It’s a freaking hot dog vendor job! I show up in jeans (blue jeans, no less, not even nice black jeans) to meet with clients who book me for $5K+ jobs. I can’t believe a hot dog vendor is expected to show up in business casual.
I wouldn’t wear jeans to an interview, certainly in my field, but in the larger scope of things I agree with the above. Sure you can buy a lousy fitting pair of used khakis at Goodwill, something you would never, ever otherwise wear by choice. You can wear said khakis to the interview, but to prove what, exactly? What is the purpose other than to prove you will follow the prospective employer’s directions no matter how trivial, irrelevant, or even actually detrimental to the purpose of completing your assigned tasks. Obviously following directions is important, but I’ve always wondered why this direction is so critical for the kinds of jobs we’re talking about.
Oh yeah. It’s supposed to make some kind of impression on the patrons.
(I just finished watching Bill Maher).
NEW RULE:
Employers, nobody who comes into your chain store coffeeshop to buy your overpriced lattes gives a damn if your baristas wear jeans instead of black slacks. Nobody who comes to spend six hours waiting in lines and thirty minutes riding rides in your amusement parks is going to be impressed by the fact that the college student who lowers and raises the safety barrier over the seats of the roller coaster came to work in khakis, even though he or she doesn’t otherwise wear anything below the waist that’s not made of denim.
But that’s part of it. I think a nice pair of black jeans look better than some generic pair of khakis. Are black jeans really considered declasse?
I always thought this was, or should have been, a good point. In the business casual offices I’ve worked in, you almost always see one or two people who routinely show up to work in old beat-up Dockers, for instance black ones that have faded to dark grey, and have bits of visible fraying here and there. And that’s allowed, while new jeans are not.
Utterly wrong. I’ve done onsite customer service in dozens of businesses working with anyone from the warehouse sweeper to the presidents of double digit million dollar companies. Unless it was a high level conference room meeting with all the “players” I did fine with very black jeans, button down shirt and black work shoes.
Corporate providers of service do typically require slacks, shirt and often tie.
That first “uniform” was supposed to say “interview.”
When hiring a hot dog vendor, an employer is looking for someone who will show up on time, not steal, give two weeks notice when they quit, and generally adhere to basic professional standards. Given that these kids probably have limited work histories, the clothes they show up in are one of the few signs employers have to work with to guess if the kids understands and respects basic professionalism.
There’s another aspect to this - these minimum wage jobs often require that you provide or pay for your own uniforms. Maybe they don’t want to deal with another whiny teenager complaining about how he “doesn’t have any khakis and can’t he just wear jeans?” Someone who walks in wearing clothes approximating the uniform is already partway there.
And no, I’d strongly recommend against wearing jeans. As we see in this thread, jeans can hurt your chances. Khakis and a polo shirt or button-down shirt are pretty much always safe.
Maybe he was turned away not because he was underdressed, but because he was overdressed; it was an amusement park in summer after all. They just did not want to deal with his “I am too good to wear shorts and get my hands dirty” attitude.
Well said. As I said before, I probably wouldn’t turn such an applicant away, but he’d be making it very easy for me to select someone else, especially if there were lots of applicants. The kid learned a lesson. Don’t make it easy for the interviewer to filter you out of the process. Do the easy stuff, like not dressing in a manner that some would consider borderline at best.
I agree with this point. I know someone who is a manager at a fast food restaurant. As you might expect, it’s very common for young people working in fast food to simply not show up for their shift and not bother to call in to warn anyone they’re not coming.
I imagine those kids are thinking “It’s just a fast food job, so who cares?” but it’s extremely inconsiderate of the other people working there and REALLY screws things up for everyone else when things like that happen. It makes things very stressful for my manager friend every time something like that happens and he has at times had to cancel personal plans because he had to work extra hours to cover for these kids who don’t show up.
Sending any sort of message that you don’t take the job very seriously will hurt your chances, because nobody else working there wants to get screwed over because you didn’t take it seriously enough to show up on time consistently. I definitely think that, to many people, the jeans imply you don’t take it seriously. Just because these jobs don’t pay as well as an office job doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take it seriously - even people at low-paying jobs want you to show respect for them.
I would never wear jeans to an interview and I would never advise anybody else to do the same.
Here’s a good rule of thumb: if your line of thinking is, “yeah, that would probably be ok to wear to an interview unless the employer is going to be a big jerkwad about things” then it is not ok to wear to an interview.
Dressing one level up is a good idea.
Now, I personally would have given the kid an interview but I probably would not have hired him over an equally acceptable candidate who showed up in khakis.
I would have done exactly the same thing. However, then what would happen? The kid would go to his next interview in jeans, not get hired, and keep wondering what was wrong.
This interviewer did him a favor that you or I wouldn’t have extended. He taught him a lesson. I guarantee you that even if the kid interviews for a janitorial job in a peep show parlor, he will never wear jeans again.
Thanks everyone, I have now made up my mind at last. However smart they are, and whatever colour they are, jeans carry a connotation of casualness to most people, and probably always will, until the day we are all wearing tight silver jumpsuits with a v-stripe and knee-boots (and roll on that day, I say). Some interviewers or company cultures as a whole might not be bothered by the casual connotations of jeans, but a lot are bothered, so why would you take the risk? I do feel sorry for the kid, but he learned a lesson.
So I am going to rush into work on Monday morning to put the mother right on this point, I’m sure she’ll appreciate it…
Agreed. I do a lot of hiring of book shelvers for my library and I’m always weary of the kids who show up dressed too nicely. I want to shake them and ask them if they understand that they’ll spend at least an hour a day on their hands and knees stacking books.
When I worked at an amusement park, jeans were the dress code: Blue jeans and the official red t-shirt with the logo. I doubt anyone would actually have been sent home or the like for wearing khakis, since the managers were nice folks, but we weren’t supposed to.
Now, granted, that was an amusement park, not a theme park, and it was blue jeans, not black, but I think the point still stands.
I hesitate to even mention this (and perhaps it should be on a new thread?) but what about job applications or resumes/CVs done in Comic Sans?
Fun and friendly, or repulsive and unacceptable?
It depends. Does your professional name include the phrase “the Clown”? If so, then it’s totally acceptable.
I think I’d need some evidence that anyone anywhere has ever used comic sans on a résumé.
Would you consider khakis and a polo shirt too nice for an interview at a library?
No, that’s about what I expect. But I’ve had teenage girls come in in high heels and fancy dresses and I’ve had teenage boys come in in full suits. I find it odd in both cases.