Work advice: My employee wears provocative outfits in the office. Help!

"I get complaints from co-workers that her flesh-baring outfits are distracting and unprofessional."

New York Times advice columnist Anna Holmes answers readers’ work-related questions.

Q: A woman who works for me dresses in a provocative fashion. We work in a formal professional setting. She wore a black lace dress with cleavage on a Monday, and I blurted out, “Boy, you’re dressed up for a Monday!” Her response was that she had a date that night.

I get complaints from co-workers that her flesh-baring outfits are distracting and unprofessional. I contacted HR, and their response was for me to handle it. I know you’re not meant to comment on appearances, and this is a sensitive topic. Help!

– Anonymous

A: Wow. This week is full of tough questions with no easy answers. (Which is part of the reason I picked them.) I have some experience with this. A female co-worker at a long-ago gig used to wear very loose tank tops with no bra underneath, meaning that she often bared her breasts when she bent over. It was mortifying, distracting and unprofessional – but at the same time I was fascinated. The co-worker, whom I’ll call Abby, had to know what she was doing, which suggested an exhibitionist side that, if I’m honest, I found a bit amusing.

The thing is: I wasn’t her supervisor. Beyond a few times when I whispered, “Abby! I can see your breasts!” I didn’t feel like I had the standing to say anything. You, on the other hand, do have standing – not to mention the go-ahead from HR. So I think you have to own this one and act on your co-workers’ complaints. I’m torn, however, as to whether you should communicate expectations around dress to the group as a whole. Doing so might embarrass the employee, since it’s possible that she’s the only offender in terms of inappropriate attire. So I’m leaning toward discussing it with her directly.

As for how to do this? You can use some of the phrasing you used in your letter to me. For example: “I understand that many workplaces nowadays have adopted a more ‘business casual’ dress code, but we work in a formal professional setting and I expect staffers to show up to work in formal, professional attire.” (It might be – or feel – harder to do this if you’re a man, I want to acknowledge, but if you choose the right language, it should work.)

Vanessa Friedman, The New York Times’ chief fashion critic, suggests that you first find a neutral space where you can chat with your employee – not your office, which could feel disempowering for her. Start the conversation by acknowledging that, though she is within her rights to dress how she wishes, her colleagues are commenting on her attire, which is taking away from their perception or understanding of the quality of her work. “It may be useful information, if delivered the right way,” Friedman said.

I also consulted with Susan Scafidi, the founder of the Fashion Law Institute at Fordham Law School. She told me that the important thing when speaking to an employee about an unprofessional appearance at work is to avoid addressing any immutable characteristics, like hair or body type. “You can say, ‘You are absolutely entitled to have your own style, but for this office, we prefer to be a little more covered up, and that’s true for all of our colleagues,‘” Scafidi said. “And that’s about the best you can do.” Scafidi also wonders whether there’s a workplace standard, or dress code, in place at your office; if so, she suggests that you review it and share it with your employee.

Listen, there could be a whole host of things going on here, including differences in what is considered appropriate, clothing-wise, among and between older and younger generations. (“It has been ever thus,” Friedman said.) Economic circumstances should also be taken into consideration. Professional attire can be expensive and difficult to access when you’re an entry-level or younger employee. I had experience with this earlier in my career, when I regularly wore the “nicest” things I had – strappy sundresses – to an internship in a wood-paneled office of a storied magazine. I still wince at the thought.

But ultimately, there’s only so much you can do. It’s very possible that your employee is aware of her sartorial provocations but just doesn’t care. (It sounds like this may be the case.) “You can tell if someone is freaking out or having any sort of reaction at all to what you’re wearing,” Friedman said. “And I think the manager can say: ‘Look, I support you. I support your right to wear what you want. But maybe consider putting a jacket on.‘”

Do dogs belong at work?

"My co-worker’s dog is allowed to walk around the office freely, as if it was a human being."

Q: I’ve started a new job at a small, private, predominantly white company, and I am one of few African Americans in the overall company. The others are working from home, as they are tenured employees. It is a VERY dog-friendly environment, and I do not like pets or animals of any kind. My co-worker’s dog is allowed to walk around the office freely, as if it was a human being. The dog has no concept of personal space and gets extremely close to me after we have an awkward staring match. I feel compelled to lightly pet it, because my white co-workers are watching my interaction with the dog. I fake-smile and pretend like I’m OK with it when I am tortured on the inside.

I overheard other co-workers discussing that they may bring their dogs in the office, too, and it’s honestly making me feel super uncomfortable. Now, this is a predominantly WFH job, so there will be few times where I will actually have to be in the office. But while I’m still in training I do have to show up in person. Everyone else in the office sees no issue with the dog being present and in fact encourages it. I already feel slightly out of place as the only Black person in the office, and I don’t want to ostracise myself even more by saying I hate dogs/animals. So should I just suck it up until WFH kicks in – or should I say something?

– Anonymous

A: First of all, we need to address your discomfort with being one of the only Black employees in your small company. Been there, done that. (Most of my life, in fact.) My experience is one where I’ve felt both like I stand out among my (white) professional peers by being Black, while at the same time feeling invisible to them as a human. One of my experiences with this involved a smarmy white manager in a small private company who hired multiple women of colour to serve in roles below him, a savvy sleight of hand that made him look politically progressive while at the same time providing cover for his lack of curiosity about the actual lives they led and his contemptuous manner toward them when they dared disagree with him about, well, anything.

Why do I bring all this up? Because you say that you don’t want to be ostracised “even more”, a phrasing that suggests you already feel punished at work in some form or fashion. And, because your letter makes no mention of challenges that relate directly to your job performance or any negative professional feedback you’ve received, your choice of words suggests something sinister, namely that you’re being (or feeling!) punished for being Black.

I’d ask you to sit with this for a moment and ask yourself a few questions. Have you felt this way from the beginning? Have you noticed a difference in treatment toward your other Black colleagues? Would you feel comfortable approaching one or more of these colleagues for a discussion about how they’ve navigated this mostly white space? These are not questions you necessarily need to answer right now, but they might help you better understand your current work situation and feelings of alienation.

On to the dog(s). I’ll admit that it’s a lot more difficult for me – a big animal lover – to put myself in your shoes, especially because the dog you describe doesn’t sound threatening, just annoying. (Most dogs are very people-oriented and affectionate, so it’s hard to expect them to adhere to human concepts of personal space.)

It’s also hard for me to tell whether your dislike is rooted in fear, which would change things, in my mind. Why? Because I don’t think saying something about disliking the dog is going to go over well with your colleagues. (As a pet owner, I hate to say it, but it’s true.)

If, however, you’re frightened of animals – or say that you are – I hope that there will be enough empathy on your co-workers’ part that they might try to keep their dog away from you. Emphasis on “try”: Without tying the dog up, which I don’t think the co-worker will or should do, the dog will go where he or she wants to go, and that will sometimes be in your direction.

Barring some way of closing off your workspace so that the dog cannot get near you while you’re working – a baby gate? Bear with me, I’m just spitballing here – I think you’re going to have to either say something to your co-worker or an HR representative about being scared, or steel yourself and try to tolerate your extreme discomfort when you’re in the office. I get that it’s not fun. At all. (You use the word “torture” to describe your inner turmoil.) You can try saying the dog is distracting – which it might very well be, even and especially for animal lovers. But though we dog people might be judgmental about others’ uninterest in other creatures, we’re much less likely to bristle against others’ fears, which is why “I’m scared” is your most compelling card to play. Let us know what happens!

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Written by: Anna Holmes

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