Ambitious professionals are splurging on their looks to get ahead in the workplace
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Better looks, better odds
If you're not intentional about your appearance, you might be overlooking real currency in the workplace.
Whether you care or not, your appearance is shaping real outcomes in the workplace. That includes how you're perceived, how ambitious you seem, access to promotional opportunities, and even higher compensation.
It's why Business Insider created Hot at Work, a new series that explores how appearance and beauty standards shape opportunity, pay, and confidence at work.
We've explored modern beauty standards and how some professionals feel pressured, often self-imposed, to spend $12,000 to present a youthful appearance to fit in with their industry. Or how executives are getting plastic surgery to look less irritable and more approachable on the job.
Our reporters have also explored the downsides of maximizing your appearance at work. For example, one writer spoke to professionals who refrain from wearing designer clothes at work because it can send the wrong message about money management.
Experts are also doling out advice if you're still facing the "do I or don't I" wear jeans to the office conundrum.
You could write off thinking about your appearance as superficial, but others are gaining by using it as a strategy.