Art N Body

Today's hiring managers tend to be from a generation when tattoos were limited to Marines, bikers, and gypsies. When these managers interviewed for their first jobs, even facial hair for men and open-toe shoes for women were a no-no. Today, facial hair is commonplace and hair length runs from the shaven head to a neatly tied pony-tail. Female candidates arrive to the interview with cleavage exposed and "dressy" flip-flops. If you take a look around most workplaces today, employers have either given up trying to regulate dress code or just don't care. But that still doesn't stop candidates from getting under the skin of hiring managers with almost any display of tattoos and piercings. That's a problem because forty percent of adults’ ages 18 to 40 now have a tattoo or non-earlobe piercing, according to the Pew Research Center's Gen Next Survey.

Young workers even those going through business school and looking to be corporate leaders one day have ramped up both the number and placement of this body art. Such markings started to become mainstreams due to the tattooed punk movement of the 1980s. This has created a firestorm of activity to create personal appearance policies that include rules about tattoos and piercings. But as many employers will tell you, it's not that easy without discriminating against certain classes of workers and without significantly reducing the size of the talent pool.

Candidates and employees often feel the employer has no right to restrict the display of piercings and tattoos. That's not true. Companies can limit employees' personal expression on the job as long as they don't infringe on their civil liberties. According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, employers are allowed to impose dress codes and appearance policies as long as they don't discriminate against a person's race, color, religion, age, national origin or gender. Companies faced with inked and pierced applicants can demand eyebrow rings or tongue rings be removed and tattoos covered to help project the proper image to customers. That is because some customers, particularly older ones who dislike tattoos, could be turned off and they may be less likely to do business with it. Loss of business is a justifiable reason to restrict the display of body art in whatever form it takes.