Speaker 1: From executive search to talent strategy, leadership development, rewards and
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Speaker 1: potential of your people, so you can take your business
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Speaker 1: Ferry dot com slash up. There's this notion that the
Speaker 1: office dress code is going away. Offices are becoming more
Speaker 1: casual and the variety of things people can wear is increasing.
Speaker 1: But we're wondering if the dress code still exists, but
Speaker 1: maybe in a different form. This is game plan. Welcome
Speaker 1: to game Plan. I'm Rebecca Greenfield, a reporter at Bloomberg,
Speaker 1: where I cover the workplace, and I am Sam Grosbart.
Speaker 1: I am a writer at Bloomberg Business Week magazine. This
Speaker 1: week we're talking about the office dress code, what you
Speaker 1: wear to work. There was an article that came out
Speaker 1: in The New York Times earlier this year that declared
Speaker 1: the end of the office code and said that everything
Speaker 1: is confusing and up for grabs. Now, can I make
Speaker 1: a snap judgment on that horse hockey? That's a weird phrase.
Speaker 1: The point the article is making is it's looking around
Speaker 1: offices and saying, you know, maybe fifteen years ago, business
Speaker 1: casual rained, and people were wearing khakis and buttondowns, and
Speaker 1: women had to wear more formal clothing. And now you
Speaker 1: look around offices and even here at Bloomberg, and there's
Speaker 1: a huge variety of what people wear. Some people are
Speaker 1: in jeans and a blouse, some people do dress up.
Speaker 1: Some people, like the developers at certain offices, where really
Speaker 1: really casual jeans and T shirts and tiva's and socks.
Speaker 1: And part of that has to do with what those
Speaker 1: people do for a living. Obviously, if you sit at
Speaker 1: your desk all day, never really interact with a client
Speaker 1: a customer, your job is entirely internal. Take those developers
Speaker 1: you were just mentioning, well, then it really doesn't altogether
Speaker 1: matter what you wear as long as you get your
Speaker 1: tasks done, you get done on time, you get them
Speaker 1: done effectively. But if you're in a sales position, something
Speaker 1: that happens in this building, or you are a lawyer
Speaker 1: and you're going to court, or you have clients, or
Speaker 1: you have accounts that you're visiting, then your personal appearance
Speaker 1: is probably a little bit more important. You're representing your firm,
Speaker 1: you're representing yourself. It's another tool you have to well
Speaker 1: what all business people are trying to do. Get money
Speaker 1: from something, convince people you're worth paying for. So I
Speaker 1: read a story last year about an accounting firm, Crow
Speaker 1: Horror Wath that updated their address code policy. So accounting
Speaker 1: is a pretty old school, i'd say industry where they
Speaker 1: do have more formal address codes because it's in client services,
Speaker 1: and they updated it with something that's called address for
Speaker 1: your Day policy. So it's like, if you are seeing
Speaker 1: someone that day, you need to dress in a way
Speaker 1: that reflects that client and what they would want. But
Speaker 1: sometimes in accounting you are sitting in front of an
Speaker 1: Excel spreadsheet, I presume, and so you could dress more casual.
Speaker 1: They stilled rules you couldn't wear leggings to the office
Speaker 1: or sneakers, but it was under any circumstance. Yeah. Right.
Speaker 1: It was a huge deal for that industry, But also
Speaker 1: is reflective a little bit of this. It's still not
Speaker 1: a dress code. It's more up to you. It's about
Speaker 1: what your work is. You have to figure out what
Speaker 1: to do well. And that also seems to correspond to
Speaker 1: some common sense. Again, if you're going to visit a client,
Speaker 1: you're not going to wear your stained Philadelphia eagle sweatshirt.
Speaker 1: But if you are coming to the office and you
Speaker 1: know that you're basically going to be in there all
Speaker 1: day and you're gonna be sitting in front of your computer, yes,
Speaker 1: perhaps a polo shirt and a pair of jeans is
Speaker 1: more than adequate for you to complete your job. And
Speaker 1: I think employees really like that because I don't know.
Speaker 1: As an employee, I like being treated as someone who
Speaker 1: can make good decisions on my own where yes, but
Speaker 1: but but you know, employers don't always feel that way.
