Tattoos/Piercings and employment

[father_and_son]

I work for a very old school investment manager and the only person I know of with visible tattoos works in the post room. There is no way you would get a client facing role with them. I have had this discussion with my son, who has lots of tattoos, many times but to no avail.

Likewise, but maybe worse.... I work in the regional HQ of a large American firm dealing with people of all nationalities (well my area covers Europe, Middle East and Africa). Given the very international feel to the office, "professional" look is pretty much determined by the highest common denominator, so business attire is enforced at all times (no dress down fridays and very very few charity casual days) to maintain the image the company wishes to project.

There is no one in this organisation, from reception to directors to the guys in maintenance, who have any visible tattoos. Rightly or wrongly, certain industries (Law, Finance, Insurance, etc) will always take this attitude and choosing a sleeve or other visible tats will effectively exclude you from all but the smallest 'trendy' companies in those fields.


This is very much the long term choice you make if you have a neck/face/hand tat done. It old-fashioned terms, if you are blue-collar, it won't matter, but if you are white-collar, it will. When I was in my late teens, early twenties considering a large oriental dragon wrapped around my arm with its head on my shoulder, the constraint was always that it had to be above the line of a t-shirt sleeve because even then, I understood the consequences - despite being blue collar at the time, I had aspirations to change to white collar work one day.

Twenty five years later and deeply regretting never having it done... call it mid-life crisis, call it bucket list, call it whatever you like, I am once again considering having a dragon covering my shoulder and upper arm, but the same rule applies.... must be able to cover it with a t-shirt!

 

[Billy the Fish]

So I get the issue with neck, hand or face tats in certain jobs. Surely everything else is covered up in a white collar job anyway, unless you're wearing short sleeve shirts to work but in that case you should be sacked for crimes against fashion!

The BBC article was about people being passed over for having tats that were covered.

 

[BN9 BHA]

I was just going to post on same lines. I am a self employed estimator/quantity surveyor and have never got a tattoo as I did not think my clients would like it (nor me for that matter).
One client, a Sussex builder, employs about 20 blokes in their office and not one has a tattoo, for the same reason as me. Of course some of the guys may have them but they are not on show. Seems strange in some ways that men employed in a macho industry think this way!!!!
Not making a point for or against, just saying.

Funny though plenty of blokes doing the real graft in the construction industry ( the tradesmen ) have got tattoos.
I know plenty of decent tradesmen with tattoos.

 

[BN9 BHA]

What's the problem with keeping them as a hobby?

They could escape

 

[BN9 BHA]

Likewise, but maybe worse.... I work in the regional HQ of a large American firm dealing with people of all nationalities (well my area covers Europe, Middle East and Africa). Given the very international feel to the office, "professional" look is pretty much determined by the highest common denominator, so business attire is enforced at all times (no dress down fridays and very very few charity casual days) to maintain the image the company wishes to project.

There is no one in this organisation, from reception to directors to the guys in maintenance, who have any visible tattoos. Rightly or wrongly, certain industries (Law, Finance, Insurance, etc) will always take this attitude and choosing a sleeve or other visible tats will effectively exclude you from all but the smallest 'trendy' companies in those fields.


This is very much the long term choice you make if you have a neck/face/hand tat done. It old-fashioned terms, if you are blue-collar, it won't matter, but if you are white-collar, it will. When I was in my late teens, early twenties considering a large oriental dragon wrapped around my arm with its head on my shoulder, the constraint was always that it had to be above the line of a t-shirt sleeve because even then, I understood the consequences - despite being blue collar at the time, I had aspirations to change to white collar work one day.

Twenty five years later and deeply regretting never having it done... call it mid-life crisis, call it bucket list, call it whatever you like, I am once again considering having a dragon covering my shoulder and upper arm, but the same rule applies.... must be able to cover it with a t-shirt!

The quality of the tattoo artists , inks and needles is far better than 25 years ago IMO, some of the work I see today is amazing, the point I'm making is don't regret not having one done as if you choose a decent tattoo artist now the work will be far better.
Good luck with your oriental dragon, I had one done 25 years ago and I still like it, but yours will be better.

 

[Sam-]

One of best things about tattoos are that they are so personal and often split a room in half. It would be wholly ignorant to assume someone won't look at tattoos you have and make a judgement on them. I am personally an admirer of most tattoos and have a few myself. I also know that I work in insurance where I often attend market meetings. So I have tattoos in places easily covered up.

I'm not sure my company would be happy for me to have excessively visible tattoos. Generally people's attitude to tattoos has relaxed, they are often more accepted now than they were.