my boss’s boss was “concerned for my reputation” because I was at a hotel breakfast in sweats and a tank top

A reader writes:

This past week, I was working a conference out of town. Not attending one, actually doing to the work to make it happen. I wore professional dress on the plane the way there because I immediately had to go into a board meeting when I arrived. Then the next day, I wore professional dress for 16 hours while I worked. Slacks, blouse, blazer both days.

On the final day, I wasn’t working the event. I had to go to the airport early and so I wore a tank top and clean athleisure joggers and a sweater. I stopped down early to have breakfast so I didn’t have to charge the company money for breakfast at the airport. I was eating in the tank and joggers outside the room with the attendees and was not working in any way.

I flew home, logged into work, and had a meeting with my boss. As an aside to our meeting, she mentioned that her boss was at the event and saw me that morning and was concerned about what I was wearing. He had been assured I was not there in a professional capacity and was just getting food before the airport, but he was “concerned about my reputation” because of how I was dressed.

At first I thought it was funny and a little embarrassing. But I can’t stop thinking about it and the more I think about it, the more I see that is straight up misogyny to believe that two days of impeccable professionalism could be destroyed by wearing a tank top and that I’m not the problem here, the hypothetical person offended is the problem and my boss’s boss is the problem for believing that my dress was the problem and not the perception of the hypothetical person.

So now I don’t know what to do (other than never dress casually at work ever again), and I don’t know if I just let this go as another example of being a woman in a professional environment held to a different standard, if I talk to my boss about it, or if I would talk to her boss about it (who is, of course, the highest-ranking person in our organization).

What would I even say? How do I frame it, assuming I bring it up at all?

“Concerned about your reputation”? Because you were in a tank top and joggers?

Yes, it’s misogyny. I can guarantee you that if he saw a male colleague in an equivalent outfit at breakfast, he would not tell that person’s boss that he was “concerned about his reputation.”

First, men’s clothes don’t trigger the same judgment in people who say this kind of thing. Second, if he did think your male coworker was too causally dressed for breakfast, he’d relay it as, “Tell Bob to dress for work when he comes down to breakfast,” not as “concern for his reputation.” But I don’t think he’d even say that because men’s clothes just don’t provoke the same paternalistic judgment.

That said, is it worth saying something? It’s hard to say without knowing a lot more about what your boss is like, what your boss’s boss is like, what your relationships with them are like, how much you like your job, and how much capital you have and are interested in spending.

There’s certainly nothing wrong with going back to your boss and saying, “I’ve been thinking about Cecil’s comment that he was ‘concerned for my reputation’ because I wrote sweats and a tank top to breakfast, and I’d like to clarify whether the expectation is that we’ll all dress for work when leaving a hotel after a work trip.” There’s also nothing wrong with saying, “I’m skeptical that he would have expressed the same concern about the reputation of a man eating breakfast in sweatpants.”

But is it worth addressing? Eh. Maybe I’m just worn out from Dealing With It All, but I’d probably only bother if your boss passed it along in a fairly serious way, but not if the tone was more eye-rolling / “Cecil said this ridiculous thing to me.”

The post my boss’s boss was “concerned for my reputation” because I was at a hotel breakfast in sweats and a tank top appeared first on Ask a Manager.

View the full article