Today we stray from investing and personal finance to the related area of doing well at your work and moving to higher salaries. Investing and cash flow management are the key to reaching financial security in your forties and fifties, but the larger your paycheck, the easier it is to reach this point. Most of your income will come from your job in your first twenty years or so; therefore, it makes sense to set yourself up for success.
Because I am an engineer, this article will mainly be focused on engineers. But really, many of the principles fit for many careers. It is just that the specifics in dress and behavior might be different. If you are a rock star, you probably won’t dress like an engineer, but you’ll still have your uniform and expectations for how you’ll behave. That’s really the bottom line – to dress for the job.
(Note, this site contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. When you click on an affiliate link and buy something, The Small Investor will get a small commission for the referral. You are charged nothing extra for the purchase. This helps keep The Small Investor going and free. I don’t recommend any products I do not fully support. If you would like to help but don’t see anything you need, feel free to visit Amazon through this link and buy whatever you wish. The Small Investor will get a small commission when you do, again at no cost to you.)
Every Job has a Uniform
Some jobs, like policemen and nurses in a hospital, have formal uniforms. Every job, however, has standard ways in which people dress that identify them as working in that field. Most lawyers will wear a suit everyday to work, as will bankers. Lumberjacks will wear jeans with chaps and long-sleeved flannel shirts. Rock stars will wear leather outfits or lavishly decorated shirts. Country stars will wear a hat and jeans. Just seeing someone dressed in this manner makes you think they belong to that profession. This sets first impressions that people have and their expectations for you.
Engineers have a uniform as well. Thirty years ago it would have been a long-sleeved shirt, tie, and slacks. You would also probably have pens and a slide rule in your shirt pocket. The invention of “casual Friday” in the 1990s relaxed things where wearing a polo shirt and lacking the tie became acceptable. Wearing jeans occasionally also started to be OK. This is particularly true if you worked in the field or the plant.
Dress in the workplace with people you work with everyday tends to be less formal than when you are seeing outsiders. Engineers would certainly wear slacks and a dress shirt when meeting with customers and might even put on a tie. A suit jacket might also be needed for events such as a presentation to important customers or funding agencies. Technical conferences also require a more formal appearance, including a tie and maybe a suit or blazer. (I won’t comment on women’s dress, except only to say that more formal attire is also needed.)
A significant aspect of having a uniform is that it instantly identifies you as a member of the profession. Someone who sees you dressed as an engineer makes him/her recognize you as such and expect you to have the capabilities of an engineer. This is just as you’d expect a person dressed as a police officer to know how to investigate crimes and arrest criminals or someone dressed as a minister to know the bible well and be a good public speaker. You instantly gain credibility just by looking the part. This will make it easier to gain the confidence of those you deal with. You start out with an advantage over those who don’t dress the part.
The SmallIvy Book of Investing: Book1: Investing to Grow Wealthy
SmallIvy Book of Investing: Book1: Investing to Grow Wealthy
Grooming is Important
Some engineers will get their hands dirty, digging into hardware and getting covered in grease. Others may rarely touch hardware. In some jobs, engineers are forbidden to pick up a tool since craftsmen have an agreement that they exclusively can do physical tasks and engineers can only direct.
In any case, while it is fine to get dirty while in the middle of tasks, personal grooming is important. As a professional, people will expect you to have your hair appropriately brushed and styled, your nails cleaned, your face and hands to be washed, and for you to take care of other aspects of proper grooming. Being a professional requires you have a good outer appearance as part of professionalism. You’ll want people to be focused on the word you use and the things you do and not your poor grooming.
It isn’t necessary to go overboard, but simply take the time for proper grooming. Your goal isn’t to create focus on your looks but to not have any negative aspects on your appearance that people will focus on instead of the things that you are saying. Bathe and wash your hair and face. Shave or trim your beard and clean your fingernails. Make sure your clothes are clean, hole-free and your shoes are neat. (Shoes get focus from people in higher positions.)
Before you can start investing, you need money to invest. Check out FIREd by Fifty: How to Create the Cash Flow You Need to Retire Early. You’ll learn how to control your cash flow so that you’ll have money to invest and grow wealth.
It’s better to overdress than underdress
No one will fault you if you wear a tie every day while everyone else is wearing polos. In fact, people seeing you will probably be more likely to think of you for management positions. Realize that attractive people tend to be more likely to get promoted and that dressing better helps make you more attractive.
If you are going into a situation like a customer meeting or a conference, dress at least to the shirt and tie level. Wearing a suit jacket would also be a good idea. You can always take it off if you find no one else is dressed to that level. Regardless of how the customer or others at the conference are dressed, wearing jeans or (what were you thinking!) shorts is not acceptable. Realize you are walking into a situation where you may find future jobs from the people you meet. You want them to think well of you from the time you meet them.
Does this mean you should wear a suit to go to play tennis or for drinks after a conference? No, dress appropriately for the situation you are in. If it calls for a suit, wear a suit. If it calls for a jersey, wear a jersey.
If you really want to learn about investing, including how to invest in individual stocks and increase your returns, check out Investing to Win. Here I provide my strategies from forty years of investing in stocks and other assets.
(If you’d like to learn more about how to decide how much you should put in different types of assets, Sample Mutual Fund Portfolios gives lots of information and examples of how to make allocations for all sorts of different goals, including retirement.)
What about tattoos
Today we’re seeing more and more people with tattoos and piercings than ever before. Where it used to be limited to sailors and exotic dancers, it has become mainstream to have inked arms, nose rings, and other ornamentation. Still, having excessive ornamentation can pull focus from you and make people less likely to take you seriously.
If you’re young and haven’t gotten a lot of tattoos (or any) when you read this, don’t. If you get a bunch of tattoos all over your arms, neck, and face, everyone will notice that and forget about you. They won’t think of you when deciding who they want to represent the company to big customers. You’ll be relegated to the back shop and really need to fight to move up to high levels. If you really must get tattoos, get modest ones that you can cover with clothing easily. Keep piercings to modest ones that can be removed when needed.
How you dress at work each day and during special events in your work is important. It conveys a message of how seriously you take your work and yourself. If you dress poorly, it makes it that much more difficult to get people to take you seriously. Some people are good enough to overcome this disadvantage, but why put yourself in this position?
Want to learn the secrets to investing and really turbocharge your returns? Check out the second book in The Small Investor series, Investing to Win. This book presents 40 years of investing experience. Someone starting with zero knowledge of investing and the stock market could take this book and learn all that they needed to invest and do well. It would also be useful to someone who has invested and traded stocks for a while but who is really not getting the kind of returns desired.
Investing to Win
Have a question? Please leave it in a comment. Follow me on Twitter to get news about new articles and find out what I’m investing in. @SmalllIvy_SI
Disclaimer: This blog is not meant to give financial planning or tax advice. It gives general information on investment strategy, picking stocks, and generally managing money to build wealth. It is not a solicitation to buy or sell stocks or any security. Financial planning advice should be sought from a certified financial planner, which the author is not. Tax advice should be sought from a CPA. All investments involve risk and the reader as urged to consider risks carefully and seek the advice of experts if needed before investing.