Speaker 1: Before we start the show, we have an announcement. After
Speaker 1: a year and a half of Game Plan, we're going
Speaker 1: to be putting this show on hold. We're sad about
Speaker 1: not getting to talk to you guys every week, but
Speaker 1: if you have a half big take that you've been
Speaker 1: sitting on, now's the time to call it in. I've
Speaker 1: been working for almost two decades and there's one thing
Speaker 1: about professional life. I'm still kind of stumped about what
Speaker 1: to wear. I'm not completely clueless, but like a lot
Speaker 1: of us, I still have some work fashion questions. I've
Speaker 1: just been afraid to ask. Well, that's all going to
Speaker 1: change today. This is game Plan. Hi. I'm Francesco Leafy
Speaker 1: and I'm Rebecca Greenfield, and this week we are talking
Speaker 1: about what to wear to work. This is a something
Speaker 1: that feels like it's super related to actually like doing
Speaker 1: a good job, but it turns out that even if
Speaker 1: it shouldn't, what you wear actually matters. I hate that
Speaker 1: it does because I want to live in a world
Speaker 1: where it doesn't matter, but people judge you. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: And there has been like a weirdly high number of
Speaker 1: studies done on how what you wear affects how you
Speaker 1: work and they've come up with all kinds of conclusions
Speaker 1: about the psychological effect of your clothing on your productivity
Speaker 1: and just like how you feel about your job. There's
Speaker 1: one study that said dressing up at work so kind
Speaker 1: of like dressing a little more formally than whatever is
Speaker 1: expected of you at your job, helps you with creative
Speaker 1: thinking because basically it makes you feel like a big
Speaker 1: shot and therefore like you're you're high above the fray.
Speaker 1: You don't think about like the small details, you think
Speaker 1: about the big ideas. I remember another one that was
Speaker 1: that found that the people who wore suits in the
Speaker 1: study ended up negotiating for more money. They had to
Speaker 1: do a negotiation, So it was like, you feel like
Speaker 1: important and powerful and big, so you're throw and you
Speaker 1: get more powerful. Um. And there's also the converse of that,
Speaker 1: which is that if you wear casual clothes, one study
Speaker 1: showed that that makes you somehow better at carrying out instructions.
Speaker 1: So I guess like it actually it can be good,
Speaker 1: but it sort of makes you feel like you're less
Speaker 1: important in the office, but it makes you good at
Speaker 1: following directions. Maybe that's why a lot of industries, like
Speaker 1: service industries have uniforms. I mean, I don't think that's
Speaker 1: only why, but you know they want workers to fall inline.
Speaker 1: You're one member of a very big workforce, um, and
Speaker 1: your uniform reminds you of that. We also, in a
Speaker 1: Bloomberg article a couple of years ago, wrote about how
Speaker 1: wearing branded clothing makes you more confident. So if you
Speaker 1: have a logo on your clothes, that can that can
Speaker 1: increase your confidence, and further more, you can actually take
Speaker 1: on some of the characteristics that you associate with that brand.
Speaker 1: So like if you're wearing Nike shoes, I guess you'd
Speaker 1: people were inclined to just do it, So it's not
Speaker 1: necessarily the brand of your own company, but just lame brand,
Speaker 1: right like that that the logo makes a difference in
Speaker 1: how you feel about what you're able to do. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's kind of crazy how much of an effect our
Speaker 1: clothes end up having on how we think about ourselves. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not just that people are looking at you and
Speaker 1: judging you. You're you're internalizing what you're wearing. So whether
Speaker 1: you like it or not, what you wear matters. But
Speaker 1: figuring out how to dress the right way, even if
Speaker 1: you know, kind of like what you're going for isn't
Speaker 1: always the simplest throwing on a blazer um or a
Speaker 1: power suit. There's there's no manual for how to transition
Speaker 1: your wardrobe when your job changes. Yeah, there was the
Speaker 1: whole debate about this, saying that the office dress code
Speaker 1: has gone away, so it's even harder now for people.
Speaker 1: I don't know that I necessarily agree with this, but
Speaker 1: there's the idea that before everyone just wore business casual
Speaker 1: um and that for a man meant like khaki pants
Speaker 1: and a button down, and for women it was one
Speaker 1: of those a line pencil skirts. But now there's probably
Speaker 1: a lot more variety in industries. I would say that
Speaker 1: still within industries and offices there's a dress code, and
Speaker 1: and we did an episode on this about a year
Speaker 1: ago looking into the office dress code and if it's
Speaker 1: dead or not. We argue that it's alive and well,
Speaker 1: but I do think, yeah, it's there's more variation with
Speaker 1: among the industries now. I think that variation can be
Speaker 1: tough because I think it actually ends up meaning that
Speaker 1: there are still rules, it's just harder to figure out
Speaker 1: what they are. So it's easy enough if you know
Speaker 1: everybody at your job wears a blazer, just have to
Speaker 1: find the right blazer. But when it seems like there
Speaker 1: are no rules about what you wear, but you know
Speaker 1: that there are kind of secret codes and people are
Speaker 1: following them, and there's all this variety and what you
Speaker 1: can buy and what people are saying it's okay to work.
