To Dress, or Not to Dress: That is the Question

Maybe you don’t have to worry about employees coming to work in flashy, risqué evening gowns, but you may have to deal with other wardrobe and general appearance faux pas.  Sure we have to consider multi-generational differences and want to allow our employees the opportunity to be self-expressive.  That does not, however, mean we must allow them to dress inappropriately. 

If you are looking to add information about personal appearance to your company handbook, you might not want to take advice from Kelly Rowland.   Rowland, singer and once member of Destiny’s Child gone solo, made an appearance at the Grammy Awards earlier this month wearing a dress that would have violated any personal appearance policy I have ever seen.  While CBS is said to have distributed a memo about appropriate attire, US Weekly reports Rowland as saying, “"It's so funny! I thought about the dress code and thought about it again, and that's about it."

OK, maybe you don’t have to worry about employees coming to work in flashy, risqué evening gowns, but you may have to deal with other wardrobe and general appearance faux pas.   Sure we have to consider multi-generational differences and want to allow our employees the opportunity to be self-expressive.  That does not, however, mean we must allow them to dress inappropriately. 

Businesses have different needs when it comes to their personal appearance policy.   If you are working in a machine shop, you most likely would want to make sure your policy does not allow employees to wear loose clothing, long hair that is not properly pinned back or jewelry that could be caught in one of the machines.   Maybe you have safety gear (special goggles, protective clothing, steel-toed boots, etc.) that must be worn in certain areas.  Maybe you want your managers and outside sales staff to represent the company in a way that is appropriate for their job duties.  What about tattoos and piercings?  These requirements should be clearly defined in the personal appearance policy.  (We will discuss the topic of piercings and tattoos next week.)

Your personal appearance policy should also include actions that the company may take against an employee who does not adhere to the policy.  Again, these actions should be clearly spelled out for the employees.  This way, if they choose to go against the policy, like Kelly Rowland did, they will know that there will be consequences.  Of course, training your managers to enforce these policies, and being consistent with the enforcement, is key to keeping you in the office and out of the courtroom.

To read the full article by US Weekly go to: http://ow.ly/hTPfm

About the Author:

Darlene Fenn is a Southern California HR consultant with over 20 years of experience in HR and the prevention methods a business needs to minimize risk and maximize their human ROI.  You can find out more information on Darlene at www.cohrconsulting.com.