Speaker 1: There are accounting firms that one accounting firm I believe
Speaker 1: has business formal Well, you know, I will say this much.
Speaker 1: There is something very easy about a strong dress code.
Speaker 1: In some respects. It's the fuzzy ones that leave people guessing.
Speaker 1: And maybe there's more room for error because the parameters
Speaker 1: haven't really been defined and so you don't know and
Speaker 1: then you come in and realize, oh God, I went
Speaker 1: too far, or I'm out of sync with the rest
Speaker 1: of the room, or what have you. That sort of
Speaker 1: illusion of liberty can also breed a certain degree of anxiety. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think that's one thing that the article does
Speaker 1: get right. That New York Times article and to speak
Speaker 1: to that anxiety, I want to bring up a friend
Speaker 1: of mine. She's in her late twenties and just started
Speaker 1: on the tenure professor track at a university, and she's
Speaker 1: been thinking a lot about her dress code because again,
Speaker 1: that's not an institution that has a formal dress code obviously,
Speaker 1: and then she had just been a grad student. Then
Speaker 1: you know, grad students where pajamas, and she loves huge clubs,
Speaker 1: and she's been thinking a lot about how she wants
Speaker 1: to signal that she's not a guy student and she
Speaker 1: is a professor, so she's dressing up more. That makes sense.
Speaker 1: So there's no office dress code, but she's still dressing formally, right,
Speaker 1: She's using her clothing to help her achieve something. And
Speaker 1: that's what I think hasn't changed with this article doesn't
Speaker 1: quite get at, which is like, yes, there's no specific,
Speaker 1: codified uniform, but people are putting on uniforms, maybe now
Speaker 1: more than ever, to signal who they are, what they do,
Speaker 1: and what their clothing says about them. And that's what
Speaker 1: our guests are going to talk about today. Today we
Speaker 1: have a little bit of a different format. We talked
Speaker 1: to three different people who work in three different industries
Speaker 1: about how they use their clothing to signal who they
Speaker 1: are at work. Our first guest is Carrie Goldberg. She
Speaker 1: is a lawyer here in New York who often operates
Speaker 1: in the shlubby confines of the New York State Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: I was drawn to Carry because I read about her
Speaker 1: in the New Yorker. They had a great profile of
Speaker 1: her work. She defends revenge porn victims. But they had
Speaker 1: this paragraph in there that talked about how her industry
Speaker 1: tends to be schlumpy. But she stood out because of
Speaker 1: the way she dressed, and she would wear five inch
Speaker 1: heels and mini dresses and trench coats, and as we learned,
Speaker 1: we talked to her a lot of leather, and I
Speaker 1: thought that that was really striking details. So that's why
Speaker 1: we have around today. How would you describe your work look?
Speaker 1: I would describe my work look as sort of Axl
Speaker 1: Rose meets Olivia Pope meets manic pixie dream girl. Maybe
Speaker 1: like glam goth lawyer geek. Okay, I'm getting that's a
Speaker 1: very clear picture. I think if you obviously you can't
Speaker 1: see Carry right now, but now you have a very
Speaker 1: strong idea what would be a typical outfit that would
Speaker 1: live up to that description. I always like to have leather,
Speaker 1: so there's always leather coat or leather leggings. I like
Speaker 1: long nails, sharp eyelashes, stiletto heels, like like a lot
Speaker 1: of stabbing things in my look. How long have you
Speaker 1: been practicing law? I've been a lawyer since two thousand seven,
Speaker 1: so nine years. Have you always dressed this way? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So my first job was as a housing court attorney
Speaker 1: representing low income tenants that were being evicted. And there
Speaker 1: was this really glamorous landlord tenant attorney named Carmen. Who
Speaker 1: I mean it was. It was just this really schlubby
Speaker 1: environment housing court is, and but Carmen was this like
Speaker 1: blonde bombshell that would wear Chanel and really stood out.
Speaker 1: And I was like, oh, everyone who knew who Carmen was?
Speaker 1: And I was like, oh, maybe I could be like
Speaker 1: the you know, low income tenant attorney version of Carmen.
