Personal presentation at interviews?

Admiral Huddy

Admiral Huddy

Admiral Huddy

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Simple question really. Do you think your personal presentation at interview is important? When I say personal, I mean tattoos, piercings, hair etc. Do you think an employer is personally influenced as what he/she deems as acceptable.

Ear lob stretching for example, do you think this is acceptable or not? At the end of the day, does it not come down to the opinion of the person interviewing?

Thoughts?
 
Obviously it depends entirely on the position you are applying for.
If you want to apply for a position in a solitor's office then having lots of piercings and tattoos is not going to look good and consequently I don't think you would get the job.
However apply for a job in a tattoo shop for example and I am sure they would welcome as many tattoos as you want :)

Then you have the opinion of the person interviewing.
I personally feel that opinions are changing towards tattoos/piercings but there is still a "stigma" surrounding them that I don't think will ever fully disappear.
 
I'd suggest that if an interviewer cannot see past the appearance of a candidate and evaluate their skills, strengths, weaknesses and suitability for a role then perhaps they aren't the best person to be interviewing.

Having said that, I'm sure roles exist which certain things aren't suitable.
 
Lobe stretching is horrid, most tattoos are tacky, some piercings too.

I'm not going to judge a person's ability to do a job based on that though, except if the tattoo is of awful terrible quality but they are wearing it with pride. Then I'd be wondering how they couldn't see how bad it was.

Judging a person's ability to do their job based on their appearance is just weird to me, no different to overlooking an applicant because I find their tooth to gum ratio, or chneck disturbing.

I've never understood the societal pressure to look a certain way for specific roles and why a certain style of dressing is considered professional over others, ignoring impractical clothing that could get in the way of a job role, ie wearing sandals on a building site. I had the misfortune of having to work with someone who had this "issue" over their sandals.

They would wear them all year, and ride a bike everywhere, so in the winter they'd come in stinking of sweat with blue feet but have a melt down if anyone suggested that maybe they wear something a bit more appropriate for the situation, this included a site foreman insisting steel toe boots were to be worn if he wanted to step on site.
 
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Depends on the job. I would certainly have looked down on those kind of things when I was interviewing for a job to deal with the public. In recent times though I've only employed programmers and I don't frankly care how they look - one bloke comes in a dress sometimes , which is fine except the one looks like my nans curtains.
 
I think it largely depends on the person doing the interviewing and their views on it all. Seconded by the position of job you are after..ie If its a Tatoo artist job then most likely the more tattoo's you have the merrier. If its a position on the Sales Floor at Mothercare they may not be too happy with multiple piercings or other 'works of art'.


Generally during an interview if you are dressed smart, with some pride in your appreance you should have a good chance unless the interviewer has a thing against the tattoo's etc.
 
Admiral Huddy said:
Simple question really. Do you think your personal presentation at interview is important? When I say personal, I mean tattoos, piercings, hair etc. Do you think an employer is personally influenced as what he/she deems as acceptable.
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Yes, simple as.

Ear lob stretching for example, do you think this is acceptable or not? At the end of the day, does it not come down to the opinion of the person interviewing?
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Comes down to the job, the environment, and the interviewer, but the simple truth is that there are some jobs you just won't get if you look like a pincushion. (And some where it's a huge advantage, I suppose, but there you go!)
 
For me, it all depends upon the effort the interviewee has made...things like tattoos and piercings are not as important as being clean, well dressed, tidy, enthusiastic and polite.

Of course this depends on the position applied for and the nature of the self expression. My rule of thumb is as long as it is not offensive then it is not a problem.
 
Yes, a family friends partner with some funny letters before his name (can't remember what course he and his partner did) applied for a position at a council and he was turned down on the job on the basis he needs to be cleanly shaen
 
It wouldn't bother me as an employer if the applicant was competent, but the older generation seem to have a problem with it.

My heavily tattooed, ear lobe stretched nephew is having a hard time at the moment finding anything other than bar work in pubs & clubs.
 
Hyburnate said:
Yes, a family friends partner with some funny letters before his name (can't remember what course he and his partner did) applied for a position at a council and he was turned down on the job on the basis he needs to be cleanly shaen
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I don't understand the obsession employers have with being clean shaven.

There's no chance at all that I'll ever be clean shaven, ever. I'd look like a child, a very large child if I were to do so.

NOPE.
 
First appearances can mean a lot. When I was doing interviewing for our apprenticeship scheme (so lots of young "fresh out of school" people) you had to ignore that.

I remember one guy that showed up in a full tracksuit and florescent green trainers... instantly the 3 of us on the interview panel had a "impression" of him. But he turned out to be a really smart guy and quite funny. After the interview I took him back to the reception and said to him he might want to change his appearance if he gets the job here. He admitted he was quite nervous and wasn't sure what to wear so he wore what he was comfortable in and wore at college. Since then we hired him and he has been one of our most promising apprentice's very switched on and keen to learn.

That said we also had a guy who dressed like Neo from the Matrix he even walked into the interview room with dark sunglasses on and didn't even take them off. After about 2 questions (him still wearing the glasses) I asked him to take his glasses off, to which he then came back with are you stereotyping me..... low and behold we didn't hire him lol

So yea looks can be deceiving.
 
FARGO said:
I'd suggest that if an interviewer cannot see past the appearance of a candidate and evaluate their skills, strengths, weaknesses and suitability for a role then perhaps they aren't the best person to be interviewing.

Having said that, I'm sure roles exist which certain things aren't suitable.
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As said, does this not depend on the job? Let's say for a high street shop.

The reason I'm asking is my son has a stretcher and is looking for employment whilst he's studying. He's had plenty of interviews but not been successful. I can't help thinking that the piercing is restricting his chances because regardless of how you and I might feel, my feeling is that it comes down to the interviewer and how he perceives the individual.

Where ratio of people seeking the same jobs seems to be increasing, is it not an advantage to be as natural as possible?


AmyS said:
My heavily tattooed, ear lobe stretched nephew is having a hard time at the moment finding anything other than bar work in pubs & clubs.
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Do you think his appearance is affecting his chances?
 
Based on the way people in general behave towards those that look "different", I would say yes the stretcher will be harming his job prospects.

Or rather, people being narrow-minded about people's choices to look how they want are.

That leads on to the question of, does he want to be working with people who have those sort of views, and who place so much importance on a person's physical appearance?
 
Adsta said:
First appearances can mean a lot. When I was doing interviewing for our apprenticeship scheme (so lots of young "fresh out of school" people) you had to ignore that.

I remember one guy that showed up in a full tracksuit and florescent green trainers... instantly the 3 of us on the interview panel had a "impression" of him. But he turned out to be a really smart guy and quite funny. After the interview I took him back to the reception and said to him he might want to change his appearance if he gets the job here. He admitted he was quite nervous and wasn't sure what to wear so he wore what he was comfortable in and wore at college. Since then we hired him and he has been one of our most promising apprentice's very switched on and keen to learn.

That said we also had a guy who dressed like Neo from the Matrix he even walked into the interview room with dark sunglasses on and didn't even take them off. After about 2 questions (him still wearing the glasses) I asked him to take his glasses off, to which he then came back with are you stereotyping me..... low and behold we didn't hire him lol

So yea looks can be deceiving.
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I hope your rejection letter said "We regret to inform you that you are not The One."
 
Depends on the job, I don't think it matters at all if you're looking to menial crap like work in retail or groundwork.

But if you were applying for a job requiring people to take you seriously and judge a book by it's cover, or a sales based job or something like that. Appearance is paramount.
 
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