Spaniard here. I was talking to a friend who lives in Scotland and works as a teacher. She said that they are not allowed to wear jeans at work, but they can wear sneakers. That combination of formal-casual is already odd to me, but I was really surprised to hear about the no jeans policy.
Here in Spain most public employees and I’d say many of those in private sector jobs (with the exceptions of law firms, executives, finance, top white collar workers) are allowed to wear jeans at work.
How is this in your country and your job? Jeans, yes/no? Formal, semiformal, casual?
EDIT: changed “informal” to “casual”.
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It probably depends on where you work, but I think most work places allow pretty casual wear.
Personally I like dressing up a bit in general. But I don’t do that when going to work as my workplace has a very casual dress code. Many people wear jeans, hoodies etc. So I’d feel strange going into work wearing heels and a blazer.
Depends on the company and the industry obviously, but in general it’s very informal nowadays.
I work in sales for a big corporation, and jeans and a t-shirt + hoodie is completely fine (obviously different on days where I have a meeting with a customer). Some colleagues dress up a bit more, but it’s mostly personal preference and nothing else.
The only things that have been specified at my workplace are no shorts, no cleavages, and no hats indoors. Other than that you can wear basically what you want, but the general expectation is business casual. Jeans are fine.
I work in IT and in my old company everyone was wearing jeans and sneakers but in my current company we have to wear suits and the likes because it’s a big multinational corporation so it depends on the company but yeah overall it’s usually more casual
Scot here, I would say that when they have these policies it’s often meaning no ripped jeans etc, I wore plain black jeans to school even though there was ban on it, no teacher ever pulled me up on it. British schools have an odd relationship with uniforms.
At work now I wear jeans and a t-shirt, I’m an engineer in an office. If ever anyone comments on it I tell them you pay for my brain not my wardrobe. I usually have a shirt in the office though incase I do have to meet a non engineering client but that’s not a common occurrence. I will say my office is quite young and they tend to be more pragmatic, the older employees that are 50+ tend to dress more formally.
In my previous job at big and famous international company I saw once department manager to attend physical meeting with shorts and barefooted. One man in IT wore regularly kilt skirt and another leather hoses.
We didn’t had any dress code until one day we got e-mail saying “from now on see-through blouses for ladies are not permitted.” We were like “omg, it’s discusting. Where, and do you have any pictures of examples?” Nobody didn’t know what incident triggered that e-mail, but rumours said that some ladies in our Riga office were too brave during summer. Unfortunately I worked in Tallinn office at this time.
Now I work in smaller startup company and we have regular people here wearing regular clothes, it means jeans and t-shirt what looks like the cleanest one from laundry bin.
Few days ago I was in BMW dealership to pick up some spare parts I ordered and surprised to see that salesman over the counter wore buttoned up blouse, tie and a suit.
I wear jeans all the time and nobody had any problem with that. Nobody.
I work in a pharmacy and I can wear whatever I want – a polo shirt, a normal shirt, a T-shirt, a pullover, jeans… But I can’t wear shorts because that’s “unprofessional”.
Last summer I suffered a lot because it was hot as hell but the AC was adjusted to the needs of geriatric patients and my older coworkers, so something that would fit my body would be too cold for literally everyone else. I was sweating below the waist like a pig and it was really uncomfortable. I don’t service patients all the time, so I started taking shorts with me and whenever I had to go out there to the patients I changed in the toilet. But it was inconvenient so I had to look for very thin trousers and I fortunately found a pair.
But, there’s one guy (very “famous” in our industry in Poland) who has a PhD in pharmacy and he used to work in pharmacies in the UK, Finland, Australia, something like that. And he let the success go to his head way too much. I once watched a webinar of his about the dress code in a pharmacy. He insisted that every male pharmacist should wear a complete suit and a tie (WTF), but not a real tie, just in case an angry patient tries to pull it and strangle you (WTF). And of course very formal shoes. Plus no facial hair at all. But you can wear sideburns, however only a few centimeters measured with a ruler (WTF). And all female pharmacists should wear a two-piece dress (WTF).
