I stopped dressing to “impress” after about 4 years in my field. The amount of crap I’ve fixed that was done by more tenured/“experienced” people is too much to count.
At this point, I’m wearing what’s comfortable. If you don’t like it, too bad. I’m here because you need me, not because I want to be.
I’m still paid fairly paltry amounts, so I dunno if I’m the “highest paid” person. Management certainly doesn’t listen to me, but they keep signing the cheques. If you want to pay me to tell you about problems so you know about what you’re refusing to do anything about, I’m okay with that. Your company, your decision.
I’ve actually seen this go the other way before.
I met this dude from Serbia, I can’t remember his name, but he was the friendliest guy you’d ever meet, and was probably about 7 foot tall.
One day our infra team was having an issue with a custom Spark cluster, and he was brought in to help. He came in a full suit that looked tailor made, like he’d just walked off the set of Suits, a suited Galdalf in a room of hobbits dressed in t-shirts around a foot or two smaller than him. He was in the room for two hours, and whatever he installed or ran for everything up and running again, with some extra time to help with some other tweaks.
He worked near my desk, so I asked him if he wanted to come for lunch. He declined because he was busy, so I asked if he wanted me to grab him something. His response “…Cherry Coke”. Once he’d finished, he came over to us, and offered to take us out for food. He paid for everything, including a drink at a nearby whiskey bar he apparently goes to often. I asked him why he wore a suit, and his response was “I’m uncomfortable wearing loose clothes, and I like layered clothing that fits to my frame, so I always wear suits when I need to be comfortable”. In many ways, for someone his size, I guess it made sense.
I miss him sometimes, because he’d always say “hello my British friend” every time he saw me nearby, even though we both lived in Britain, and he definitely knew my name. If I had to guess, the dude probably had a solid mil in stock, and was getting paid a solid £150k a year + more stock. He was definitely rich, because he could afford an apartment in central London near the office. Dude worked probably 60-80 hours a week though, and if asked he was on a plane to the US, India, wherever someone needed a freakishly tall suited guy to fix a data problem.
Guy has plot armor
He’s dressing much nicer than he used to. At least his clothes fit. He used up wear basketball shorts and giant t shirts everywhere
Sounds like business casual to me
Basketball shorts and giant t shirts sounds pretty much like me, though I’m not really the best paid engineer in my company. I might even be the lowest, because everyone else has more experience than me @ 5 years.
Doesn’t the lack of pocket space bother you? I am a cargo shorts forever type of guy…I could and do sleep in cargo shorts from time to time.
I can fit 2 liter water bottles in my pockets. Idk maybe basketball shorts isn’t the correct term. They’re long comfy shorts.
He has some max Payne 3 vibe
I was on a contract for the government when my company hired a really good DBA. He hated dressing up. He was introduced at a meeting and wore a polo shirt, which I thought was fairly professional.
Government contracting guy said to wear a tie.
Next meeting, he wore a tie around his polo shirt.
He was fired on the spot.
There are times I fucking hate the government and this was one of those times.
The guy was fucking amazing. But my company fired him because the government didn’t want someone so sloppy on the team.
Those same government agencies then turn around and hire my company to pull them out of the fire after they royally fuck everything up. We charge a fuck ton, will never go onsite, and they should consider themselves lucky if the engineer is wearing pants.
no pants is okay so long as there’s a tie somewhere in the outfit
just not on a polo
No underwear is ok so long as you’re wearing a top hat.
This explains a lot about why government sites are such garbage.
Government sites are garbage for a lot of reasons, mostly due to old people not understanding how the Internet works and they’d rather build a camel than a horse.
sloppy
in actual work ethics as well or just in perceived social/office norms?
Mostly the latter.
Honestly no database admin is anywhere near that level of “fuck you” influence in any organization. We are more talking about the guy whose name is on all the patents and who is putting together the tech demos which win the big money contracts.
There was a meeting a couple of years ago between my company’s engineers and some NASA representatives. No one in my company really wears suits anymore and the NASA guys complained that it was “unprofessional” to not wear a tie when one of our leads went up to present in just a Tshirt and jeans. After hearing that, the lead went back to his desk and came back with a wooden joke tie hanging around his neck to continue. They stopped criticizing our apparel after that.
I think talking about fashion when you should be talking about engineering is unprofessional. And probably done by someone who doesn’t deserve to feed their family. “Why don’t we have anything to eat daddy? I’m hungry!” “Because daddy likes clothes more than food, so he’s not allowed to have a job ever again.”
I’m interested in knowing what this wooden joke tie looks like
Epic
Hey! It’s me!
Adam Sandler?
Ha! No. Senior engineer showing up to meetings looking like a bum who just rolled out of bed (because I did).
Pssh… This guy is chump change, maybe a senior engineer at best. You can tell by his footwear. The really highly paid engineers have Crocs with socks, if any footwear at all. 😆
If i see a man walking around in my office with a grey wizard beard and barefoot, I will auto assume it’s the senior developer and not a homeless dude.
At my last job we had to visit the company financial office to work on their expensing software and the receptionist actually called security because they thought our lead developer was a homeless person who got into the building.
