Personal Grooming Tips for Business Women

By Lahle Wolfe

Job Vacancy Indonesia, Employee, Vacancy 

Dressing for success includes more than just choosing the right outfit. To complete your professional look you must also consider accessories and personal grooming.

You should always dress to impress clients, investors, and customers, because a winning sales pitch is not enough to seal the deal. A woman's professional appearance needs to support her professional accomplishments.

If your business attire is distracting because it is too sexy, drab, or colorful, your business contacts may focus on how you look, not on your business skills.

Simple, But Important Grooming Tips for Business Women

• Perfumes, Scents, and Odors in the Workplace: Do not let the first impression you make about yourself be your personal scent preferences!
  Avoid wearing perfume and heavily-scented products in all business settings. You might like them, but they have no place in a business environment. Scents can trigger asthma, overpower a room, and are often more offensive than pleasing to others.
  
  Never smell like smoke (if you smoke in a car, your clothing will always pick up the odor).
  
• How to Present Professional Looking Fingernails and Hands: Women often use their hands to talk with so they become a focal point. It is important to have hands and fingernails looking professional -- not like you are heading out for a wild night on the town.
  Nails should be clean, and trimmed or sculpted. Avoid wearing unusual or shocking nail colors. Nail art and nail jewels are not acceptable for business meetings.
  
• Hairstyling Tips for Business Women: Style should be neat and conservative, and preferably off the face. With few exceptions, hair color should not be shocking or unusual (leave blue hair for Halloween). Hair sprays and gels that have a strong scent or odor should be avoided.
• Business Makeup Advice: Keep it simple and appropriate for daytime. Wearing no makeup at all is almost as bad as wearing too much makeup.
• Appropriate Jewelry for Business Women: Jewelry should not be noisy (no metal bangle bracelets), too large, or costume jewelry. Keep earrings small, simple, and above the earlobe.
  It is better to wear no jewelry at all, than too wear too much jewelry. But all business women should at least wear a nice, conservative wrist watch.

Demonstrating that you care about your personal appearance communicates to the person you are meeting with that they are important to you. Paying attention to the details of your appearance sends a message to others that you will also pay close attention to business details, and the needs of your customers and clients.