Speaker 1: I didn't like totally emulate Carmen or anything like that,
Speaker 1: but I just I kind of made my own version
Speaker 1: of that. And it helps you know, if you're a
Speaker 1: new attorney or new at anything, it helps to have
Speaker 1: a look just to make yourself like kind of memorable
Speaker 1: beyond being memorable? Is there a reason why you addressed
Speaker 1: this way for the type of alaw you practice. I
Speaker 1: represent victims of online harassment, sexual sult so always my
Speaker 1: clients are people who are under attack, So there is
Speaker 1: sort of an armor to the clothes I wear. I
Speaker 1: feel more protected and protective if I'm in something something
Speaker 1: like leather or something something sharp, like sharp heels or
Speaker 1: something that that it could become an attack weapon, which
Speaker 1: I've never had to use in a court environment, but
Speaker 1: that was pre existing before I. Before I started my
Speaker 1: law of practice, I dressed like this already. How do
Speaker 1: you think the judges perceive you and what you wear?
Speaker 1: Do you think about that? I should think about that.
Speaker 1: I don't really care that much. If I ever thought
Speaker 1: that how I looked was going to have a negative
Speaker 1: impact on my client, I would absolutely scale it back.
Speaker 1: And I'm not showing up to court and lingerie and
Speaker 1: and Stiletto's. I'm I'm in business attire. It's just got
Speaker 1: a bit of an edge. And what about your clients?
Speaker 1: How do you think your clients perceived the way you look?
Speaker 1: I think they like to feel that they're being protected
Speaker 1: by somebody that has a vision and has preferences and opinions,
Speaker 1: and that can really be conveyed very easily through clothing
Speaker 1: and how somebody looks. And if if somebody looks put
Speaker 1: together and like they're making deliberate decisions just in something
Speaker 1: as basic as you know what shirt and choose and
Speaker 1: watch their wearing, then there's an assumption that that translates
Speaker 1: to other strategic decisions as well. Kry, I want to
Speaker 1: ask you a question as if I were a recent
Speaker 1: law school grad about to embark on a legal career
Speaker 1: and I come to you as sort of a mentor
Speaker 1: and ask you how should I dress for my profession?
Speaker 1: Do you have an overall philosophy of how your clothing
Speaker 1: works within your profession. I think the most important thing
Speaker 1: is to dress for confidence and not for comfort. People
Speaker 1: often like conflate confidence with comfort, and I just don't
Speaker 1: think you need to feel comfortable too in what you're wearing.
Speaker 1: You know you're not going to be wearing your eyes atoners,
Speaker 1: slippers and fleece long John's to court. You know you're
Speaker 1: not going to feel confident that you have to like
Speaker 1: feel like you look good. Well, it's like a power
Speaker 1: Suit R version of the power Suit basically yeah, and
Speaker 1: like it's super or a costume. I definitely feel like
Speaker 1: when I'm in core or when I need to be
Speaker 1: particularly on, I'm putting a costume on, and it's like
Speaker 1: it's getting me into the mindset that I need to
Speaker 1: be on. Carry is clearly a firm believer in the
Speaker 1: work uniform or like costume. I think she. I mean,
Speaker 1: as she sort of described in the interview, you know,
Speaker 1: she uses artifice and she uses sort of the weaponry
Speaker 1: of clothing to put forth a particular image about herself,
Speaker 1: even at the expense. I thought quite interestingly of comfort, right,
Speaker 1: And it's clearly working for her because she wins and
Speaker 1: has become very high profile. But it's also something she chooses.
Speaker 1: And for our next guest, we talked to somebody who
Speaker 1: doesn't quite get to choose what she wears to work.
Speaker 1: Shantiana Bowers is currently a salesperson at the Stephen Allen
Speaker 1: Boutique in Tribeca here in New York, and before that
Speaker 1: she worked at Madewell. To places that have very specific
Speaker 1: ideas of how you should dress. How would you describe
Speaker 1: your work look? Okay, so I have to be a
Speaker 1: bit cool. Basically, my coworkers and I we all kind
Speaker 1: of had an unspoken understanding about which one of us
Speaker 1: hid twitch points um my current stories, Steven Allen. They
Speaker 1: do a lot of basics that are slightly elevated, so
Speaker 1: we all have to find our own angle. For me,
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit quirky but still quite tailored, so
Speaker 1: a lot of button downs under sweaters with like a
Speaker 1: pleated slack or something, but really funny looking socks and
Speaker 1: like low Oxfords. You said that you kind of negotiate
Speaker 1: this with your colleagues, so other people take on different approaches,
Speaker 1: different sort of interpretations. Yes, we're all basically whatever store
Speaker 1: that we worked that version of ourselves, So Ed Madewell,
Speaker 1: I was still like kind of relaxed, cool girl Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: but I'm also like an actual New Yorker, So it
Speaker 1: would be like Timbaland's but not really because we can't
Speaker 1: actually wear Timbalands there. But yeah, so, can you tell
Speaker 1: us about some of the rules that these retail stores
Speaker 1: have made well wear their rules that you have to
Speaker 1: abide by. Oh, totally, but it's mostly dress the look.
