My office's dress code is smart casual. Recently I wore a short, but still smart, skirt into work and my manager told me it was inappropriate. Now that it's summer, how do you suggest I strike the balance between coping with the warm weather and looking professional?
Clearly someone who has been working with you has felt uncomfortable and the fact that somebody has felt strongly enough to say it, probably means it's been noticed by quite a few people and the way you dress has been making people feel uncomfortable.
It is not appropriate to make people that you are working with and around feel uncomfortable. Appropriate is a good word, because appropriateness depends entirely on the environment which you are working in — it would be silly to say you can't wear shorts if you were working in a sports club, say.
Talking about the weather is a little bit disingenuous because there are plenty of ways to keep cool in the hot weather. When I'm travelling in very hot countries I very rarely show bare skin and find wearing light coloured cottons and linens is often cooler. You can get some very smart, slightly looser items of clothing such as lovely fitted cotton jackets.
If there are people feeling uncomfortable in the workplace, then your employer is unlikely to get the best results from them. You should wear something that is more appropriate, so you can do a better job and your colleagues can do a better job too.
Deborah Meaden is author of Common Sense Rules (Random House, £7.99). Read more advice from Deborah Meaden.
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