Speaker 1: I feel like you walk into that without a background
Speaker 1: of dressing a certain way for work, and you can
Speaker 1: get really confused, and that's kind of annoying and inconvenient.
Speaker 1: I remember when I first started working, I was working
Speaker 1: in d C, which is much more formal than here
Speaker 1: New York. People wear business casuals. So I just bought
Speaker 1: a bunch of skirts and tops and I did wear
Speaker 1: them for probably the first six months of my working life,
Speaker 1: but have not touched them since because that's not really
Speaker 1: how people dressed in our industry. They're probably not in
Speaker 1: style anymore. Also, yeah, that was a while ago, and
Speaker 1: I don't I don't even want to know what I
Speaker 1: was wearing. And they were probably cheap. There's a lot
Speaker 1: wrong with that. But I had like the I think
Speaker 1: the pain points here really are transitions. So it's like
Speaker 1: when you go from school, you know, college are graduate
Speaker 1: school to professional life, or you go from one industry
Speaker 1: to an industry where everybody dresses kind of different, or
Speaker 1: you just go from kind of a lower level job
Speaker 1: to a higher level one where you're expected to wear
Speaker 1: more formal clothes, and how you plan for those transitions.
Speaker 1: That that's the thing, I think where people really don't
Speaker 1: know what to do. Like I remember I bought an
Speaker 1: interview suit that was probably the first suit I ever bought,
Speaker 1: um right out of college, and I bought it from
Speaker 1: and I remember exactly what it looked like. It was
Speaker 1: like it was a it was a what do you
Speaker 1: call it a skirt suit. I mean it was like
Speaker 1: a skirt and a blazer, and it was linen with
Speaker 1: like this was like white linen with this weird kind
Speaker 1: of metallic plaid pattern over it. And I thought it
Speaker 1: was like the classiest, fanciest thing I've ever seen at
Speaker 1: the time, and I thought it looked great on me,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure it's like instilled me with all kinds
Speaker 1: of confidence that those job interviews that I wore too,
Speaker 1: And then I just continued wearing it and it was
Speaker 1: like the only suit I owned for literally like ten
Speaker 1: years because I worked in nonprofits right out of school,
Speaker 1: and it just like wasn't a it wasn't a suit
Speaker 1: wearing kind of place. So once a year, when I
Speaker 1: had a meeting that was important enough that I had
Speaker 1: to wear a suit, I throw on this suit and
Speaker 1: at some point I realized, like, I only own one
Speaker 1: suit and it's ten years old. And that's like, I
Speaker 1: think you get yourself into these bndes. Yeah, And even
Speaker 1: if you're not transitioning to a different industry, what happens
Speaker 1: to me is every time I start a new job,
Speaker 1: it's in the same industry. I am like, this time,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna dress better than I used to, And I
Speaker 1: go out and I buy some like upgraded work where
Speaker 1: and then I wear it again for about six months
Speaker 1: and then I'm back to my uniform. Yeah, you always
Speaker 1: go back to your default, but you can only really
Speaker 1: dress like you. Yeah, So I think I will learn well.
Speaker 1: I think the question is how do you dress like
Speaker 1: you and also dress for work? And we have an
Speaker 1: expert here who's going to help us with that question
Speaker 1: and many more. Chris Browser is the editor of Bloomberg Pursuits,
Speaker 1: our Luxury and Lifestyle Vertical and just an all around
Speaker 1: stylish guy. So, Chris, we're going to ask you to
Speaker 1: solve some of our big fashion problems. But before we
Speaker 1: get into that, do you have a general philosophy on
Speaker 1: how to dress for work? Like, what's your big idea
Speaker 1: about this? So my big idea is that less is
Speaker 1: actually more. You don't want to be out there trying
Speaker 1: to be the flashyest person in the office, not only
Speaker 1: because you just can't keep that going for such a
Speaker 1: long time, but also if you wear flashy outfits, people
Speaker 1: remember that outfit and then if you have to wear
Speaker 1: it again in like four days, people will remember that
Speaker 1: you wore it a few days ago. Whereas if you
Speaker 1: have like a bunch of staples and things that you
Speaker 1: rely on, but you kind of always look the same
Speaker 1: and you can kind of wear the same clothes over
Speaker 1: and over and over again. Yeah, I definitely wear the
Speaker 1: same black jeans and just assume people think I own
Speaker 1: twenty pairs and black jeans. Yeah, that's that's the thing. Um,
Speaker 1: Like fashion people are known for having uniforms. A lot
Speaker 1: of fashion people, you know, they work at Vogue, but
Speaker 1: they wear black, just sort of simple black shirts and pants,
Speaker 1: and that's because they know, like you can't you kind
Speaker 1: of can't do it every day if you're trying to
Speaker 1: be a sort of flashier make a statement. They just
Speaker 1: it's easier just to look like you and have people
Speaker 1: not really pay attention to it. So you mentioned the
Speaker 1: uniform thing. There was a big debate I remember, started
Speaker 1: by the New York Times, of course, where they argued
Speaker 1: that it was the end of the office dress code.
