The Dress Code

The dress code:

A sign of professionalism? A necessary evil? A nazi-conformist mind-control tactic?

Recently, the mode of dress of what my regional manager refers to as the "professional staff" (by "professional staff", he means pharmacists, pharmacy techs, Administrative assistants, the manager, and the RSO) has come under fire in my lab. Let me give you a bit of relevant background information about the "professional staff": they never leave the lab, and are never seen by customers or patients. EVER.

So you're probably thinking, "Score! Jeans and tshirts and comfy clothing for all!", right? Well, the rest of us always thought so, too. Apparently, this is a big sore spot with our RM. He has passed down an MBO (I can never remember what MBO stands for, but i know my boss's raise depends on achieving them) to my boss, stating that the professionalism is lacking in our lab, and she is to remedy it immediately. And by "professionalism is lacking", he means he hates our comfy clothing. In response to this, my boss has passed down a Thou Shalt Not Wear Comfy Clothing edict: khakis/slacks in place of jeans, and polo/button-down shirts in place of tshirts and hoodies, and no white tennis shoes. For reasons i can't fathom, the RM seems to think that the more stuffy and uncomfortable our clothing is, the more professional and productive we are. This bothers me for a plethora of reasons:

1. We wear lab coats. They're long, and cover us down to about mid-calf. You can't tell the difference between a polo shirt and a tshirt underneath them anyway!

2. It gets really hot when you're working in front of the fume hoods. Long sleeves are an impossibility, which leaves polo shirts as the only option. Polo shirts are, in my opinion, itchy and uncomfortable.

3. I don't draw doses or compound drugs any faster for wearing slacks instead of jeans.

4. I'm on my feet 8 hours a day. Why can't i wear shoes that DON'T hurt my feet??

5. After ten years of wearing whatever the hell i want to this job, I don't own any of the required clothing, and am now obligated to go out and spend money on clothing i hate.

Go ahead and ask me if they're going to reimburse us for acquiring what's basically a work uniform (The answer to that, incidentally, is "It's not in the budget"... as if a new wardrobe is in MY budget). Or, better yet, ask if we're getting a cost-of-living raise when minimum wage increases, to help offset this added expense (i probably don't need to tell you what the answer to that one is).

So i have to ask: Why is it so important for a bunch of people who basically don't see the light of day for 9 hours to look professional? It isn't going to inspire confidence in our ability to deliver time-sensitive, sterile drugs in patients and doctors who never see us. None of us give a shit what anyone else in the lab is wearing. Is the dress code really a necessary thing, or just a mechanism for keeping those of us with less than savvy fashion sense from being eye sores? Isn't the lab coat enough protection from fashion atrocity?