Speaker 1: You don't actually have to buy it. For a lot
Speaker 1: of the retail stores, so they encourage us to buy
Speaker 1: it with different sentives to get different things. They have
Speaker 1: contests to keep up moral and things like that. But
Speaker 1: what you really have to do is look at the collection,
Speaker 1: look at what you have. Make it work so you
Speaker 1: can sell this product to customers instead of them coming
Speaker 1: in and being like, hey, you look really cool, but
Speaker 1: you obviously don't shop here. We heard a rumor, I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is true. Somebody on our show
Speaker 1: said that people at Madewell have to wear a certain
Speaker 1: amount of layers. Yes, really, what so what is that role?
Speaker 1: So the layering rule works if you don't have a collar,
Speaker 1: you need to have a jacket. But it's not nearly
Speaker 1: as strict as j Cruise. I'm gonna just put that
Speaker 1: out there. Yeah, Ja Cruise is like and blazer and
Speaker 1: Scott and like it's and top hat and please, you
Speaker 1: are the most tailored man in the world. If you're
Speaker 1: working at is there a big difference between the clothes
Speaker 1: you wear to work and the clothes you wear when
Speaker 1: you're not at work? Um, when I worked at made
Speaker 1: well no, now, yes, okay, how would you describe the difference.
Speaker 1: I have to be a lot more tailored now than
Speaker 1: I had to before. I could still be relaxed, but
Speaker 1: it's a lot more pants instead of jeans or a
Speaker 1: fancier sweater than I would normally wear made well, a
Speaker 1: little less all around casual, a little bit more elevated casual,
Speaker 1: like a nice a shoe. It's interesting to hear you
Speaker 1: talk about how they want you to have pick your
Speaker 1: personal style but then also conformed to the storre. So
Speaker 1: I liked when you were talking about, Yeah, like normally,
Speaker 1: like your Brooklyn so you would wear Timberlands, but like,
Speaker 1: you can't wear Temberlands it made well, So you have
Speaker 1: to conform to that. So how do you, I guess,
Speaker 1: how do you negotiate that? Really? You wait and see
Speaker 1: what they're going to collaborate the next you. For me,
Speaker 1: I couldn't wear Timblance, but there was a point in
Speaker 1: time when we started selling Doc Martin's, so I got
Speaker 1: to figure out at my docks and I was super excited.
Speaker 1: Does the way you dress for a particular retailer attract
Speaker 1: a particular kind of customer among your colleagues? Is it
Speaker 1: sort of known or if not expressed, that it's understood, Oh,
Speaker 1: you're dressing for these kinds of people who come in
Speaker 1: and somebody else was dressing for a different kind of
Speaker 1: customer who's coming in. We all try our best to
Speaker 1: work with a variety of customers, but I tend to
Speaker 1: get more men and usually guys who are lawyers who
Speaker 1: need something that they can wear in the office and
Speaker 1: also still express their style. So I'm a person who
Speaker 1: sells a lot of overcoats in like fun but still
Speaker 1: muted colors. Like, why do you think that? What about
Speaker 1: your person? I saw a lot of overcoats and fun
Speaker 1: muted colors totally. Why do you what about your personal
Speaker 1: style do you think attracts that? Um? I really like
Speaker 1: wearing slightly men's wear inspired things, and I think that
Speaker 1: makes guys very comfortable when it comes to dealing with me.