Speaker 1: Where do you fall on that the line of that debate,
Speaker 1: I think we actually right now we're kind of going
Speaker 1: back into an era of formality. I it's sort of
Speaker 1: I get a sense of a grown upness and what
Speaker 1: people are wearing. I think for a while, uh, when
Speaker 1: sort of hipsters ruled the roost, everything was open plan
Speaker 1: and you know, norm core was kind of the look.
Speaker 1: People kind of became a little bit more shlubby, I
Speaker 1: would say, like five years ago. And now, you know,
Speaker 1: offices are realizing that a little bit of formality actually helps.
Speaker 1: So people are getting offices again. Um, people are wearing
Speaker 1: lace up shoes, and I sense a sort of return
Speaker 1: to let's get dressed up, let's be adults in the office. Okay,
Speaker 1: speaking of schlubby, when is it okay to where means
Speaker 1: at the office, because my my answer is like always,
Speaker 1: but I could be wrong. I mean, I think it's
Speaker 1: different for women and men. I think women can wear
Speaker 1: jeans in a way that looks a little bit more
Speaker 1: dressy than men, although sort of dark washed jeans are
Speaker 1: kind of always a reliable, uh staple. Do you think
Speaker 1: there's an age or a rank in the office where
Speaker 1: you grow out of jeans? I've been worrying about this recently.
Speaker 1: Am I too old for jeans? Do I look like
Speaker 1: a college student? I think it depends on the workplace.
Speaker 1: I think if you're in an office where a fair
Speaker 1: number of people wear suits, then if you are at
Speaker 1: a level of seniority where you manage people, you probably
Speaker 1: are getting to the point where you can't wear jeans
Speaker 1: that often. So kind of like, look at the people
Speaker 1: above you maybe see I think my manager wears jeans. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, well we're journalists, right like we people wear
Speaker 1: shorts to this office, you know, other people are a
Speaker 1: little bit more formal. I remember my brother is a
Speaker 1: lawyer at a hedge fund, and I remember the day
Speaker 1: that they started being allowed to wear jeans, and he
Speaker 1: would wear what he would normally wear, like a sort
Speaker 1: of button down oxford, maybe a tie, but just replace
Speaker 1: the pants with jeans and you have the whole outfit
Speaker 1: has to make sense together. So you know, if you're
Speaker 1: if you feel like it's a little formally you have
Speaker 1: to dress up on top that you're throwing jeans on,
Speaker 1: that's probably misguided. This is probably a good time to
Speaker 1: ask about work transitions, like when you do have a
Speaker 1: change in dress code at the office, like you just described,
Speaker 1: or you go from uh one job where things are
Speaker 1: slightly more casual to a job where things are more formal,
Speaker 1: or you just go from school to work, like you've
Speaker 1: been in graduate school wearing sweatpants every day and now
Speaker 1: you have to have a work outfit. Like how do
Speaker 1: you deal with this, the need to basically suddenly change
Speaker 1: your whole wardrobe. I mean, I think what you can't
Speaker 1: avoid is a big shopping trip, you know. I I've
Speaker 1: switched jobs where I'm like, oh, I gotta like upgrade
Speaker 1: my wardrob But you sort of try to do it
Speaker 1: piece by piece, but then you're still really kind of
Speaker 1: wearing the same stuff you always were. You have to
Speaker 1: bite the bullet and just go shopping and buy a
Speaker 1: bunch of things, and so you know, if you don't
Speaker 1: have a ton of money, go to a place like
Speaker 1: top Shop or Zara, have good clothes that fits. Um My,
Speaker 1: the blazer I get the most compliments on is one
Speaker 1: from top Shop, and I definitely have ones from more
Speaker 1: expensive places. Um. And then the other thing I would
Speaker 1: say is throw away the things that don't fit you.