Audible chuckle
I’m in this comment and I support it.
I used to wear flip flops to the office quite often, back when I went to the office.
The really highly paid engineers don’t show up to meetings, they call in via zoom from their home.
Na, it’s jandles (thongs/flip flops).
Always a t-shirt and shorts in summer.
There’s an interesting cultural difference that I’ve observed. My grandpa was a senior engineer and he was proud to dress immaculately. He went to work in a suit and he never wore less than business casual even when going to the beach. I don’t think he owned any shirt that wasn’t a button-up long-sleeve. I’m an engineer (with a different specialty) and I only wear a suit to job interviews. Generally when I’m at work I’m in jeans and a short-sleeved shirt.
I wonder if it’s a matter of generations or countries or both. When and where my grandpa was young, a suit was very expensive and hierarchies were rigid.
Im not in the US and here most IT people wear casual. The exception is those in fintech which usually have a more formal dresscode. Im always wearing comfy clothes like cargos and a hoodie… And really i couldnt care less if someone at work didnt like what i wear. Im not there to look pretty for them, im there to make stuff work better and make the company more monkey.
I’m an engineer (with a different specialty) and I only wear a suit to job interviews.
I’m in a position that does interviews for software engineering. In my entire time working in this field I’ve seen one person wear a suit to an interview. It made them stand out all right, but not in a good way. We all wondered wtf was wrong with that guy after the interview.
Really? Isn’t it normal to wear suits to interviews?
Not in software development in the US. I wore ripped skinny jeans, converse, and a t-shirt to the most recent in person interview I had. I was hired.
Not in software and website development. It is very out of place.
Maybe this says more about me than anything else… But for me, I’d rather be judged by my work than appearance or credentials. The worse I can look in a corporate environment and still maintain a reputation of a great engineer the more authentic I feel my reputation is.
When I retire I aspire to be well respected by everyone in spite of looking like a category 5 dumpster fire.
I think its generational. I even see the generational differences across my office. when meeting with our customers for formal meetings, the 35+ engineers are in a suit, or at least a blazer. The 20 somethings are wearing torn jeans and burkenstocks
I think at the places where I’ve worked, torn jeans would be a little over the line in the office, although managers who said something about it would be perceived as stuffy. However, I would ask before wearing business casual to a meeting with clients. I would assume that a suit was expected and I think I would be in real trouble if I wore torn jeans.
But then again, I’m 35+ now. Do you work at a small startup?
I work at a daughter company of a bank that develops said bank’s internal software. Torn jeans are A-OK and might only get commented on when visiting the parent company. My team’s architect is virtually never seen without a Chaos Computer Club hoodie.
Earlier in my career I worked for a well-established company in the medical sector. The only person in the company who dressed up was the boss – and only when meeting someone external.
I am 35+ and I’m both companies we had older team members.
I think it’s 90% because of silicon valley and the tech industry. Software developers often make more than licensed engineers of other disciplines these days, so why would a young engineer model themselves after their professional body and older members instead of the disruptive adjacent industry?
Idk I’m an industrial engineer and I dress like the workers because it’s comfortable, safe, and shows them I’m not putting myself above them
I’m a software engineer myself but I have only ever worked on the east coast. Maybe that’s the difference?
I’m on the east coast myself, in my 40s, also tech (mostly hardware/design, but some software in support of that hw or just doing something experimental).
I will 100% show up with a T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. If I have a meeting or its the fall/spring, I have a sportjacket, but I’ve admittedly shown up in a zip up hoodie before (though that was specifically in a space I was doing some concepting in, not a boardroom).
Client meetings with their c-suite will get a collar, but its a golf shirt in the summer.
That said, I work from home pretty much exclusively, so its all t-shirts now. I wouldn’t even worry about straight up Donald Duck’ing it if it were more comfortable (its not).
I think its just generational.
Lol I’ve only heard “porky piggin’ it” before!
Most I’ll do for an interview is jeans and dress shoes nowadays. And to be honest, I usually dont bother with the dress shoes.
I only did the suit thing the first few years after college
My best t-shirt and best chinos is most you’ll get from me at a job interview. Why would I dress differently than I will on the job?
I was always told that if you dress too well you’ll damage your credibility as an engineer.
Adam sandler looks a bit tired these days
He’s 58 years old, and isn’t known for his commitment to fitness. He looks pretty good for his age.
This is Adam Sandler right? The other comments have me confused
I was going to say Ben Affleck.
He should be removed from his position as Prime Minister.
Principal engineer outfit…
Okay, I am the highest paid senior in my company, how should I look up?
Regardless of whatever else you do, you should always wear the most comfortable shoes you can find.
I can hear my ex wife screaming as I type this: Sandals with socks are peak comfort.
You should connect remotely from a country with a better climate, preferably with a beach bar as the background.
If complimented on the background order a cocktail while starting at the camera too probe it’s an actual beach bar and that you can
In my experience working in a tech company, seeing someone not dressed like that is the oddity. You know they’re from marketing or finance when you see them.
Ours has a coffee stain.