Speaker 1: Some of the other female associates can sometimes seem a
Speaker 1: little bit more, you know, curly, and they have a
Speaker 1: little bit more confidence. Is like, Oh, this girl, I
Speaker 1: can ask her about a perislas. It's so interesting that
Speaker 1: these retailers have very specific rules, but they still want
Speaker 1: their employees to look like they're interpreting them in their
Speaker 1: own individual way, but still in this very specific confine.
Speaker 1: There's also I think a practical issue here, which is
Speaker 1: that the retailers are not prepared financially to outfit all
Speaker 1: of their salespeople with all of the clothing that they need,
Speaker 1: so instead of taking on that cost, they have this
Speaker 1: sort of fuzzier you should dress like you work here,
Speaker 1: but you don't have to use everything we have here
Speaker 1: because we're not going to give it to you. But
Speaker 1: if you want to buy, some kind of goes back
Speaker 1: and forth. But I think you know, interestingly, sometimes it's
Speaker 1: fun to work within those limits. Yeah, a lot of
Speaker 1: creative people in general. I used to interview creative people
Speaker 1: in a former job. They love talking about how limits
Speaker 1: boundaries what makes you creative? Up happens when the power
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Speaker 1: aligning your people to your strategy, attracting, developing, engaging, and
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Speaker 1: get a partner who truly understands people, leadership, and the
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Speaker 1: take your business up. Learn more at corn Ferry dot com.
Speaker 1: Slash up. When it comes to sort of the world
Speaker 1: of creative people and the kinds of clothing that they wear.
Speaker 1: Kim Hashtriter has been observing them for decades. She is
Speaker 1: the co founder of Paper magazine. She's famous in her
Speaker 1: own right for wearing a uniform every single day, variations
Speaker 1: on a theme that she came up with probably about
Speaker 1: years ago, And we got to talk to her about
Speaker 1: her own style and the style that she's been observing
Speaker 1: here in New York and around the world for quite
Speaker 1: some time. How would you describe your work style your
Speaker 1: work word from my work wardrobe. I can't even describe
Speaker 1: my work what I do. So it's like hard to
Speaker 1: describe my work style because my work and my life
Speaker 1: are one thing. So there's no difference in my work
Speaker 1: style and my lifestyle, which is not true for a
Speaker 1: lot of people, right they have one uniform for work
Speaker 1: and then they have a different uniform. And I've always
Speaker 1: been in love with uniforms. So I created a uniform
Speaker 1: for myself twenty years ago and I've worn the same
Speaker 1: thing every day. Yes, it's based on kind of a
Speaker 1: mouse suit, which is my favorite uniform ever. And um,
Speaker 1: I love uniforms generally. I love army uniforms. I love
Speaker 1: peak coats. I love because their design is based on function.
Speaker 1: It's not really decorative to decorative. Really, I don't love
Speaker 1: decorative stuff, although I accessorized. It's sometimes fun to throw
Speaker 1: in some like pizzas in a decoration sense, or to
Speaker 1: make the uniform unique to you. So I can't say
Speaker 1: I hate all decorative things. But also I have a
Speaker 1: very big personality and um, even paper. When we designed paper,
Speaker 1: I wanted it to look generic because what we wrote
Speaker 1: about was really wild and outrageous. And I thought that
Speaker 1: if you had a wild and outrageous design and you
Speaker 1: had wild and outrageous content, it would be like two
Speaker 1: much wouldn't be the right yan yang balance. But if
Speaker 1: you present it in a simple classical way, very wild material,
Speaker 1: it's much more more people can read it and understand it.
Speaker 1: Like the original paper was designed very simply in black
Speaker 1: and white, generic classically. So I've always been a kind
Speaker 1: of I love a yen nin yang and I love um.
