Spiky patent leather heels, clinging block colour dresses, tan tights: ladies and gentleman against all the fashion odds The Apprentice’s 1980s Boardroom Barbie is back. The rest of us may have dumped our underwired bras in the recycling, hurled our modest heels to the back of the wardrobe and buried our faces in affordable cashmere after the pandemic gifted us three days in the office (TWAT) and two at the kitchen table (WFH) but this seismic switch has not reached the makers of the 17th series of the BBC’s The Apprentice. It seems they still believe women in business must conform to a stereotypical uniform dreamt up by the kind of male bosses who roamed the earth during the dinosaur days of the Mad Men era.
How disappointing to see that this old fashioned ‘power dressing’, bodycon uniform has been revived in the first days of 2023 for the nine confident, bright female contestants. Not for our future CEOs the soft suiting that is lining every high street rail right now, or the groomed colourful day dresses we can’t get enough of. Nope the contestants have been squeezed into shockingly tight pencil skirts or hard-edged trouser suits worn with heels so high the contestants are physically hobbled as they complete tasks for the world’s most public job interview. It feels so unfair, the women must do exactly what the men do but the producers make it just that little bit harder for them.
I am not for one minute criticising the go-getting women for their fashion choices here; I’m just perplexed as to why they all must dress the same in such bizarrely unfashionable outfits. This out-of-date business Barbie look is so at odds culturally with the world working women inhabit and influence today. And I’d hoped we were beyond the idea that if you enjoy modern fashion you therefore can’t successfully present a business plan.
Why can't you dress like a modern woman who'll lead in a modern way, a boss who has their finger so firmly on the pulse they know it's ok to be a feminine, female face in a boardroom?
I get that one must not wear pattern on telly and I am certainly not suggesting the women wear top-to-toe designer labels. And I understand that anything more ‘out there’ than a pussy bow blouse may give 75-year-old Sirulun a sartorial heart attack but why can’t you dress like a modern woman who’ll lead in a modern way, a boss who has their finger so firmly on the pulse they know it’s ok to be a feminine, female face in a boardroom these days?
Perhaps this weirdly constricting shorthand for ‘sexy’ 80s workwear means no one contestant stands out for anything other than their business acumen? Maybe the telly bosses think sticking to the uniform means people won’t be distracted by the contestants’ appearance? Quite the opposite is true though, it’s a giant talking point of the show each season and I’ve watched The Apprentice every season since it started in 2005.
Whatever the reason is for presenting this daft workwear look on a prime time telly show it’s a short sighted view to take. Given there were only eight FTSE 100 companies run by women in 2021 it seems that what women wear most definitely is not affecting our ability to get the top job, sticking to this kind of man-pleasing uniform clearly hasn’t worked for us in the past.
Any which way you view it dressing the female contestants like this is not helpful for them or for us. Sticking to this cliché uniform is a disappointing missed opportunity.
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