TJ Walker (live stream) gives practical advice on how clothing, grooming, and on-camera wardrobe affect professional perception. He emphasizes dressing consistent with industry norms (e.g., artists vs. mutual fund managers vs. high-tech vs. white-shoe law firms), advises simpler/on-camera clothing (solids, avoid white/black extremes and stripes), and recommends purposeful grooming that aligns with one’s role to avoid confusing others.
Chapters
A part of your body language in the workplace is what you're wearing, how your hair is styled. Now, there's no one perfect way. It varies from industry to industry. If you are a modern artist, you don't want to dress in a conservative, boring suit and tie and conservative clothing. If you are working in a very conservative, traditional mutual fund where everyone else wears a suit and tie, you probably don't want to show up in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts. A lot of this is just common sense, and yet people often violate it. The main thing you're looking for when it comes to your dress is are you dressed in a way that is consistent with how people expect someone in your shoes, in your position, your job to be, or are they confused? If you're confusing them, that's generally a bad thing. Again, I'm not telling you to dress like me or anyone else, but I want you to have a real thought to it. There should be a purpose to how you're dressing so that it advances your career and advances what you're all about. Why am I wearing this? For example, I used to wear a suit and tie in all my videos because I typically wear a suit and tie when conducting media training workshops with executives at major corporations and major political leaders. But what I found is this is a more intimate environment. Online, people are watching from home on a bus somewhere. They're casually dressed. And there are industries, like high tech, for example, where it's the kiss of death to be seen in a suit and tie. So that's why I have this. This is what I call sort of my not to shirt. It's not too formal, obviously, it's not too distracting. There's no patterns jumping around. It's not too black because there's actually a lot of white in here. So you can see some nuance. You can see where the arms and the torso are different. It's not too light, obviously, and no one's bothered by it. I have worn ties before where people write in now, what'd you wear that ugly tie for? It clashes or it pixelates. So when you are thinking of how to dress, if you're doing anything on video, simpler is better. Solids are better. Avoiding white clothing, avoid solid black. And I realize to some of you this looks solid black, but it isn't. Avoid stripes. They jump around. That's if you're going to be on tv. But if it's for the typical day in the office, you want to be dressed by the standards of your workplace and your organization. Now, I've been to High tech companies where people are fabulously wealthy and it's seen as really odd to have an expensively tailored suit. It would cut against your credibility in other places. If you don't have an expensively tailored suit, it doesn't look good for you. There are certain white shoe law firms here in New York City where friends of mine who are attorneys say, dj, I never ever see a client in person. I don't go to court, but I still wear the tailored suit with the French cuffs and the thousand dollar handmade shoes. Because that's the expectation. If you want to play in the game, you got to dress the uniform is their expression. So every industry is a little different. Give some thought to it because you might not care about clothes, a lot of people do. You might not care about shoes, a lot of people do. Not going to spend a lot of time talking about hair, but just realize every industry has certain standards. And you know, some industries, me being clean shaven would look really weird and strange. Other industries, having a beard. Even though beards are almost the default position of so many men in the world, in the work world these days, some professions, it's still considered a little out there. So you've got to figure that out. Have something that isn't distracting, either accentuates what you're about or at least doesn't get in the way. That's why I don't have a lot up here. I just try to keep it as short as possible and, and that way nobody thinks I'm trying to fool them with long comb overs or all sorts of complications. There's less, not a lot there, but there's not much to distract you. That's why I keep it short. Am I telling you to cut your hair short? No. You got to figure out what works for you. Because all of this is sending a message to your clients, customers, prospects of who you are and how you want to be perceived.
