No Stupid Questions

Because that's how it worked for pretty much everything back in the day when your chances of getting a loan from the bank depended on the impression of trustworthiness you projected on the bank manager when you asked for it, rather than some obscure algorithm running in the bank's systems that didn't take in account any feedback from an actual human.

Amongst large companies automation removed humans from the loop, at least at an early stage, so now your machine processable input and/or information about you extracted from some other sources about what you've done so far, matching whatever the algorithm is configured to favor is all that matters. Sure, beyond that you'll almost certainly end up with a person making a final decision (for hiring, not for bank loans), but you first have to pass that big initial automated hurdle that's supposed to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Amongst other things this has killed "being judged as having potential" as a way to get a foot on the door, unless you have a high score on a metric supposedly correlated to it such as good grades at a supposedly elite university, since unlike "impression" such metrics can be mathematically evaluated and compared by algorithms.

Mind you, when looking for work in smaller companies that haven't outsourced their hiring, impressions still work since your first point of contact is going to be a person whose opinion counts rather than an algorithm or a person too low on the pecking scale for their judgement to be taken in account.

Good clothes used to be expensive and a signifier of wealth. Someone who could wear a suit likely had money and someone who had a fashionable suit likely had more money. Over the past generation, as clothing became cheaper and large parts of the richer segments have up on dressing well, the value of wearing a suit dropped.

Wearing a suit is still valuable in some circumstances, but nowhere near as much as before.

You can get into a lotta places wearing a hard hat and reflective vest while carrying a ladder.

My dad was a big believer of this when I was younger. Finally I humored him and had him drive me around town as I went into every buisness ask for a paper application. I printed and stapled 30 resumes for the trip, got dressed up, on the way into town he was so smug about how I was finally "really trying to get hired". Four hours later, we'd been to nearly 50 businesses, I'd gotten two paper applications and only 16 of my resumes were accepted. Everyone else said to apply online or "we only hire through the temp agencies". My dad for his part took it way harder than me. I think he actually realized that's not how it works anymore because he never suggested it again and took me seriously when I said I'd been putting in applications online.

I've never encountered anyone of any age that thinks that. Presentation of yourself is important, but nobody has ever even implied that just looking nice is enough to get everything. It's simply part of the whole equation.

Generationally, the only thing here I've seen disconnected between Boomers/Xers and yoinger generations like my own and Gen Z are that they have a different sense of what looks good or professional. Personally, I like that younger people also hate suits. Suits are stupid.

It depends upon the setting and what you want. Showing up to a McDonalds shift in a suite and tie trying to get the CEO job. Not so much.

Showing up to your first office job and meeting with your bosses in a nice polo or button down shirt and slacks looking professional, yes. It signals you are eager and want to succeed. Which will go a long way.

Of course you still have to put the work in. But your boss will be more likely to give you more training/work/promotions if they know you want to learn and work over someone who doesn’t give a shit.

Not so much the dress up. But yeah. You need to show up. Also, it doesn't help to be a bitch about people trying to give solicited advice by sharing their experiences.

If you want to make $350K working 10 hours a week in your underwear, go find out how all those other wildly successful folks in your generation are doing it.