… ought to make workers more productive
(c) 2019, Davd
Female workers are more productive if they feel warm enough. CBC Business producer Don Pittis backed up this obvious looking point with some recent research and some quotations from a woman architecture professor; and all I have to add to that part of the business, is that I expect men who feel warm enough are more productive than men who feel too cold, same as among women.
Pittis’ main demand was that men should dress more casually, and in clothing that enables them to be comfortable at say, 28C [82 Fahrenheit], so that office buildings need not be cooled below that temperature. I will support such a rule if the women [and the men] can dress modestly1 at 82 Fahrenheit without being too warm; but if they cannot, it be more important that they do dress modestly.
Being “too cold” is not the only kind of office experience that degrades performance. Being distracted also degrades.
One book i reviewed in 2016 took note of women’s sexuality displays distracting men, recounting a vignette of a decent working class man talking about distraction… and since the author was a Lesbian columnist disguised as a man, it seems safe to treat her account as free of misogyny.
Norah Vincent quotes Jim, one of the men with whom she bowled, saying,
I can work with a [plain] chick. There’s a [plain] chick works in my office with me every day and I’m fine. But every now and then there’s this hot, hot woman who comes into the office, and for the whole time she’s there I’m completely f[….]d. Everything’s out the window. I don’t get s[…] done. All I can do is stare at her like this
he made a dumbfounded expression”. [Vincent, 2006: 352]
Jim is an office worker, and it’s only fair that his workplace should be free of performance degrading distraction. That woman he described as “hot, hot”, was doubtless dressed to exhibit her sexuality. Had she been dressed as many apparently Hutterite, Mennonite, and Muslim women are dressed in Central Alberta towns, “Jim” would have been able to pay attention to his work, in her presence.
Repeat: women who are sexually attractive when they choose to be, can be merely pleasant looking, if they choose not to project their sexuality3. Choosing not to project sexuality is work-facilitating. (Choosing to project sexuality in a workplace, is disruptive to the work efforts of some, likely many men present.4)
If women in an office can dress modestly and be comfortable at 28C [82F], my guess is that the men can find some kind of summer clothing that is modest and comfortable for them, at the same temperature. Then “fine”, let both sexes dress, modestly but lightly, for the summer.
Summer will end, of course; winter is coming, as it comes to conclude every Canadian year.
I write this from Alberta, where winters are longer than summers, and colder than the summers are hot. One day this past February the temperature fell to -46C [about -50F] in the town where I was that day; and i am assured it never got up to +46C, not even to +40, in that town. When buildings need heating rather than cooling, let’s encourage men and women to dress warmly, so the thermostat can be set at 20C [68F] or even 18C [65F]? Makes sense to me; and if i find myself working in a winter office, I’m even willing to wear long-johns.
I’m not demanding that the men in any office wear suits and neckties5. Sweaters and tweed jackets with easily washable “slacks” were my preference as a professor; sweaters, slacks and long-johns would be good enough for me now.
I am demanding that modesty have clear and strong priority over fashion; and that if men should dress for the season to help keep down summer cooling costs; then women should dress for the opposite season, to help keep down winter heating costs… and distraction of the men.
Referenced:
Vincent, Norah, 2006. Self Made Man: One Woman’s Year Disguised as a Man. New York: Viking Penguin.