Honestly, I’m going to work to WORK, not to look so good as if I was going out to a five-star restaurant. Plus in this job you have to carry heavy things, you sometimes have to kneel on the floor to look for something in the cabinet, you can get dirty, and you can sweat. Obviously, he thinks that a pharmacist doesn’t have to engage in such activities, but it makes him a big pompous buffoon.
Im a university teacher (not a professor, more like a work group teacher) and I wear jeans. In fact I wear *almost* the same as I’d wear outside of work, which is pretty casual. What I don’t wear are my more alternative-style clothes or very revealing clothes (like tank tops, cropped tops, shorts).
When I got this job I tried to shop for some ‘normal’/generic and semiformal clothes (as I like to wear things that are a bit alternative), but I just didn’t feel like myself in them and that made me very uncomfortable. So now I just choose something from the more ‘normal’ range in my closet :p
You can wear almost anything. I had teachers in a suit but also in ripped jeans. No one cares. Only exception might be we waiters in a fancy restaurant and some banks and similar companies might want their employees look a bit more representative. But I think official restrictions are pretty rare.
Depends on the job, but I’m a civil servant in Northern Ireland (not public facing) and its a complete mix of people dressing like I insist on wearing (shirt, black jeans, brogues) to people sitting in t-shirts, hoodies, leggings, tracksuits, etc.
If you are front facing in the CS you need to dress somewhat nicely though but it’s still somewhat discretionary. Only big no is wearing sports logos, political things or anything else that could be construed as offensive.
Jeans and T-shirt. I once had a job where I was told I should not wear hoodie with anything on it like signs or pictures(I had large wolf on it). “Plain” hoodie was ok though.
Anyway in manual labor jobs it’s usually montérky, it’s like boiler suit, but just pants and t-shirt with company logo.
I’ve told this story already, but here we go. In 2008 we’ve been sent to the US office with another colleague. In California, in July. So we arrived in sandals, shorts and t-shirts, wearing backpacks as Czech tradition demands. Also I had earrings and shaved head.
We were constantly stared at. Even in the “casual” californian office the usual attire was jeans, closed shoes, and a shirt.
Really depends on your job I’d say. I work in the management consultancy business so suits are the normal thing (though without tie).
You always adapt to the client you’re working for. For instance, in an M&A company, nothing changes. But in government agencies it’s usually very relaxed (like t-shirts and jeans are pretty common) and in those cases I dress down so I won’t stick out like a sore thumb.
Software engineering in the UK, large US company, no real dress code as such but most of us aren’t customer facing.
I dress like a slob most times. I wear my [old work boots](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/ff/4a/07/ff4a079c96d2ddc5ef16a8a7e97338db—hours-blundstone-boots.jpg), shorts, and a t-shirt. Nothing offensive on the t-shirt, maybe nerdy stuff or just a nice picture/design.
If I had to meet with customers, I’d wear slacks/trousers, leather shoes, and a work shirt, no tie. i.e. I’d wear my interview clothes that I’ve not worn in years.
For customers, I will polish the workboots and wear trousers which hide the top of them so they look like normal leather shoes.
As long as you don’t take the piss, you can wear whatever you want in my office.
Depends on the job. I work for a large multinational corporation in their finance/accounting dpt.
Office policy says no open-toed shoes, no workout clothes, no excessive cleavage, no ripped jeans unless it’s like just a small detail, leggings don’t count as pants. 95% of things go, and frankly they’d lose their workers otherwise. I dress very casual but usually in dresses/skirts because waistbands suck when you sit all day and have both stomach problems and sensory issues.
Depends on the line of work. I work in schools with children and everyone just wears whatever they feel like as long as it’s comfortable to them. I personally mostly wear tracksuit/jogging pants and a hoodie most of the time. My line of work is pretty famous for wearing very casual stuff
I’m glad that this is also changing in other industries. “formal attire” is simply a dumb and outdated concept.
I only heard that jeans are too casual in some countries a few months ago and that was a big surprise. In Poland teachers can definitely wear them and in general they can dress however they want as long as it’s reasonable. The same in my job, we don’t have any dress code and I suspect that’s a standard in a lot of places.