September 3, 2008
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Relativity
Everything is relative.
When I was working at a big law firm in New York, we wore true business casual - dress pants, nice shoes, nice shirts, sweaters or blazers, and so on, and we were glad that we didn't have to wear suits to work every day. When I moved to Europe, the NGO where I worked called the dress code business casual, but in reality we wore everything except for jeans, printed t-shirts, shorts, sneakers, and flip-flops, except for on Fridays, when we could dress all the way down, and we were glad we didn't have to wear fancy pants. Now, the legal department where I work also calls the dress code business casual, but we wear everything - jeans, shorts, sneakers, flip-flops, t-shirts, anything goes as long as we don't look like complete bums, and we're glad that we don't have to wear anything different than what we wear on weekends or at home.
The other week, a friend who works at the same company, but primarily with software engineers, commented that coming to our building, which is all lawyers and business people, is strange, because "everyone's wearing pants." She clarified, saying that it isn't that the engineers run around in the nude, it's just that they tend to roll into work in whatever they pick up first - grubby shorts, holey jeans, pajama bottoms - anything goes.
No wonder we make fun of the engineers.
Comments (5)
Hahaha!
One of the many things I'm thankful for in my employment history is that I haven't worked a suit job in 14 years. My current job is the most conservatively dressed job I've had since the suit job. There's no official dress code, but I haven't met a single person in the company (80+ people in our office) who has unnaturally colored hair, visible tattoos, or visible piercings anywhere except ears. Weird.
I think I may be the only person who wears t-shirts with things printed on them on a regular basis. And yes, I feel that it's part of my duty as an engineer to uphold the eccentric engineer image
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So you are wearing at the office what you wear when you are home? Well, flip-flops only if they are leather (at least for guys) and at least we (males) are supposed to wear fancy pants. - Funny is that while workign at the law firm I was the only one wearing Jeans and T-shirts (with and without prints) at the office (if I did not have to go to court of course) and feel that I have to dress up more since I am here haah.
Don't make fun of the engineers. They really don't care =)
And holey jeans? Looks like they dress worse than most college kids!
Where I work, business casual is "no shorts, unless you really want to and they are in decent shape". I always wear jeans or pants and have some kind of a collar... but that's because I don't really feel right going to work dressed like it's home. It's a nice feeling to come home and dress down.
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