Speaker 1: Everyone has stuff in their closet that's like, you know,
Speaker 1: oh I wear this, I can put it under a
Speaker 1: sweater and like it sort of fits, and or like
Speaker 1: this tie has a stained on it, but like you know,
Speaker 1: if I if I button my blazer, no one sees. Um,
Speaker 1: gotta throw that stuff away because you're gonna be tempted
Speaker 1: to use it, to wear it, and just get rid
Speaker 1: of it, and then that will elevate your sort of
Speaker 1: baseline wardrobe. And finally, when you're shopping, I think the
Speaker 1: key thing to remember is get stuff that fits you well.
Speaker 1: Don't get stuff that you necessarily think is particularly you know,
Speaker 1: more beautiful than fits well. Like fit is the ultimate
Speaker 1: expensive looking attribute. If your clothes fits you well, it
Speaker 1: looks much more cheek and much more expensive. Then if
Speaker 1: you have something made up some wonderful fabric or whatever
Speaker 1: that was from a fancy label that doesn't fit you
Speaker 1: as well. When you talk about going on a shopping trip,
Speaker 1: my immediate thought is, I don't want to spend so
Speaker 1: much money. So is there a hack for people who
Speaker 1: are budget conscious or who just don't have the money
Speaker 1: to spend on a whole new wardrobe. The real answer
Speaker 1: is to have, you know, kind of a uniform where
Speaker 1: you can swap in and out things. So if you're
Speaker 1: a woman, go get, um, you know, some pants, get
Speaker 1: some simple dresses that you can accessorize and that you know,
Speaker 1: sort of are the blank palette on which you can
Speaker 1: build a bunch of different outfits that look different even
Speaker 1: though you're really kind of wearing the same clothes. Like
Speaker 1: for men, I often recommend go out, get three suits,
Speaker 1: get them wherever you can afford them. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: get a gray one, get a navy one, and then
Speaker 1: maybe get another color. Um. And you know, if if
Speaker 1: it looks nice enough, you can wear the blazer with
Speaker 1: a different pair of pants. Uh, And you can. No
Speaker 1: one's really looking at your suit. They're looking at your
Speaker 1: tie and your shirt and your shoes and your socks.
Speaker 1: So if you have those three things you can really
Speaker 1: rotate it around. It's like Marge simpsons sannel suit from
Speaker 1: the Simpsons, you know, like you can you can make
Speaker 1: a lot of looks out of one suit. What about
Speaker 1: something that you kind of can't get away with saving on, Like,
Speaker 1: is there one thing that you think everyone should just blur?
Speaker 1: John m Yeah, that's a good question. I think. I
Speaker 1: think you can't overestimate how much your shoes affect the
Speaker 1: way that you look. And uh, bad shoes fall apart.
Speaker 1: They look bad really quickly, and if you don't take
Speaker 1: care of your shoes, it just makes the whole outfit
Speaker 1: looks schlubby. So um. You know. For men, I often say,
Speaker 1: go get a pair of black laceups, brown laceups, maybe
Speaker 1: a brogue, and then take really good care of them.
Speaker 1: You know, go to a shoeshine place. It costs four dollars,
Speaker 1: get shoe trees and keep them in the shoes so
Speaker 1: they're stretched out. And the same thing with women. You know,
Speaker 1: get shoes that are comfortable, that that accentuate any outfit
Speaker 1: that you can wear a lot. And you know, if
Speaker 1: you're wearing a nice outfit, but then you're wearing sneakers
Speaker 1: or like super comfortable office shoes that throws the whole
Speaker 1: outfit out of whack. So I think the shoes are
Speaker 1: actually really a good investment. So women often have this
Speaker 1: issue in the summer of being cold in the office
Speaker 1: because most off is a really over air conditioned and
Speaker 1: having to have some kind of sweater strategy. And this
Speaker 1: is often like a fleece you don't really care about
Speaker 1: that you can leave over the back of your office chair,
Speaker 1: or some piece of swag that you got as part
Speaker 1: of a gift bag for a corporate event, and it
Speaker 1: never goes with your outfit, and it's always really obvious that, like,
Speaker 1: you got dressed at home and now you're cold and
Speaker 1: you're walking around in this thing. How do you deal
Speaker 1: with the office sweater problem? Well, first of all, I'm
Speaker 1: glad that we're talking about the office temperature issue because
Speaker 1: as a longtime listener to this podcast, I know that
Speaker 1: this is a recurring theme. And also I said on
Speaker 1: the same floor as you guys, and can attest to
Speaker 1: the fact that there are constant temperature wars on our floor.
Speaker 1: Um Like literally you turn around the like one corner
Speaker 1: of the floor and it's like you're walking into a sauna.
