I’m always getting asked questions about Toastmasters. Some are a little crazy – are there many single men in your club? Others are amusing – what does Toastmasters have to do with making toast? The most common question I’m asked is which club to join. However, I was recently asked an interesting question: how should I dress when visiting a club?
Every club is different, so it really depends on the club. Community clubs meeting at night or on the weekends might be casual, while corporate clubs might require a more formal dress. So here are some tips:
Dressing for Success
Whether you’re at a job interview, attending a networking event or giving a speech, it’s important that you dress appropriately. I’ve seen fashion faux pas in business situations that have actually shocked me: from the person that I interviewed who was dressed more casually than me to person at a networking event who was dressed like he was meeting Cinderella at the grand ball.
Appropriate dress is always in the eyes of the beholder and inappropriate dress can often cause negative perceptions about you before you even open your mouth. Three’s no hard and fast rule such as all job interviews require formal dress or all networking events require business dress as I’ve seen several situations where events that traditionally require formal dress requested casual dress and vice versa.