A software engineer I know showed up to his Google interview wearing cargo shorts and a faded gaming t-shirt. He got the job. Starting salary: $210,000.
A few months later, his roommate interviewed at Goldman Sachs wearing khakis and a button-down. No tie. He made it to the final round but didn't get the offer. Was it entirely because of his outfit? Probably not. But the recruiter's feedback included a comment about "cultural fit" – and when he asked a contact at the firm, they mentioned that showing up without a tie to a banking interview sends a signal about how seriously you take the opportunity.
Same city. Similar talent. Completely different rules.
Here's what nobody tells you when you're building your career: every industry has unwritten appearance standards, and violating them can cost you opportunities before you even open your mouth.
The Tech Exemption
Silicon Valley created something unprecedented in corporate America – a culture where looking polished can actually work against you.
I've watched this play out countless times. Engineers who show up to interviews in suits get side-eyed. The unspoken assumption? They don't get the culture. They're probably not technical enough. They care too much about appearances and not enough about shipping code.
The hoodie became shorthand for innovation. Mark Zuckerberg's grey pullover wasn't laziness – it was a strategic rejection of everything Wall Street represented. PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel famously said you should never invest in a tech CEO who wears a suit. In this world, dressing down signals that you're focused on what matters: the work.
But here's the thing most people miss – tech casual isn't actually casual. It's a carefully curated anti-uniform. Those Allbirds sneakers cost $100. That Patagonia vest runs $150. The "I just threw this on" look requires more thought than most people realize.
The rules in tech aren't about looking good or bad. They're about looking like you belong to the tribe. Show up overdressed and you're signaling that you don't understand the culture. Show up in a wrinkled graphic tee with food stains and you're signaling you can't take care of basic responsibilities.
The sweet spot? Clean, comfortable, and unstudied. Like you could pull an all-nighter debugging code and still look presentable for the morning standup.
The Finance Standard
Now flip to finance, and you're in a completely different universe.
Investment banking has dress codes so specific that junior analysts whisper warnings to each other. At J.P. Morgan in the 2000s, there was an unwritten rule: wearing a pink shirt, suspenders, or a pocket square as a junior banker was career suicide. Those were reserved for Managing Directors. The message was clear – know your place.
The investment banking dress code isn't just about looking professional. It's about projecting trustworthiness with other people's money. When you're asking someone to hand over millions of dollars, you need to look like someone who takes everything seriously – including how you present yourself.
Navy and charcoal suits. White or light blue shirts. Conservative ties. Polished leather shoes. The uniform exists because finance is built on trust and tradition. Clients expect their bankers to look a certain way, and violating those expectations creates friction before any real conversation begins.
Even Goldman Sachs' much-publicized 2019 move toward "flexible" dress codes came with an asterisk. The memo essentially said: you know what's appropriate. Translation? Don't test us.
The finance appearance standard extends beyond clothing. Grooming matters. Accessories matter. The wrong watch can send the wrong signal. Too flashy and you look like you're trying too hard. Too casual and you look like you don't take the job seriously.
Women in finance face an even more complex calculation. The expectation is polished but not distracting, authoritative but not intimidating. It's a narrower target to hit, with more ways to get it wrong.
The Healthcare Exception
Then there's healthcare, which operates on an entirely different logic.
In most medical settings, competence trumps appearance in ways that would be unthinkable in finance or even tech. A brilliant surgeon with a bad haircut and rumpled scrubs will always outrank a mediocre one in a designer suit. The hierarchy is built on skill and credentials, not visual presentation.
This doesn't mean appearance is irrelevant in healthcare – it's just calibrated differently. Patients want doctors who look clean, competent, and trustworthy. But that trust comes from different signals: the white coat, the stethoscope, the calm demeanor. The specific cut of someone's clothes matters far less than whether they seem capable of saving your life.
The practical demands of healthcare also reshape appearance standards. When you might get blood on your clothes or need to move quickly in an emergency, fashion becomes genuinely irrelevant. The job selects for people who prioritize function over form.