Speaker 1: And um so I also have an office sweater and it's, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a dark cardigan. I'm not necessarily like
Speaker 1: a cardigan person, but it's the same thing as what
Speaker 1: you're describing. You kind of have to have something like that.
Speaker 1: I think the best solution is to wear something dark,
Speaker 1: um and that fits you pretty well. It's not super
Speaker 1: slubby um that you can button up or not button up.
Speaker 1: That that's almost like a blazer in the way that
Speaker 1: it could potentially make your outfit look a little bit
Speaker 1: more formal when you put it on. Like there's been
Speaker 1: times when I've had to go on TV here and
Speaker 1: I wasn't wearing a blazer and I put on a
Speaker 1: cardigan and I'm not saying it looks amazing, but it's
Speaker 1: sort of solved the sort of visual graphic issue. And
Speaker 1: I think that's probably your safest bad you know. I
Speaker 1: think somebody else might tell you just to go schlubby
Speaker 1: and just be like the look, I'm not trying to
Speaker 1: look like, I'm just trying to be warm because you
Speaker 1: jerks are turning the temperature down all the time. Um,
Speaker 1: So I don't know. I would go for the sort
Speaker 1: of neat and trim thing, but definitely someone else might
Speaker 1: tell you just to love it up. So if you're
Speaker 1: passive aggressive, you get the ugly hoodie to be like,
Speaker 1: people make your up. I think you know, I would
Speaker 1: stop short of something that you have to pull over
Speaker 1: your head it put on, because that is a really
Speaker 1: aggressive a look be you can mess up your hair
Speaker 1: and it's just like you're like, I've given up. You know,
Speaker 1: I am fully covered up. There's no chance that I
Speaker 1: might have to dash to a meeting and like look
Speaker 1: nice and like this is what I look like today.
Speaker 1: What about the opposite temperature problem that men have, which
Speaker 1: is in the summer, it's hot out and they can't
Speaker 1: wear shorts to work, or maybe they can according to you,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I suspect you'd say, now, um, so
Speaker 1: how do you dress in that scenario? So this is
Speaker 1: a real issue in New York for guys. I mean,
Speaker 1: I can't tell you the amount of times I've showed
Speaker 1: up to work and I've like sweated through my clothes.
Speaker 1: And I know people who bring other shirts to work.
Speaker 1: You know, Um, I think you have to for me,
Speaker 1: I have to sort of find out what my like
Speaker 1: heat points are, so like my ankles get very hot.
Speaker 1: That's like a touch point for me, and so I
Speaker 1: will often do that. Look where you, uh, you're wearing
Speaker 1: like little no show socks in your shoes, sort of
Speaker 1: nice stress shoes, and then you kind of roll up
Speaker 1: the ankle the ankle of your pant so that you
Speaker 1: get a little like breathing there. I think, Um, you know,
Speaker 1: depending on where you are, maybe that's maybe that for you.
Speaker 1: Is you wear a nice uh button down shirt that
Speaker 1: is actually short sleeved and you wear it with a
Speaker 1: tie or depending on where you are, maybe air tie. Uh.
Speaker 1: You've got to just figure out, like where you can
Speaker 1: vent your heat. The ability to wear shorts really is
Speaker 1: just based on what where, what your office is like. Like,
Speaker 1: there are definitely engineers in this building that wear shorts
Speaker 1: every day in the summer, and I know exactly who
Speaker 1: they are. If I see them out on the street,
Speaker 1: I'll be like, you're the guy that wear shorts every day. Um,
Speaker 1: And I think because we have a broad range of
Speaker 1: people here, you can do that. But if you're in
Speaker 1: an office where almost everyone we wears a suit, you
Speaker 1: absolutely cannot wear shorts. I want to get a little
Speaker 1: deeper into the shorts thing, because deep, yeah, let's do it.
Speaker 1: Let's ask the hard questions because I don't even I've
Speaker 1: never worn shorts to the office, and I don't consider
Speaker 1: myself a particularly formal person. But that's like one threshold
Speaker 1: I haven't crossed yet. Are there rule for if you
Speaker 1: decide you're going to take the punch and you're gonna
Speaker 1: try to wear shi I know it depends on your
Speaker 1: office dress code, but like, should you always wear a
Speaker 1: certain type of shoes or should you do something else
Speaker 1: to your outfit to balance at the shorts wearing. That's
Speaker 1: a good question. Um, I think that you have to
Speaker 1: have the kind of outfit that people look at you
Speaker 1: and you're they're like, oh, that is a fashionable person
Speaker 1: who made a choice to wear those shorts today. That
Speaker 1: was like, the shorts are the best thing for that outfit.
