The White House Gives Up on Making Coders Dress Like Adults

[Blue_Tires]

The U.S. Government wants to hire more people like Mikey Dickerson. He’s the former Google engineer the White House recently tapped to lead the new U.S. Digital Service.

Dickerson has impeccable credentials. He comes from one of Silicon Valley’s most successful companies. He flew into Washington a year ago to salvage the disastrous Healthcare.gov website. And by all accounts, he did an amazing job. Now, his White House on-boarding has become a kind of recruiting tool for Uncle Sam. And just for good measure, the feds want all the techies out there to know Dickerson wasn’t forced to do that amazing job in a suit and tie.

In a White House video, Dickerson says he is asked one question again and again by people curious about his new job. They “want to know if I’m wearing a suit to work every day,” Dickerson explains in the video. “Because that’s just the quickest shorthand way of asking: ‘Is this just the same old business as usual or are they actually going to listen?’”

When it comes to computers, the federal government has a nasty reputation for prizing ISO standards and regulatory checkboxes above working code. The video is the White House’s best effort at saying it’s going to get real and hire people based on what they can do, not how they dress for work. Ben Balter, who spent some time as a White House Presidential Innovation Fellow a few years back, tells us he had to code in suit and tie.

According to the Dickerson, that’s changed. He isn’t showing up in a T-shirt, but he’s free to wear a wrinkled button-down and comfortable pants.

http://www.wired.com/2014/08/the-white-house-dickerson/

I should have been an IT guy...Tech has to be the only major industry where even at the highest levels they have the power to permanently ditch the garden-variety "business wear"

[GeorgeGist]

1. Kinda late in the game ...

The video is the White House’s best effort at saying it’s going to get real and hire people based on what they can do, not how they dress for work."

[Blue_Tires]

2. Hey, I've long dreamed of a world where everyone

could go to the office in casual clothes and running shoes if they wanted to...

[onecent]

23. AMEN Blue Tires

[monmouth3]

3. When I worked at Bell Labs during the time of launch for Telstar, the engineers wore

bermudas and sandals, even though it was a Jersey winter. No one thought anything of it....

[Drew Richards]

7. Giggle giggle giggle...telstar...you old fogy you... Lets see...I was at Md facility...where were

You Jersey?

Snatched me from AT&T to work on processor/unix compliance.

[monmouth3]

8. I was in Holmdel, NJ and I am an old fogy...LOL...n/t

[Drew Richards]

16. Don't make me go in the basement and get my tracking data out..don't you make me!

[LiberalArkie]

17. Western Electric defense products

And yes I pissed off a lot of base commanders with cutoffs and t-shirts

[JustAnotherGen]

28. I work at a wireless mothership

In NJ - I'm wearing Tevas, and j Jill pure Jill to work tomorrow. . Nothing has changed.

[procon]

4. Sure, this makes perfect sense

If clothing choices can make people seem more like an adult, that explains why restrictions on kid's hairstyles make them appear studious.

[redqueen]

5. I cannot say enough how much I detest superficiality. nt

[lob1]

9. Me too. Especially when superficiality is their goal.

[valerief]

6. A small software company I worked for in the 80s had people

coming in wearing bathrobes or pajamas. Sometimes, we wouldn't go home and not just after the weekend rum punch parties.

[Blue_Tires]

10. Um....yeah....That's where I must draw a line

[Skittles]

11. I agree

that's just plain disturbing

[Blue_Tires]

12. I work at a university

and last week we had freshman orientation/move in week...I had to administer freshman placement exams at 11 a.m. and lo and behold, one of them showed up in PJs and bedroom slippers...

I had to bite my tongue really hard, but I SO wanted to yell at him: "Seriously? Are you serious?? 11 a.m. isn't even that early! You just moved in *yesterday*! Classes haven't even started yet! IT'S BEEN LESS THAN 16 HOURS SINCE YOU SAID GOODBYE TO MOM AND DAD AND YOU'VE ALREADY MADE THE FULL-SLOB TRANSITION!!"