Speaker 1: I think when you have outrageous ideas, it's good to
Speaker 1: like package things simply so that you can get your
Speaker 1: ideas across. So I mean, I know it's like abstract
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, but it kind of filters into also
Speaker 1: what I wear. So that's when I just decided one day, okay,
Speaker 1: I went to my friend who used to make suits
Speaker 1: for Steven Sprouse, the designer, and he Steven Sprouse. I
Speaker 1: always loved what he did because his clothes were actually
Speaker 1: very classic and plain, but that he did them in
Speaker 1: like day glow and wild fabrications. So I love that
Speaker 1: kind of um simplicity, but using fabric to kind of
Speaker 1: like make it more interesting. So I went to his Taylor,
Speaker 1: who I was a friend, and I brought my favorite
Speaker 1: jacket in the world was what was this maud style
Speaker 1: jacket that Isaac Mizrahi had designed and I had it
Speaker 1: and it had huge flowers all over, but I loved
Speaker 1: the shape. And I brought my favorite skirt, which was
Speaker 1: the O g Alma motor skirt, and I had my
Speaker 1: friend make patterns of it and together it was kind
Speaker 1: of like my version of a mouse suit. That's what
Speaker 1: I always said. And I had n't first make it
Speaker 1: in the indigo color of mouse suits because just to
Speaker 1: see if it worked and it had actually wearing it today,
Speaker 1: this is a version that Levi's, the company, actually made
Speaker 1: me one where I sent them the pattern and they
Speaker 1: made me one of Levi's because I thought that would
Speaker 1: be cool to have a Levi's version. So when I
Speaker 1: realized I loved it and it was really simple and
Speaker 1: it was just a skirt and this jacket, I decided
Speaker 1: to make it like thirty of them, and I made
Speaker 1: them for daytime. I made them for evening, but they
Speaker 1: were all exactly the same, and they all were simply
Speaker 1: like if you I mean Levi's did it with a snap,
Speaker 1: so it's a little different, but it has a simple
Speaker 1: kind of mouth collar and it's boxing and it has
Speaker 1: two pockets. And um I made linen for summer and
Speaker 1: all different colors and yes in indigo and in black,
Speaker 1: but also in hot pink and turquoise, and then I
Speaker 1: made for winter. I at it in like a beautiful
Speaker 1: I just would get really good fabric and make them,
Speaker 1: and then for dressy I'd make them in taffoda, so
Speaker 1: i'd have a black tie version. But twenty three years
Speaker 1: or so, I've been wearing the same thing. Do you
Speaker 1: ever get bored? Never know? We hear a lot about
Speaker 1: uniforms now in the tech world. People just not wanting
Speaker 1: to think about what they wear. The Steve Jobs uniform,
Speaker 1: that's definitely a different twist than what you have. They
Speaker 1: do it so they don't have to think about fashion.
Speaker 1: Steve Jobs did wear uniform. Didn't you wear levis in
Speaker 1: a turtleneck? I mean that's what he's And if you
Speaker 1: look a lot of there's a lot of people that
Speaker 1: wear uniforms, but visual people. Sometimes I'm very visual, and
Speaker 1: as a visual artist, I think Steve Jobs was a
Speaker 1: bit very visual person. I think it's more if you're
Speaker 1: a visual person that has good taste. I think that
Speaker 1: if you're not, it doesn't work as well because then
Speaker 1: you just look like a mess. Probably. Um, So I'm wondering,
Speaker 1: as somebody who's in the art and fashion world, what
Speaker 1: do you think that having a uniform has done for
Speaker 1: you professionally? If anything, it just makes it not about
Speaker 1: like what I'm wearing, you know, So I don't really
Speaker 1: need to be a peacock. That's not what I do,
Speaker 1: and so I'm more interested in Um, I'm an explorer
Speaker 1: and I'm a m discoverer and it's not about me.
Speaker 1: So what I do is not about me. So even
Speaker 1: though I wear a uniform, I do and I say
Speaker 1: I don't want it all to be about me. I
Speaker 1: make it about me. I wear red glasses, I wear
Speaker 1: like you know, I always accessorize with my personality. I
Speaker 1: do insert my personality into my uniform definitely. But it
Speaker 1: seems like if you are in what is a visual profession,
Speaker 1: then you may yourself not you may dress very plainly.
Speaker 1: In contrast, if what you do is not considered a
Speaker 1: very artistic visual profession, maybe like a like an attorney then,
Speaker 1: or you're a banker, then you want to address and
Speaker 1: you have to do a lot more yes, because your
Speaker 1: work is not visual. Whoever you are, whether you're in
Speaker 1: a visual or creative or not creative, you have to
Speaker 1: feel really good in what you're wearing so that you're
Speaker 1: not thinking about it. If you're working person, you shouldn't
Speaker 1: be thinking about how you look when you're working, you know,
Speaker 1: you just shouldn't. So you need to feel good about it.
