Are British Men Scruffy In Their Clothes?

Are British Men Scruffy In Their Clothes?
Just replace British with any other nationality in the world and the answer would of course be the same. Many are, many aren’t.

My opinion on the OP’s particular situation is that I wouldn’t normally see a problem with an employee calling in at his place of work when off duty, wearing jeans and a tee shirt. The offensive slogan, however, is a different matter. That’s so disrespectful.

It’s always been the same, we just haven’t necessarily noticed!?

mumofmadboys, in regard to your post @07:25 today, you or anyone else on this forum do not know the name of the company or its exact location.

You also do not know me or my real name, the name of the employee involved or the names of any other person involved in this matter.

No doubt as the confrontation was witnessed by several others it has been discussed widely outside the company and possibly on social media already.

How then could this employee bring any charges against anyone when it is an employment situation that occurs in any number of companies every day.

Working life can be a stressful experience for people at any time, and confrontations will occur and will be talked about, it's as simple as that.

No one has yet stated if this young employee is at this point guilty of any misdemeanour at this point, only what the circumstances seem to be that surround this matter.

Also surely if matters such as this are not seen as open for discussion on this forum, the much more private matters of allegations against others in personal relationships should also not be discussed?

Anyway, I am off to the office now where doubtless it is the top topic of conversation outside of the work at hand and that no one can attempt to stop.

Surely this amount of detail should not be on the internet for all to see re a current case of work place discipline. If the tee shirted guy saw it I would think he would have a justified complaint about his superiors.

When you go to France or Italy you can always tell the Brits from the cheap ill fitting clothing. But strangely men in those countries don’t wear suits to weddings or funerals, which is about the only time Brits do.

Since the employee wasn’t expected to work on Saturday and apparently only called in to get something as I understand it, it seems to me that the whole thing has been blown out of all proportion. Quite ridiculous in my opinion.

I think in this incident there is also the case that this junior employee verbally abused the office manager in front of other employees in the first instance.

However, we shall see what all have to say on Thursday when due process as under current legislation is carried out.

I think (well, hope) the days of managers humiliating workers in front of their colleagues are unacceptable as a way of dealing with the issue.

Sadly though, as I was writing it I thought of a good few examples of similar scenarios.

the office manager was out of line, and obviously has not had much training in how to manage people.
it is not acceptable to tear him off a strip in front of co-workers, and that is what has given rise to the formal complaint.
I can see what people are saying about the t=shirt, but he is young, inexperienced, was not scheduled to work that day, it was a Saturday, and he may have decided to pop in en route to some leisure activity.
it could be said to shew commendable commitment to check on his work plans for Monday.
I guess the grievance will go against him, as I feel he is not likely to get a fair hearing. pity.
there are ways of talking to people, and this was not it.

Callistemon, what as he thinking, we will undoubtedly find that out on Thursday.

My first post was before I read about the t shirt Grandad
What made him think that was appropriate?
And he was very rude to a superior.

What was he thinking?

Callistemon, in regard to your post @ 21:04 today this young employee came to us after gaining excellent A level results at school and then working part-time for another company while studying and achieving lower IOSH certification in industrial safety.

He, therefore, is looking for further training from us so to achieve higher IOSH certification and in that has been placed with one of the assignment teams where he will gain wide experience in the field while under the supervision of the Assignment team organizer.

As with many companies in present times Saturdays are now part of the normal working week for many within the company. His colleagues within that team had come into the office to set up their work for this week on Saturday. He was not expected to arrive as he had taken the previous two days as a holiday and they had not heard from him since the previous Wednesday.

However, he arrived somewhat unexpectedly on Saturday wearing the now notorious Tee-Shirt. As I now understand it, our office manager said something similar to "you should not be wearing anything like that in the office", and he then made some very off hand and sarcastic remarks in return in front of other employees

She then ripped into him "good and proper" again in front of many others, and we are where we are now, sadly. The grievance and the disciplinary hearings have now been arranged for Thursday with one of the other partners in the business taking those hearings. I will take any appeals that come out of those hearings on Saturday if necessary.