[Skittles]

14. when I see grown people at the supermarket in PJs and slippers

I mean, WTF - they need their asses kicked, badly

[maddiemom]

18. In the mid-sixties, (at our school) college students were not allowed to wear jeans, or (girls) be

seen downtown in slacks. We used to go to morning classes in trenchcoats, which we kept on over our "baby doll" pajamas, or rolled up pajama pants.A few years later, when I began teaching, women teachers were not allowed to wear slacks, let alone jeans, in the classroom.

[LittleGirl]

22. I couldn't wear pants in school

even in the winter. I had to take them off when I got there. With my winter coat, gloves and boots. That was until 1970 when they allowed girls to wear pants as long as it was a pant 'suit'. And no one in my family wonders why I will never wear a dress again. Froze my ass off when I was a kid.

[maddiemom]

40. I have a niece, now in her thirties, who raised toddler hell anytime she was put in a dress.

The only time she was ever seen in a dress was her senior prom, a trade off because she had a date and wanted to go (unusual for her). She's ended up successful in a profession in which pants are more practical---not that its much of an issue today.

[LittleGirl]

41. I worked IT

so it was better if I wore pants. (with all of those guys I had to work with).

[madville]

13. The FBI is trying to amend their drug use policy

Right now the FBI can't hire anyone that has smoked marijuana in the last three years if I remember right. Apparently that is putting a huge crimp in their efforts to recruit qualified IT an hacker types for their cyber crimes divisions. The FBI director recently stated in a recent Congressional hearing that they are trying to get that policy rescinded or modified to not penalize past recent marijuana usage, of course they wouldn't be allowed to use while employed I would bet.

[KamaAina]

20. Or they could set up their cybercrime division in Denver or Seattle

[madville]

21. Federal employees are still prohibited

From using marijuana, regardless of location. We got all kinds of emails about it when those local and state laws were enacted.

[Warren DeMontague]

29. Right, and so they can't fucking hire competent people.

So like with the dress code thing, they can stomp, whine, and cry about the culture going to hell in a bucket, or they can adapt to reality.

Sooner or later they'll need to do the latter. Because the competent people are going to be like "fuck you, i do a good job, i'll wear what i like, i'll smoke what i want on my own damn time, and if you don't like it i will work for someone else, who is probably cooler AND pays better"

[LittleGirl]

42. Yes! and they would pay better

because of the low bid contracts with the gov't. The only people getting rich are the owners of those contractor firms.

damn it.

Love your post.

[KamaAina]

46. Could they subcontract the work?

[TlalocW]

15. I'm a coder

For the past 10 years, I've been primarily coding for a small website shop - first in office as the head programmer and then as a contractor (everyone was made a contractor) from home. As it became more and more apparent that for the most part, I wasn't going to have any contact with clients, they kept moving the other programmer and me further away from the front of the office so we started dressing however we wanted, and eventually I was wearing t-shirts and either dockers or sweats, and it was fine with the boss.

Then one of the new hires who had a stick up their butt complained so the boss asked me to start dressing more professionally in dockers and a button-down shirt. I asked for one more week of dressing "normally" so I could find time to get my wardrobe. I wore a different, "Bite Me," shirt every day of the week (all but one were gifts from friends who know me well). Boss smiled at that.

Monday morning comes back around, and I show up for the start-of-the-week all staff meeting in dockers and a button down shirt... a bright orange button down Hawaiian shirt. The boss laughed. The guy I know who had the problem with me fumed. The next day, a bright red Hawaiian shirt. Day after that, a black one with chili peppers. Then another orange one with a different design. Finally a blue one with ukeleles on it. Boss loved it, and since I was meeting what the rules the boss put down, the other guy couldn't do anything about it, and I was still coding in comfort.

TlalocW - Just finished a web app wearing shorts and a t-shirt.

[justiceischeap]

19. I'm a Sr. Developer at a company that demands

Business casual and I push the casual.

It's the first tech environ I've worked in that I had to dress that way. I'm also their first in-house tech person too. I wish they'd find me a closet somewhere and hide me away so I can dress more comfortably.

[blackspade]

24. Or an archaeologist.

I never wore a suit the entire 10 years I was with a large environmental engineering corporation!

