Brad Rateike: Work-from-home might end superficial judgments

During my junior year at Franklin College, I had the privilege of interning at a large company in downtown Indianapolis. Though I had visited downtown many times in high school, it was essentially as a tourist. I had never spent time in a professional environment for an extended period. This was my first “real” experience to put on a resume, and I wanted it to go well.

I was going to an office every day, so I needed to look the part. That said, at 19 years old, I was by no means a “clothes horse.” Jeans, Birkenstocks and fraternity T-shirts filled my closet. However, I was heading into the “rigid” world of business casual, so I had to tighten up my clothing game.

Fortunately, more than a handful of the 28 men at the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity house were about my size, so I found enough khaki pants/button-down sweater combinations from our collective wardrobe to get by. I had one suit and maybe a blue blazer, but I could not wear those every day. Either way, I was not going to let a dress code interrupt my budding professional career.

After a few weeks of shadowing my boss—a senior executive at the company—I accompanied him to a meeting a few blocks away with the longtime head of a trade association. I shook “John’s” hand as we arrived and introduced myself. He stood there in his suit and tie, still shaking my hand, and asked, “What kind of dress code do they have at your office?” Without hesitation, I replied, “Business casual, sir.” He turned to my boss and said, “You know what they say—casual dress, casual mind.”

I was stunned. Good manners permitted me from responding inappropriately, but I was embarrassed. My boss chuckled, although I interpreted his laughter to be along the lines of, “Hey, why are you picking on the kid?” which made me feel better.

My boss never brought up the conversation and neither did I, though I have since viewed it as a teaching moment. It was the first time someone had told me to my face that they made a judgment about me as a person based on something completely superficial.

I guess I knew that people “judge” all the time, but I secretly hoped everyone was judging other people and not paying attention to me. Alas, John burst that bubble. In the arena of work horses vs. show horses, John (I will give him the benefit of the doubt) probably wanted both, but it was clear he could never view me as a work horse if he did not see a little show horse on display.

In many ways, the pandemic-induced work-from-home era has substantially decreased the number of superficial judgments we might or might not intentionally make each day. I hope that is a positive change. However, it does make me wonder how the definition of “success” will change in personnel assessments as we contemplate one day working in proximity with one another again.

A remote environment favors the work horses, i.e. those who produce, as opposed to those who merely present well. I would argue the two are not mutually exclusive. I can teach someone to present well, but I cannot guarantee they can produce.

However, during these times, do we need to adjust the barrier to entry so we do not prematurely assess someone’s professional potential based on the shirt they wear on a Zoom call?•

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Rateike is founder and owner of BAR Communications and served as director of cabinet communications for President Donald Trump. Send comments to ibjedit@ibj.com.

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