Smash This

(My husband gets the nod for challenging me with a new word:  smasual.  This is a Brangelina-type word smash-up reported in the Wall Street Journal that means “smart casual.” )

People who know me find it difficult to believe that I ever tolerated the life of Corporate America.   I am not exactly one to conform to protocol and uniforms.  These days, my idea of dressing up is putting on my “good jeans” and a little mascara.  I am well-practiced at the low maintenance paradigm.  Much to my mother’s chagrin, I avoid lipstick; my fingernails do not exceed the length of my fingertips.  I derive more enjoyment from movie-and-pizza date night than from a 4-star restaurant whose entrees force you to experience a whimsically ironic juxtaposition of heirloom ingredients.  

No one was more surprised than me when I enlisted with Arthur Anderson & Company back in the mid-80s.  We had just relocated to San Francisco and AA&Co had a monopoly on the healthcare IT business in the Bay Area.  Anderson had already staffed for the year, doing me a great honor by extending an invitation to work there—more so because I possessed neither a classical MBA nor a degree in computer science.  With a master’s in health policy and a year of experience managing a large health data system for Blue Cross, I was more experienced than many of their plebs.  On the other hand, having attended a graduate school in public health—where the professors wore jeans and made us call them by their first names—I was lacking the pre-requisite course, “Business Attire 101.”

Upon signing on with Anderson, the healthcare partner offered me a $1000 advance to purchase business clothes, explaining that I was required to wear suits at all times—even if I was only in the office and not at a client site.  I used this cash windfall to purchase a few suits that I just loved.  But when I showed up at work the first day, the same partner called me into his office and asked when I thought I would have the opportunity to purchase suitable clothes.  Apparently, although well made, the more feminine cut of my suit was considered highly inappropriate for their environment.

Eventually, I learned the subtleties of business attire and how to toe the corporate line.  As I climbed the corporate ladder, I adapted to the tailored look of the business world, eventually learning the best sources for women’s suits cut from the cloth of men’s suits.  I learned to walk in nondescript black pumps without falling down.  After a few years, I could get through an entire day of work without ripping a run in my pantyhose.  

Several years later, I was working as a marketing executive in a publically-held, Atlanta-based healthcare IT company.  Here, corporate formality was intensified by its southern roots.  We had an explicit dress-code, outlined in considerable detail in the employee manual.  If there was a penalty for deviating from it, I never knew.

One hot summer day, our corporate headquarters had mechanical problems, causing the air-conditioning system to fail.   It would be non-functioning for the next work day.  A corporate memo was distributed to every employee explaining that while there was no air conditioning, employees would be permitted to dress in “business casual” attire.  Immediately, the entire office was abuzz, celebrating like children on the last day of school.  But as the day wore on, it became apparent that “business casual” left much to the imagination.  A few hours later, another memo materialized, this from the CEO’s secretary—a very southern belle of a certain age—making explicit the conditions of the relaxed dress code.

Men were permitted to wear khaki pants, a golf shirt or button-down with no tie.  Women were required to wear dresses or skirt and blouse with pantyhose.  Pantyhose!  A corporate memo made it very clear that although temperatures in the no-open-window office were expected to reach 100 degrees, women had dang well better wear their pantyhose.

This edict—both the stocking requirement and the ridiculousness of memo itself—created the opposite of its intended affect.  Rather than clarifying the issue, it inflamed everyone.  The women in particular were in an uproar over the fact that the company could dictate such a prissy and sexist requirement.   The men, on the other hand, were angling to be assigned to “pantyhose police.”

Several years went by, bringing in a younger and more enlightened CEO.  Immediately, he was taken aback by the strict dress code, wondering how many great computer engineers turned down jobs with us because of the suit-and-tie environment.   He was quick to relax the dress code, establishing “business casual” as the new norm.  

Over the last decade or two, the profile of America’s biggest companies has changed dramatically.  So has the work environment.  The business suit requirement hardly applies to visits with clients anymore.  The term “business casual” no longer carries with it the sense of dressing “up” for work.  More and more businesses allow jeans, sneakers, shorts, and T-shirts.  About ten years ago, I was invited to a consulting firm to pitch a strategic planning engagement and was told to dress “informally.”  I wore a proper Hillary-style pantsuit, only to find the company’s CEO in cut-offs and a T-shirt.

Perhaps the progressive evolution of the American workplace is responsible for rendering the term “business casual” meaningless.  Where it once indicated a certain minimum standard of dress, today it seems to indicate a freedom to choose comfortable, informal attire.   Indeed, it has become like the penny in our currency—no longer carrying enough weight to matter.  “Smart casual” is the new “business casual,” a distinction that implies crispness and pressed creases.   These are clothes with a destination and a purpose.

Today, I work mainly from home in the most comfortable attire possible.  I enjoy the occasional visit to my client’s offices, giving me the opportunity to elevate my appearance.  But I never wear pantyhose and I never smash two words together into one.  Neither of these seems smart to me.