Speaker 1: And that's why whatever your issues are, like your self
Speaker 1: image issues, just that's why I found the jacket that
Speaker 1: I adored the most, and I wore it so much
Speaker 1: I had holes in it, so I had my tailor
Speaker 1: make a pattern out of it. I found the skirt
Speaker 1: that I loved, so, you know, I found my favorite
Speaker 1: things and I put them together and I made my
Speaker 1: own uniform and it was like, so it's like very comforting,
Speaker 1: and I don't know, it's just natural. It feels natural
Speaker 1: to wear that. So Kim said a lot of great stuff.
Speaker 1: And one thing that's it out to me was when
Speaker 1: she said that it's important to be comfortable. It's interesting
Speaker 1: to hear that from a fashion person, first of all,
Speaker 1: and then it was in stark contrast to what Carrie
Speaker 1: told us, in which case being comfortable has nothing to
Speaker 1: do with it. It's about what you project and the
Speaker 1: strength and the defense of it all. Yeah, And for her,
Speaker 1: I think comfort was forgetting that your clothing says something. Right.
Speaker 1: It was like, if you're comfortable, you're not using your
Speaker 1: clothing as a weapon exactly. And that seems like the
Speaker 1: lesson here from all these three people. They have very
Speaker 1: different ways that they use their clothing at work, in
Speaker 1: different philosophies or how they dress, but they all do
Speaker 1: dress very intentionally and use it in ways to benefit
Speaker 1: their job. Yeah. I mean in a Shantiana's case, it
Speaker 1: actually has an effect on her commission on exactly how
Speaker 1: much money she's probably going to make in a given
Speaker 1: day or a given week, which is something I think
Speaker 1: that women are more acutely aware of when it comes
Speaker 1: to what they wear at work. Surely. I mean, historically,
Speaker 1: women are sort of on the outside of the power
Speaker 1: structure in many industries, many companies, And so for me,
Speaker 1: as a guy, well, I suppose I wouldn't have to
Speaker 1: think about it all that much because I'm already benefiting
Speaker 1: from the patriarchy. Yes, I love when we get that
Speaker 1: word in here. But even if you think about women
Speaker 1: wearing power suits or pant suits, oh yes, like a
Speaker 1: certain a certain former presidential candidate, it's a way to signal, oh,
Speaker 1: take me as seriously as a man. I will dress
Speaker 1: like a man, and then you will take me seriously. Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: And that happened a great deal, particularly in the right,
Speaker 1: when women were entering these professions for the first time.
Speaker 1: And now we're seeing women try to signal power in
Speaker 1: different in other ways, not by emulating necessarily masculinity, but
Speaker 1: perhaps accentuating femininity or other aspects of their person. One
Speaker 1: example of this that I can think about is Megan Kelly,
Speaker 1: the Fox News host. I remember it was a big
Speaker 1: deal when she cut her hair, because all the Fox
Speaker 1: News hosts have long, wavy mermaid and she cut her
Speaker 1: hair to be the short, slipped back kind of more
Speaker 1: powerful seeming, right, but then also a little bit more androgynous,
Speaker 1: And how are we going to know if she's a
Speaker 1: lady if she doesn't have that long lady hair exactly.
Speaker 1: So it's definitely a power move. And the fact that
Speaker 1: of course we even know about this, or that we're
Speaker 1: even talking about this as opposed to Anderson Cooper's latest haircut. Right,
Speaker 1: Nobody ever describes what men are wearing in the opening
Speaker 1: paragraph of a story about them pretty much never maybe
Speaker 1: Johnny Depp, he gets one. Yeah, so yeah, this is
Speaker 1: something that women have to deal with more than men.
Speaker 1: But it's really great and refreshing to see three women
Speaker 1: using that to their benefit. Exactly. They've taken the time
Speaker 1: to kind of consider it and they're putting it into action.
Speaker 1: But I do think that that lesson can apply to
Speaker 1: people of all genders, being conscious of what you wear
Speaker 1: and knowing that it is something you can use to
Speaker 1: get what you want. That's right. I will speak for myself.
Speaker 1: I am silently judging everyone, men and women, both so
Speaker 1: you may as well know that, and you should dress
Speaker 1: at least to impress Sam anything else. Yeah, No, I
Speaker 1: mean I think that's pretty much a good rule all around.