Speaker 1: So for me, that would be, you know, well tailored shorts,
Speaker 1: maybe in a color, not just like some khaki shorts
Speaker 1: that you would wear on the weekend. You wear a
Speaker 1: nice belt, perhaps a colored belt, and then you have
Speaker 1: to wear a dress shirt on top. Uh, And I
Speaker 1: would say you have to wear either very clean, new
Speaker 1: fashionable sneakers or um, or a simple dress shoe with
Speaker 1: a no show sock. So yes, there are rules. Cha.
Speaker 1: Yeah you said just took me right out of the
Speaker 1: running by the way, like, oh that she made a
Speaker 1: ancho's fashionable choice. No gane shorts? Okay, well so if
Speaker 1: you but if you wear a skirt, you don't wear
Speaker 1: tights with them? I mean, like what you dress? Skirts
Speaker 1: and dresses are easy, I mean you might wear tights. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't understand the difference between like a skirt and
Speaker 1: a pair of shorts for a lady. Well, I guess
Speaker 1: there isn't like if you could certainly wear a pair
Speaker 1: of shorts that are the same length as a skirt,
Speaker 1: it's just they're shorts, And I associate shorts with like
Speaker 1: with very casual wear or like active where. Um, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I guess maybe this is my hang up. No,
Speaker 1: I think the stigma against shorts is gender neutral, Like
Speaker 1: it's just that's the only option for men. But it's
Speaker 1: not often you see a woman wearing shorts in the office, right, Yeah, Like,
Speaker 1: if we want to, we have a lot more options
Speaker 1: if we need to be cooler than men do cooler
Speaker 1: temperature wise, so you can just you can throw on
Speaker 1: a skirt or a dress in the summer. Are there
Speaker 1: work where trends that you're really into these days? So
Speaker 1: I think for men, we're in a good period of
Speaker 1: suiting where people have gotten away from the standard navy
Speaker 1: and gray and sort of pinstripe suits. There's a particular
Speaker 1: color of blue that um we that has been for
Speaker 1: the past two or three years kind of taking over
Speaker 1: the world. But it's it's this slightly edgier, slightly more vibrant,
Speaker 1: almost royal blue suit, which I think is really handsome
Speaker 1: and more and more sort of you know, straight middle
Speaker 1: of the road. Guys are wearing suits like that that
Speaker 1: fit really well, and I think that's a really good look,
Speaker 1: and I encourage people to explore colors outside of sort
Speaker 1: of the standard. And then for women, I think there
Speaker 1: is kind of this pressure into um, the work where
Speaker 1: thing which you have written about for us, UM, which
Speaker 1: I feel like sort of pushes you into um kind
Speaker 1: of like a sheath dress sort of look a lot
Speaker 1: that feels like the most flexible basic But I I
Speaker 1: love um. You know, women who just really like a
Speaker 1: great tailored pair of pants and like a great shirt.
Speaker 1: I think that's a really cool look, and I think
Speaker 1: that's very now and I hope that continues to be
Speaker 1: the trend. This isn't the first time we've asked for
Speaker 1: your input on this, but I want a final ruling
Speaker 1: from you, and we'll make it our final question. When
Speaker 1: is it okay for men or women to show their
Speaker 1: toes at work? I think it's different for men and women.
Speaker 1: I think women, if you have a nice pedicure and um,
Speaker 1: you're you have a nice pair of shoes, I think,
Speaker 1: especially in summer, it's pretty okay. Um for men. You know,
Speaker 1: I've thought a lot about this, partly because you guys
Speaker 1: have asked me this before, and um, I used I
Speaker 1: have evolved done this. I used to be a person
Speaker 1: that thought that you could wear like a nice sandal
Speaker 1: to work, and now I am not one of those people. Um,
Speaker 1: and I think, sorry, what's a nice men sandal brand?
Speaker 1: I asked you that last time. Yeah, you know, there
Speaker 1: are nice sandals from Gucci. Um Fending makes them. You
Speaker 1: don't have to go that expensive. I mean that's a
Speaker 1: little over the what are they are they like? What's
Speaker 1: the shape I'm picturing here? Oftentimes that they'll cover a
Speaker 1: lot of the front of the toe, so there's at
Speaker 1: some front of the foot rather the bridge there's UM,
Speaker 1: there'll be a lot of coverage and UM, it'll usually
Speaker 1: be made in leather. I can't think of another material
Speaker 1: that I would recommend. Uh, and they it's basically more
Speaker 1: shoe than flip flop, and I think that's sort of
Speaker 1: a safe but you want to cover as much of
Speaker 1: the foot as you can. UM. I think that it
Speaker 1: is okay to wear open toed situations at an office
Speaker 1: where almost nobody wears a suit. If you were in
Speaker 1: a workplace environment where like if someone wore a suit,
Speaker 1: you'd be like, whoa do? Like what you got a
Speaker 1: job interview? Like, then you can wear open toe shoes.