[Jack Rabbit]

25. Whoever invented the necktie should have been hanged with it

While he's choking, we'll let the ladies have at him with their high heels.

I, too, worked in IT and at places where I'd have to wear one of those useless, utterly uncomfortable things. Wearing one and calling it "professional" didn't stop a single ABEND.

[whistler162]

31. The first place I worked in IT required

a tie even on 3rd shift. Part of the job as a computer operator was to clean ink from the large impact printers. As you may guess ink got on the tie, one tie in three years, so it was a blue tie splotched with blue/black ink.
.

[Jack Rabbit]

36. You must be a lot younger than I am

The computer operators didn't have to wear ties around disk drives.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

26. 'a wrinkled button down'?

I believe there's a pic of me at work at my last job floating around the net somewhere - frayed black jeans and a black t-shirt with some celtic logo on it. The only time we ever had to wear 'button downs' was when prospective clients were visiting. Once they actually were clients, we didn't bother dressing up when they visited. At that point, they were there for the code, not how we looked while writing it.

(Edit: Found it.



I've even got my deformed gummi bear army on the desk beside me.)

[Warren DeMontague]

27. Meanwhile, everyone west of the mississippi is like "...and?"

Who fucking cares what coders wear.

[gcomeau]

32. Coders care...

Which is why organizations that try to make them wear suits and ties end up with crap talent. Understanding that is actually kind of important for anyone who relies on good code.

[Warren DeMontague]

33. Sort of my point. This is kind of old news in a lot of places.

Socially and culturally i think things more or less travel west to east, which is why the beltway still hasn't figured out that not everyone wears a damn suit to work.u

[gcomeau]

38. Ah...

I read the "west" but my brain thought "east"... and that caused me to interpret the rest of the comment rather differently.

[Warren DeMontague]

39. !semoH ,rorrim eht ni UD gnidaer pots attog uoY

[LeftyMom]

43. Seriously. You dig that crap out of the closet if you have an interview or somebody died.

And maybe not then.

[gcomeau]

30. Yup...

Tech has to be the only major industry where even at the highest levels they have the power to permanently ditch the garden-variety "business wear"

I'm coincidentally looking at the Director of Engineering for our entire division (almost 1000 people) having a conversation beside my cube right now.

Jeans and a t-shirt, much like my own.

[Rex]

34. Shirt with collar and nice shorts, I love my profession.

I dunno why we dress casual, but I do like the non-tie approach.

[Warren DeMontague]

35. "Adults".... LOL

"with fifty years, upon my head... To have you call me child"

[Nye Bevan]

37. You can't make coders wear suits. You just can't.

Glad the WH realizes this.

[RagAss]

44. Yup...30 years here...never wore a tie back then...and now it's just t-shirts and jeans.

...and when I work from home...I'm in my friggin underwear.

[politicat]

45. We are paper fashion plates.

Spouse is senior developer resisting a management bump. His company's agreement is business casual with clients, Boulder casual in office. spouse wears doc martens, black BDU trousers and the shirts I make for him. Those are either solid, long sleeve polo shirts with some interesting bit of pocket embroidery (Linux Tux, cutie Cthulu, Miskatonic Univ logos, gears, nyan cat, bacon cat, you get the picture) or short or long sleeve twill or poplin shirts, also usually with embroidery. (Though yes, he does have a grumpy cat camp shirt cut out and waiting for me to assemble, and picked out a subtle TARDIS print from spoonflower.) his work mates wear everything from jeans to dockers to carhartt, flannel to polar fleece, Birkenstocks to New Balance. The best part of Boulder county is the lack of formal.

I work on campus when I'm there. I can get away with anything from a boiler suit to boho, but I built a uniform because i'm lazy. Narrow black or grey trousers or skirt, plain shirt, cardi or jacket, tights, doc martens. It's the accessories for me - interesting watches, hair colors, bags, skins on external brain.

In Our fields -- formal business clothing means interview, midday funeral, or management is laying off. Not appreciated. We do fashion as a near identical commodity that requires minimal thought and works all within its system (grr animals for grownups) but no piece is such an investment That we don't mind disposing when needed.