As summer starts, discussions about suitable office dress code flares up again. In past years, full-length films have graciously dominated the discussion, this year, shorts came shining through. Dave McPartlin, a 46-year-old headteacher from Lancashire, has taken a bold decision. No wonder he wears shorts to work in the sweltering heat during the last weeks of term! He says to enforce a dress code it has to be well articulated. Otherwise, it remains “preposterous” to burden personal attire. This feeling resonates with so many of us working in the profession. Among them is Tony Hardy, chief executive of a Northumberland headquartered branding agency.
McPartlin, who heads up a primary school, has recently been seen wearing shorts during the hot weather, putting comfort and practicality first. He wants his employees to be able to dress however they want to dress. Even with a clear dress code, we shouldn’t stymie their personal expression. I don’t think they have the slightest concern, he added, about how people feel about dress codes in their places of work.
Tony Hardy, an extremist in this regard as well, usually found in athletic shorts while helicoptering his stable of nine employees. His company’s branding agency has a come-as-you-are dress code, where everyone is free to wear shorts—even in front of clients! Hardy argues that comfort is essential for productivity, stating, “Imagine sweating buckets all day and being really uncomfortable and then expecting them to turn out great work.”
The shorts-to-work trend isn’t just for teachers and department directors. Diane Brander, who sometimes chooses shorts to work in, agrees. Nevertheless, this loose interpretation of the dress code invites concerns regarding professionalism and whether or not casual attire is fitting in various settings.
Short shorts as work appropriate are “very much a grey area. Her recommendation is for people to judge how risky they think their company’s dress code enforcement is before choosing whether or not to wear shorts. “Because it will cause you far too much stress to get the look right and you maybe won’t feel confident about pulling it off,” Taylor explained.
Experts in the fashion industry are split on the matter. If a few would be lenient in the office on shorts, Carmen Bellot, style editor at Esquire magazine, says many won’t. Especially in professional spaces where dress codes are often vague and confusing.
Discussion about professional dress not only affects their rhetoric, but their corporate culture. A spokesperson for PwC noted that their firm does not impose strict guidelines on clothing choices: “We don’t list items that people can and can’t wear.” In contrast, Santander emphasizes that “anything that could be beachwear isn’t okay for the office,” highlighting a more conservative approach to professional dress codes.
As organizations adapt to changing workplace cultures, the question remains: are shorts suitable for the office? Though some industries have adopted the comfort of business casual, many others are set in their old business ways. The shoe saga’s simplest takeaway is a revealing window into bigger societal changes toward comfort and self-expression in the workplace.