Speaker 1: But if there is a modicum of people in your
Speaker 1: office that wear suits every day, then you can't. To me,
Speaker 1: as a man, wear sandals. I feel like that's a
Speaker 1: great role of them. Yeah, well, Chris, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for coming in here and solving all of our
Speaker 1: fashion problems. Becca. I know you won't toot your own
Speaker 1: horn here, so I'm going to say it, but I
Speaker 1: think that you are kind of low key the poster
Speaker 1: child for exactly the fashion philosophy that Chris was espousing listeners.
Speaker 1: You can't see Becca, but she wears basic, simple, stylish
Speaker 1: clothes that are not so flashy that you would notice
Speaker 1: if she wore them again a few days later. But
Speaker 1: they fit you will thank you. But I don't think
Speaker 1: I'm professional enough still. I I think I could dress
Speaker 1: a little bit nicer, and I see the professional woman's
Speaker 1: clothing and I'm just don't want to spend money on it,
Speaker 1: like a nice blazer or I just bought nice pants,
Speaker 1: and you can ask my sister. I spent at least
Speaker 1: a day complaining about how much money I spend on them,
Speaker 1: and they weren't even that expensive. But I thought talking
Speaker 1: to Chris made me realize that you can level up
Speaker 1: without going crazy expensive. Yeah. I was actually surprised that
Speaker 1: for somebody whose job it is to run the luxury vertical,
Speaker 1: which writes about fancy things all day every day, he
Speaker 1: kind of came down pretty hard on the side of
Speaker 1: like not overspending on clothes and not airing on the
Speaker 1: side of fashionable designery things, but actually finding clothes that
Speaker 1: fit you well. And that's such a good lesson. It
Speaker 1: sounds so obvious, but I have so many choices bad
Speaker 1: choices I've made in my past where I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: but it's designer, or like, oh, but the fabric is
Speaker 1: so pretty, and really when I put it on and
Speaker 1: I look in the mirror, it just doesn't look that good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: are you want to buy into the latest trend and
Speaker 1: it goes out of style so fast? I think that's
Speaker 1: maybe why you perceive me as someone who's just does
Speaker 1: the basics thing, because I it takes a lot for
Speaker 1: me to spend a lot of money on something I
Speaker 1: don't think I'm going to wear a lot, So I
Speaker 1: tend to not buy the really trend driven clothing. That
Speaker 1: is another I think really a solid tip in general though,
Speaker 1: just like if you're if you're going to make an
Speaker 1: investment in clothing, it better be something that is versatile
Speaker 1: and can last you a long time. And that means
Speaker 1: like it's not going to be the you know, off
Speaker 1: the shoulder what do they call that style shoulder where
Speaker 1: it's if you're not aware of this fashion abomination, it
Speaker 1: was very big this summer. It's like there's a sleeve,
Speaker 1: there's a long sleeve, but there's no shoulder to the
Speaker 1: sleeves are often Yeah, and so I apologize to any
Speaker 1: listeners who wear this trend. I'm sure you rock it
Speaker 1: and look amazing, but it's disgusting. It needs to stop.
Speaker 1: I also really like to shoe suggestion, which is invest
Speaker 1: in shoes, which I medium do. Yeah, I cannot buy
Speaker 1: really cheap shoes because they do break really quickly. Here
Speaker 1: and he talked about also repairing or like taking care
Speaker 1: of your shoes. He didn't mention repairing, but I think
Speaker 1: that's another that's another kind of pro tip that you
Speaker 1: don't really realize this when you're young, but eventually kind
Speaker 1: of get hip to the idea that you can actually
Speaker 1: get a lot of life out of shoes because when
Speaker 1: you wear down the heels, you could just go and
Speaker 1: get the fixed at a new pair of shoes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you can save and you can look expensive and
Speaker 1: look professional, and we're here to help you do it.
Speaker 1: And now let's help you. Here's some half big takes,
Speaker 1: halfy fake takes. If you have a half baked take
Speaker 1: you'd like to share, leave us a voicemail at two
Speaker 1: one two six seven zero one six six Becca. What
Speaker 1: is your half bag take this week? My half big
Speaker 1: take is that there is no reason to have a
Speaker 1: ring tone on your cell phone. Set it to vibrate,
Speaker 1: and that says office related because there are many people
Speaker 1: around me that have ring tones. One they either remind
Speaker 1: me of my alarm clock, which is horrifying, or they're
Speaker 1: really specific songs. I didn't know there's still a thing.