That said, healthcare isn't immune to appearance bias. Studies show that patients make judgments about their doctors based on attire. But the judgment criteria are different – it's more about cleanliness and professionalism markers than style or fashion sense.
The Unspoken Rules Nobody Teaches You
Here's what frustrates me about all this: these rules are rarely made explicit. You're just expected to figure them out through observation, trial and error, or luck.
A first-generation college student interviewing at a hedge fund has no idea that their off-the-rack suit reads as "doesn't understand this world" to the interviewer in bespoke tailoring. A developer from a traditional industry doesn't realize that their business formal outfit is actively hurting them at a startup.
This is one of the hidden ways that existing networks and privilege perpetuate themselves. If your parents worked in finance, you absorbed these standards growing up. If they didn't, you're playing a game where you don't know half the rules.
I've seen talented people get filtered out of opportunities because they didn't understand what their appearance was communicating. Not because they looked bad, but because they looked wrong for the context. It's a form of invisible gatekeeping that compounds over time.
Reading Your Industry's Actual Standards
So how do you figure out what your industry actually expects?
Start by observing people two levels above where you want to be. Not your peers – they're still figuring it out too. Look at the people who've already made it. What are they wearing? How are they groomed? What's the range of acceptable variation?
Pay attention to what gets complimented and what gets criticized. In tech, someone might get ribbed for wearing a blazer to a casual meeting. In finance, someone might get feedback about their tie being too trendy. These small comments reveal the actual boundaries.
Consider who you're trying to influence. A developer who only interacts with other developers has different appearance requirements than one who presents to clients. A consultant needs to mirror whoever they're consulting for. The standards aren't fixed – they shift based on your audience.
And recognize that your headshot and digital presence are now part of this equation. Your LinkedIn photo communicates the same signals as your in-person appearance. I've written before about how your headshot determines who accepts your connection requests – this is the digital version of the same industry-specific judgment.
The tricky part is that most people use the same headshot across all platforms, regardless of industry context. A tech founder networking with VCs and a consultant pitching Fortune 500 clients need very different visual presentations. If you're working across industries or making a career transition, you might need multiple professional headshots that speak to different audiences.
The Strategy for Career Switchers
This gets especially tricky when you're switching industries.
I've talked to people who moved from tech to finance and had to completely rebuild their wardrobe. Everything they owned signaled the wrong tribe. They had to learn a new visual language while simultaneously learning a new professional one.
The reverse is equally jarring. Finance people entering tech often overdress for months before they recalibrate. Every day they show up looking like they're about to close a deal, while everyone around them looks like they're about to go hiking.
If you're making a switch, invest time in understanding the new culture before you invest money in new clothes. Shadow people. Ask explicit questions about dress codes. Look at the photos on the company's website and social media. Do the work upfront so you don't spend your first months signaling that you're an outsider.
What This Means for Your Professional Image
The core insight here isn't that you should obsess over clothes. It's that appearance is a form of communication, and different industries have different languages.
Your goal isn't to look "good" in some abstract sense. It's to look appropriate for the context you're operating in. That might mean dressing down in tech. It might mean dressing up in finance. It might mean prioritizing function in healthcare.
This extends to your headshots too. A LinkedIn photo that works for tech – friendly, approachable, maybe slightly casual – might read as unprofessional in finance. The standards aren't universal, and pretending they are will hurt you.
The most successful people I know understand this intuitively. They read the room. They adjust their presentation based on context. They know that looking the part isn't superficial – it's strategic.
Know the Rules Before You Break Them
Eventually, you might earn enough credibility to break the rules. Senior tech executives sometimes wear suits precisely because it signals they've transcended the anti-suit culture. Established finance partners might dress down because their track record speaks for itself.
But you have to know the rules before you can effectively break them. Violating standards out of ignorance reads very differently than violating them from a position of power.
For most of us, the smart play is to understand what our industry expects and operate within those bounds while we build our reputation. Then, once we've established ourselves, we have more room to express individual style.
The appearance game isn't fair. It advantages people who already understand the codes and disadvantages people who don't. But pretending it doesn't exist won't make it go away.
Better to understand the unwritten rules and use them strategically than to let them work against you without even knowing it.