some of the branding opportunities that come with choices that we make about the way that we dress.
Speaker A:We're going to talk some more with Tish and Maffei about their perspective, especially from a woman's perspective, of how dressing attitudes have changed in consulting and what we can do with that.
Speaker A:And we're going to be talking a little bit as well about how dress and uniqueness and status have been researched and written about in the world of business.
Speaker A:So I think it's going to be a fascinating luminary show this week.
Speaker A:The seven day free trial for luminaries is your friend.
Speaker A:Jump on that and join us.
Speaker A:We'd love to have you with us, Mike.
Speaker A:Final question from me to you.
Speaker A:You and I are going to be together in the same room with some colleagues today and with clients tomorrow.
Speaker A:Tell me one or two things that are on your mind as you're reaching into the wardrobe tomorrow morning?
Speaker B:Well, a huge thing that's on my mind is standing on my feet all day become a bit of an issue.
Speaker B:So I've had to go more and more shoes wise to the things that really give me stability and support to be able to do that comfortably.
Speaker B:Unfortunately, none of these look like the kinds of shoes that my clients I'm sure, will have on.
Speaker B:So there's a bit of a.
Speaker B:Even after years and years of this, a bit of that.
Speaker B:How do I do this?
Speaker B:How do I pull this off?
Speaker B:And as we'll talk about in luminaries, can I become the exception that works, or am I going to be the exception that says he missed the memo?
Speaker A:Ah, Mike, like so many things in consulting, it comes down to a bit of self knowledge.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And a bit of self awareness.
Speaker A:I'm going to wish both of us good luck for tomorrow.
Speaker B:Right, well, we're looking forward to the good luck that you're having in your career as you move forward in consulting, and we look forward to joining you next time on the Consulting for Humans podcast.