Speaker 1: I think this will be a good time for us
Speaker 1: to transition to hap big takes, happy fake takes. So Sam,
Speaker 1: let's start with you. What is your not quite fully
Speaker 1: formed thought about work or maybe not work this week?
Speaker 1: This is semi work related. I want to talk for
Speaker 1: a minute about our phones and the etiquette of using
Speaker 1: them when in the presence of other people, particularly at
Speaker 1: things like say, lunches. I have found it be quite
Speaker 1: liberating for myself and my guest to, perhaps an hour
Speaker 1: into the occasion, suggest that we take a moment to
Speaker 1: both check our phones. That way, we're relieving ourselves of
Speaker 1: the anxiety that there's an email or a text or
Speaker 1: something that's waiting for us and is going unanswered. And
Speaker 1: then when if presuming everything is fine and well taken
Speaker 1: care of, we can continue on with our time together
Speaker 1: knowing that you know, we've checked in and everything's okay.
Speaker 1: And I just think it's perfectly okay. If, in fact,
Speaker 1: I would say it's helpful to periodically say, hey, let's
Speaker 1: just check our phones for a second. Yes, I am
Speaker 1: really into this. We did it kind of informally the
Speaker 1: other day an a meeting. That's right. That's right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I don't think you can do it too much.
Speaker 1: I would say that the most frequent thing you could
Speaker 1: do maybe is once every forty five minutes. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's it's just better than people kind of side eyeing
Speaker 1: their phones the entire time you're hanging out. That's right.
Speaker 1: That could be interpreted as rudeness, because perhaps it is,
Speaker 1: But this way you say so stressful for you personally
Speaker 1: to be the one doing that, right for all of us. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we it's two thousand, almost seventeen. We have phones, We
Speaker 1: communicate all the time, acknowledge it, take a moment to
Speaker 1: check it and then move on. Love it. Awesome. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna pull a Sam Growbart and this week do a
Speaker 1: recommendation for my half big take. I've been listening to
Speaker 1: a lot of fellow podcasts, and I think right now
Speaker 1: in my podcast moment, I'm looking for something that's a
Speaker 1: little bit not about the news I mean, and also
Speaker 1: not too dense. I need something a little bit lighter.
Speaker 1: So I've been listening to this podcast who Weekly w
Speaker 1: h O w h O Weekly and it's about B list, delist,
Speaker 1: C list celebrities and what do they tell you about?
Speaker 1: And they talk about there's this whole industry of entertainment
Speaker 1: reporting and entertainment watching about these like unimportant side characters,
Speaker 1: and so they just kind of talk about their lives
Speaker 1: and who they are, and they have terminology like who'se
Speaker 1: versus them? So them are famous people like Robin Wright
Speaker 1: would be of them, and who would be I don't
Speaker 1: even know, just someone you've never heard of. And they're
Speaker 1: just really funny. It's good. You know, this might be
Speaker 1: useful to me because I will confess something. I sometimes
Speaker 1: see the covers of in a supermarket let's say People magazine,
Speaker 1: US Weekly, in Touch, and you're like, I don't is
Speaker 1: that any of the people on them anymore? Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: probably because they're Who's. They're all who's exactly. They're all
Speaker 1: like reality show like third level exactly. Those are all who's.
Speaker 1: So I could listen to this podcast and this but
Speaker 1: actually catch up and it's just entertaining. They're funny. It's
Speaker 1: Bobby Finger and Lindsay Webber, who are two writers on
Speaker 1: the internet. And I really enjoy it. That sounds right up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks all right, and that is half big takes, half
Speaker 1: baked takes. Thanks for listening to game Plan this week.
Speaker 1: You can find me on Twitter at rs Greenfield and
Speaker 1: I am at Sam Grobart. If you like this show,
Speaker 1: please head on over to iTunes or wherever you listen
Speaker 1: to podcasts to rate and subscribe and review. We love
Speaker 1: to hear from you. Game Plan is produced by Liz
Speaker 1: Smith and Magnus Hendrickson. The Head of Bloomberg Podcasts is
Speaker 1: Alec McCabe. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next week.
Speaker 1: By get the most from your people and send your
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