Wearing casual clothes in the office signals you just can’t be bothered
Slowly, lazily, the boundaries blur, the elasticated waistband gives a little, then a bit more – until people forget whether they’re working hard or hardly working
The news that almost a third of workers want to ditch formal dress codes when they return to the office should provoke unease – not just among employers, but among those currently reclining in cargo shorts, without a care in the world.
Why? Because casual clothes in the office betray a distinct sense of “I can’t be bothered”. The reason why we dress up for work is the same reason why most home-workers sit at desks or the kitchen table rather than tapping away at their laptops on the sofa, why we sit upright to attention; it strengthens our sinews, it’s a shot of espresso telling our head to get in the game.
It’s why many a working-fromhome old-timer will tell you that they learnt years ago to put on proper clothes in the morning, why a priority in getting a homeless person a job is the purchase of a formal outfit. A suit for men and the equivalent office-wear for women signals professionalism, composure and intent: “I’m here, I can do this.” If your body is in work mode, it’s fair to assume your head is, too.
In the first few months of lockdown, plenty of people continued to wear freshly ironed shirts and the like when working from home. Gradually, many will attest, such discipline slipped.
And casualness in dress can contaminate other aspects of your behaviour. If you can wear pyjamas when addressing your boss on Zoom, why not roll out of bed straight on to your desk at nine on the dot? Why not mute that conference call when no one is watching you? Slowly, lazily, the boundaries blur, the elasticated waistband gives a little, then a bit more – until people forget whether they’re working hard or hardly working.
If you had to take a guess, the almost 10 per cent of those surveyed who want to wear flip flops into the office would be the type to flip-flop in their jobs – leaning back to take a phone call from a disconcerted client as they flit between Facebook and solitaire, distractedly mumbling: “Um, I’m not sure, let me just….”
The injustice is that they make those turning up suited and booted feel foolish, as though they’re trying too hard.
It’s funny that tailored clothing should be seen as stuffy and old-fashioned – when their crisp, sharp lines imbue a youthful slickness, unlike the slouchiness of fleece and flannel. I have worked in “disruptive” start-up companies that parade perks like a T-shirt dress code – only to find that its purpose seems more to distract from the most toxic, misogynistic of cultures. How could we treat women poorly when we wear jeans to work? Dominic Cummings, meanwhile, appeared to use the casualness of his dress to signal that he was a maverick. To others, it just seemed to signal that he was working not for the country but for himself.
Making work serious means we can make the rest of our life unserious. Why wouldn’t we work into dinnertime if we’re wearing the same outfit? Those wanting casual dress in the office want a “dress-down Friday” every day. But when it’s Friday everyday, the weekend never comes.