The employee has today now been suspended from work pending the above prosses.

Pleased to say that the men in my family dress rather well

My husband worn jeans once, when he was in his 20s. They never suited him

I don't own any either

I purchased an insanely expensive pair back in the 70s. £40 they cost. They were gorgeous. Patches of same colour denim . I adored them

Never worn any since.

There are many smart men to be found.

It just depends where you go

One of the problems is that many men don’t look after their figures. A man with a beer belly wearing a t-shirt and jeans is not a nice sight, and it’s a very common one. At least more formal clothes, especially jackets, disguised the belly a bit. The t-shirt is a disaster on most older men, though I do see that they are comfortable.

Unfortunately we seem to have taken many of our fashion values from America, not mainland Europe.

My sons often wear dark or black jeans, which look much smarter the blue denim.

DH has never owned a pair of jeans in his life.

Oh MissAdventure, still chuckling over this 'sturdy man in well fitted jeans'. Not sure quite why but it's tickled my giggle box. Thank you.

Chestnut many years ago one of my DDs had a boyfriend who dressed like that
I did ask him if he'd lost his belt.

I'ce just read about the t shirt Grandad
What was he thinking!!

I was going to ask if this is his first job and he perhaps doesn't have much money to spare for clothes just yet until he becomes more established.

I can remember when 'dress-down Friday' was introduced and I did think it was a trend towards sloppiness at work.

I think if your employee was just popping in briefly on his day off to check something then it wouldn't matter too much on a Saturday as he wouldn't be expected to meet clients. It was conscientious of him to do that and he may have been going out afterwards to somewhere where casual wear was the norm.

I do think older men tend to dress more smartly than many young people today.
Mind you, some jeans are very expensive (why?).
And trainers can be more expensive than leather shoes.

Showered, shampooed and tidy is important.

Why are ripped jeans so popular? Why pay good money for something which looks as if it should be used to mop up oil from the garage floor?

I agree completely with OP.

My son (born in Britain) works for a leading Research and Developement company as an IT Manager.

Whilst he is always happier in t-shirt and jeans or shorts, during working hours he knows he represents, and therefore IS, his company as far as clients are concerned.

He meets people from all walks of life and internationally and if he appeared scruffy, it would give a poor impression of his company to current clients (which includes Princess Noor University in Saudi) and those he hopes will become contracted clients in the future.

It is something he also expects from his team.

It can be written into the Contract of Employment in some companies but if not, most people would, one hopes, be happy to conform once it was pointed out that to all intents and purposes they are the face (and therefore the assumed reputation and efficiency) of their company to outsiders.

New Zealand is known as a very laid-back, casual country but even here, the standard of dress for professionals is high.

Not sure what the day of the week has to do with anything, many people work at weekends.

I do agree the initial response was high handed and the whole thing seems to have escalated unnecessarily.

I think that response is a tad high handed, it was Saturday after all. I wouldn’t want to work in a place like that.

Many thanks for all the considered responses to the launch of this thread. Unfortunately, the young employee who wore the Tee-shirt with the inscription on Saturday has no applied for a formal grievance hearing in regard to the Line Manager who "tore him off the strip" in front of others who were in the office.

The office manager in response is in the process of drawing disciplinary action against the employee for wearing such clothing in the office as that is against the company code of conduct of appropriate dress.

So, what seems to have begun as a Tee-Shirt joke by a young male employee to impress a young female temp in the administration has now turned much more serious.

I feel very sad that this " jocular incident" has now come to this.

Witzend I used to work for a man who was always going on about how well the Italians dressed and what a shabby lot we were in comparison. He was always dapper himself, even outside work, but was very snotty about those who fell sartorially short. My DH went straight from twenty two years looking immaculate in uniform, to looking immaculate in a suit for his civilian job. Now he is retired, he is allowed to throttle back and look a bit shabby in his preferred cargo trousers and tartan shirts, except when we go out, when he scrubs up rather well.