I've never been a suit person - weddings, funerals, court appearances only for me.

Do others wear a suit when visiting clients or at work generally? Or is shirt and tie acceptable? I've never even been a tie person either but I've ended up buying more ties in the last three weeks than the previous 47 years.

I always wear suit and tie on first meeting with a client. After that it depends on what I think makes the client feel more comfortable and that's more of an art than a science. As a rule, I'm more likely to wear jeans and T shirt when meetings subbies than, say, graphic designers.

I can see Shamus's point about getting into the right mindset, but as I work from home I would feel silly wearing a whistle when I have no meetings scheduled.

I'm with Fred, I generally wear a suit for at least the first meeting. After that it depends.

I got some shirts embroidered early on in my business and tend to wear them, without a tie. I never wear a tie unless I'm going to court.

I once heard someone say "how intelligent is it to start your day by putting a noose round your neck". I always find it a pointless piece of attire.

Kris

Sonia, is that their birthday suit!!! Lol

Spamkebab wrote:

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Tee hee 'male members' Tee Hee.

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 Someone had to say it, and it had to be you Neil, didn't it  

For me I wear suit for first meeting, then dress for the day after that. Some of my clients are not in smart offices (ones in a quarry), and I feel that some clients do not feel comfortable with me wearing a suit.

If I was going to a meeting that would involve negotiations, I would always wear suit, as they have a psychological on the other party. Went on one of those weird training course a few years ago, when I was in employment, that was all about personal image in business. Never had much use for it but a couple of things made sense

Bill

Edit: Just wanted to add on the subject of work clothing. Why have jeans (even Levis) got so thin in the last ten years? I know Levi changed there looms a few years back. If you want decent heavy denim jeans now you have to pay about £200 to get them from Japan (who bought tyhe origianl Levi looms)

-- Edited by Wella on Monday 11th of February 2013 06:29:01 PM

Always wear a suit and tie when either seeing a client or in the office.  Probably comes from habit having worked in CA offices for 15 years. (in fact just ordered another 3 shirts today)

Only time dont wear one is if in office at weekend.

I am with Shaun in that you feel more at "work" when you wear your tie and collar.  Whenever I was in practice and was a dress down day it always felt different.

Regards

Mark

Amanda wrote:

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I do agree with your Mark, its abit like women wearing make-up. I always wear make-up, not always loads of it, but wouldn't go to see a client without it on, it just makes you feel better and more professional.

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You've definitely got it easier when it comes to what you wear. More choice. 

Plus Neil, of course there's the other cost effective bonus that the store detectives don't home in on the people wearing suits so if you absolutely have to steal a can of beans from Tesco's, wear Armani.

... Mmm, invest in a £1200 suit to steal 60p can of beans... I see the business equivalent of that almost every day in the sets of books that cross my desk.

Peasie wrote:

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Amanda wrote:

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I do agree with your Mark, its abit like women wearing make-up. I always wear make-up, not always loads of it, but wouldn't go to see a client without it on, it just makes you feel better and more professional.

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You've definitely got it easier when it comes to what you wear. More choice. 

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Wadda ya mean peasie...

We can get black suits from Armani

We can get black suits from Calvin Klien

We can get black suits from Hugo Boss

We can get black suits from Jeff Banks

We can get black suits from Givenchy

We can get black suits from Vivienne Westwood

We can get black suits from Gucci

We can get black suits from Paul Smith

We can get black suits from Versace

and all the way down to black suits from Sainsbury's, Tesco and Asda....

... And you say that we have no choice! lol

LOL @ pulling you ear lobe Peasie, I thought that was a poker players 'tell' didn't know shoplifters worked that way too.

Imagine John McCririck shoplifting?

Every time that I go in Asda (at least twice a week) no matter what else I buy, I head to the stationary isle and get a pack of 100 6*4 index cards (£1). When I go to Tesco (2-3 times a week) I do the same with 100 5*3 index cards for the same price.

You would think that by now I would be drowning under a sea of index cards but I think that the fairies must be away with them at night as no matter how many I buy I always seem to be running low.

5*3's are for memory decks where there's a short question on one side and short answer on the other (i.e IAS37 (front of card), Provisions, Contingent Liabilities and Contingent Assets (back of card).
6*4's are for proper questions, (i.e. taxpayer has £X income, gifts shares of £X to charity, Building society interest of £X, Dividends of £X, loan interest of £X for investment in a close company What is the tax liability. Then have the full answer on the reverse)

Also, I never throw index cards away. If I mess them up or they go out of date and they are beyond tippex (as with the tax example above) then I just use them as bookmarks the way you do with the milk bottle tops.

On the shoplifting front my boy has a terrible habit of getting really close to the shelf when looking at things the way shoplifters do when slipping things in their coats without the CCTV seeing it and that makes me really paranoid that the store detectives are going to descend on us.

I think that "Male Forum Members" would have sounded more like the appealing to the problem page from a girlie mag, lol.

Any colour shirt, tie, trousers and feel undressed without a waistcoat - I wear one more often than the jacket.

Don Tax wrote:

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Any colour shirt, tie, trousers and feel undressed without a waistcoat - I wear one more often than the jacket.

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Agreed except that none of the buttons do up on mine anymore!

Time to hit the gym methinks

 

 

Very rarely wear a suit anymore. Smart jeans or trousers with jumper in the winter. I have branded polo's for the summer.

The main reason for not wearing a suit is that I don't want to mislead that meeting. If I am going to be casual thereafter it seems a bit pointless.


The last time I wore one was when I did a group presentation for someone else. The only other occasion would be where I am occasionally doing some client facing consultancy for aNother firm of accountants.

To answer the original question: No, abso-frelling-lutely not. My normal attire is a pair of cargo pants (or jeans, but only if I've been too lazy to do the washing so I have no clean cargos) with a t-shirt in summer, and a jumper or sweatshirt in winter. And I only shave on average once per week - doing that every morning is just too much like hard work.

Yes, even on the rare occasion that I'm meeting a client for the first time.

If someone looks at how I'm dressed and draws from some idiotic stereotype and assumes from it that I'm somehow incapable of doing the job, then sod them: they aren't the type of person I want to work for anyway.

(It's almost as if I'm trying to put people off so I don't have to do too much work, isn't it?)

VinceH wrote:

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I only wear the hat when I'm off walking in the mountains

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yer right.

I've got you pegged as the gunslinger from Westworld Vince, lol.

With me the issue does not come down to what the client expects me to wear but rather what I expect me to wear.

If I wore jeans I would feel that I was not showing a client the respect that they deserve.

Also the suit lets it be known that you are serious (well, unless it's a Tesco's 19.99 one in which instance jeans would have been a better call).

The above said, I've worked in IT departments where the one not in a suit is the one that you need to listen to as anyone who doesn't care whether they are fired as they know that there are half a dozen companies just waiting to hire them is to be respected.

So in a way, they are not wearing a suit as a suit. (that probably makes sense only in my little world but I know what I mean).