Speaker 1: I thought everyone just used the standard phone ringers. If
Speaker 1: you're trying to say something about yourself with your ring tone,
Speaker 1: you're not saying anything good. You're saying I don't care
Speaker 1: about people other people in the space around me. This
Speaker 1: is a This is a very real office problem because
Speaker 1: people do walk away from their desk and leave their
Speaker 1: phone behind, and I do have a phone alarm that
Speaker 1: goes off every day, um, and I feel so so
Speaker 1: so guilty on the occasions once in a while when
Speaker 1: I leave it at my desk and somebody's like, I
Speaker 1: had to turn your phone alarm off. I've gone up
Speaker 1: to people's desks and that's totally within your rights, I think.
Speaker 1: But but the ringtone it does stand out because it's like,
Speaker 1: not only is this person in considerate and they left
Speaker 1: their phone behind, but they made this weird choice to have,
Speaker 1: Like Pacabell's cannon announced that they're you know wife is calling. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know, just no, you know who you are.
Speaker 1: Maybe office buildings could have some kind of special laser
Speaker 1: sensor thing that automatically turned everyone's phone to vibrate as
Speaker 1: soon as they walked in the docks. Tech people get
Speaker 1: on this. Another great idea, fantastica what's your half? Big take?
Speaker 1: I want to talk about a well used but little
Speaker 1: discussed power move in email, which is I feel like
Speaker 1: the more senior people are, the less descriptive and less
Speaker 1: grammatically correct their emails become. So it's like sending somebody
Speaker 1: a sentence fragment email that has no punctuation and kind
Speaker 1: of doesn't make enough sense or like doesn't answer the
Speaker 1: question that it's responding to is a signifier that you
Speaker 1: are too important to care enough to like even read
Speaker 1: your email over once and make sure it makes sense.
Speaker 1: And I feel like very senior people do this. And
Speaker 1: it's also like people who maybe have a philosophy of
Speaker 1: responding to every email. So it's a way of saying, like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this response didn't make any sense and didn't help you. Um,
Speaker 1: And also it comes off kind of rude because it
Speaker 1: has no punctuation. But at least I responded within thirty
Speaker 1: seconds of you sending me the email. I think that
Speaker 1: I have a defense for this a little bit. And
Speaker 1: I think it's people who treat email like texting do
Speaker 1: it or like chatting, So when you're in an email convo,
Speaker 1: which is not how email should be used anyway, that
Speaker 1: might happen. I also think this was a thing on
Speaker 1: Twitter for a while where people would not use punctuation
Speaker 1: and have grammatical errors and there was no capitalization, and
Speaker 1: I thought it was, yeah, like a signal of coolness
Speaker 1: or something. Yeah, I will say I actually tried this
Speaker 1: the other day. I don't really remember what got into me,
Speaker 1: but I spent a day responding to emails like this
Speaker 1: because normally I kind of agonize over my emails and
Speaker 1: they're too long and they're too worthy, and people don't
Speaker 1: read all the way to the end, and I read
Speaker 1: them three times to make sure they make sense, and
Speaker 1: I still end up with like award echo in there,
Speaker 1: and I feel stupid about it, And so you care
Speaker 1: about the echoes or like a cut and paste error
Speaker 1: where a word appears twice or something, and then I'm like,
Speaker 1: I can't believe I did that, And so the other day,
Speaker 1: I just all day. I just maybe it was because
Speaker 1: I actually was really busy. I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: have time to reread this, and if they don't understand
Speaker 1: what it says, they'll just ask me for a clarification.
Speaker 1: So I sent a bunch of like kind of crappy
Speaker 1: emails that day, and I will say it made me
Speaker 1: feel really powerful. It was a high. I'm all about
Speaker 1: the email and power moves. And this has been half
Speaker 1: Bake Takes, Half Baked Takes. Thank you for listening to
Speaker 1: game Plan. You can find me on Twitter at Francesca Today.
Speaker 1: You can find me at rs Greenfield, tweet us or
Speaker 1: half Baked Takes, or call into our hotline at two
Speaker 1: and two six one seven zero one six six. It's
Speaker 1: not too late to go to Apple Podcasts or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen and leave us a nice review, five star rating, subscribe,
Speaker 1: do any of those things. If your heart so desires.
Speaker 1: Do you want our newsletter? I think you do? Go
Speaker 1: sign up for it at Bloomberg dot com slash Newsletters.
Speaker 1: You can find us under game Plan. This show is
Speaker 1: produced by Liz Smith and Magnus Hendrickson, head of Podcasts.
Speaker 1: Is Me See You next week. Bye. How do you
Speaker 1: dress like you and also dressed for work? Good question,