LEAD MAGAZINE | 2019
CHRIS REED
BE YOURSELF AT WORK
Be yourself at
work - here’s
why you will
be happier and
more productive
I passionately
believe in being
yourself no matter
where you are.
Be true to yourself
always. This also
applies to work.
You may think isn’t everyone, but actually
no, most people aren’t themselves at work.
Most people put on a front. They dress in a
different way than they would do normally.
They become worried about peer pressure/
bullying at work depending upon what they
wear and what they look like. They become a
more conservative person.
This clearly doesn’t make someone happy
and I never believe that unhappy employees
make the most productive or client friendly
employees. If all you’re doing at work is
pretending to be someone else to get on,
playing politics, doing as others think you
should, behaving in a different way, for a
quiet life you’re not giving 100% to the job
that the company employed you for, you are
not being you.
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Many people tag me into these conversations
because of my Mohawk. Clearly many people
have similar views on hairstyles, although
women ironically get away with dying their hair
more often than men as long as their hairstyle
itself is still conservative. The same applies to my tattoos. I love my
tattoos and when I wear sleeveless tops at
the weekend, in our tropical island paradise
of Singapore, I regularly get stopped in
malls, the street and bars and restaurants by
people fascinated by them. Especially “The
Joker” one, which was done in a very specific
“Trash Polka” style by one of only a handful
of people in the world who can do it and I
had to wait 18 months for him to be free and
visit Hong Kong to have it done. If you want
something to remain on you for life you should
really invest in it.
Hair dye in the main is still frowned upon
in many large conservative organisations
when it goes beyond blonde/black. A dyed
blue Mohawk would be too far for most
organisations, especially on women! I decided to use the change in professional
photos as a catalyst for a discussion about
this subject as I know people have diverging
and passionately held views on both sides.
Hence this blog.
I updated my professional photos last week
as it had been a couple of years and I needed
new ones for my new book coming out in,
“Social Selling Mastery For Entrepreneurs”, my
LinkedIn profile, my own marketing materials
and clients who book me for LinkedIn and
Personal Branding Masterclasses needed
them for their marketing. I passionately believe that my team can wear
whatever they want at work even though they
are also all client facing. I lead by example and
free them up from having to worry about what
people at work will think about their dress
sense or style. I encourage them to dye their
hair, have funky hair cuts and have and show
tattoos and piercings.
I decided to embrace this passion I have for
people being allowed to be themselves at
work and appear how they want to be at work.
I therefore decided to have the photos done
showing my tattoos. In short I empower them to be true to
themselves even at work as I believe that they
will be happy and therefore better employees
as a result of the release from the social
pressure at work to conform.
Like every entrepreneur I am in a unique
situation where I can wear what I want, have
a hair style how I want and show my tattoos
off as I want. Some choose to still play the
game and present themselves as someone
else because they have conservative clients.
Everyone has a choice as to whether they
accept this or not. I passionately believe that it’s the quality of
our work that shows through and that clients
don’t care how we look as long as we deliver.
I believe in this so much that I am effectively
putting my money where my mouth is by:
I have read many articles on LinkedIn about
tattoos and whether people should have them
and whether people should show them at
interviews or at work in anyway. Most people
seem to think that they must be covered up
which I clearly passionately disagree with.
As we at Black and Dark Art of Marketing
manage and develop people’s personal
branding strategies it would be hypocritical of
me not to be myself at work. In fact I use the
Mohawk as an ice breaker at networking events
and ask everyone “what is your Mohawk?”.
Everyone has an abstract “mohawk” it may
just manifest itself in a different way than my
actual mohawk.
1) C
hanging my LinkedIn profile photo and
all background photos that I am using on
LinkedIn
2) Putting a tattooed photo on the front cover
of my next book,
3) Using tattoo showing photos in all marketing
that I and partners do and
4) S
aying that this is what you buy when you
buy our services and our brand, you