"Ethnic" Hair and Professionalism

[InJesusName]

I know that there have been threads on this topic before, but I am in a little dilemma. I am a sales rep in a VERY image driven industry. The white reps pretty much look like Barbie dolls, and the black ones all have bone straight hair. I have recently decided to transition to healthy hair, and I am a little afraid to move forward. My concern is that braids (individuals--not micros) may not appear professional enough for my industry nor will anything that reflects the true texture of my 4a/4b hair. I am going to stretch my relaxer a little longer, and I am sick of buns and phony ponies. Have I been victimized by corporate america?

 

[firecracker]

I can definitely understand how you feel. I had to let go of my glama gurl image to go natural. I felt that I would have to dress differently and be boxed in a certain style with natural hair.
You are going to have to work on getting your mind right in preparation to reveal your God given beautiful hair or different style choices.
Microbraid are really easy and you have many options for professionial styles. You can wear a rocking bun on the side, on the top or the nape. You can wear updo's and a host of other choices. Micro's are much easier adjusting to than natural 4a hair for corporate I think.

Stay encouraged you can do this if its really what you want.

 

[Shawn]

If you're truly concerned about how you'll be received, you could wear your natural hair in real life and try a wig for work. But you might be pleasantly surprised by the reaction to your hair. I'm not so certain that other races dislike our hair texture as much as we might think they do.

 

[grnidmonster]

I know that there have been threads on this topic before, but I am in a little dilemma. I am a sales rep in a VERY image driven industry. The white reps pretty much look like Barbie dolls, and the black ones all have bone straight hair. I have recently decided to transition to healthy hair, and I am a little afraid to move forward. My concern is that braids (individuals--not micros) may not appear professional enough for my industry nor will anything that reflects the true texture of my 4a/4b hair. I am going to stretch my relaxer a little longer, and I am sick of buns and phony ponies. Have I been victimized by corporate america?

Sounds like you work in my industry-Pharma. Everyone is expected to look alike-perfect and white. I waited until I was promoted several times and felt secure before I let my "nap flag fly". I wish I had done it sooner, my customers and peers were very accepting and said they really liked it. Surprisingly, it was my brothers and Sisters in the industry that appeared to be ashamed by my nappy blowfro. I don't care though, I think it's cool and it grew sooo much.

 

[Isis]

Sounds like you work in my industry-Pharma. Everyone is expected to look alike-perfect and white. I waited until I was promoted several times and felt secure before I let my "nap flag fly". I wish I had done it sooner, my customers and peers were very accepting and said they really liked it. Surprisingly, it was my brothers and Sisters in the industry that appeared to be ashamed by my nappy blowfro. I don't care though, I think it's cool and it grew sooo much.

I was going to say this also. The disapproval usually comes from other blacks. White people generally speaking are more accepting and even fascinated with our hair texture.

 

[firecracker]

I was going to say this also. The disapproval usually comes from other blacks. White people generally speaking are more accepting and even fascinated with our hair texture.

You hit the nail on the head which is really sad and self hating in my opinion.

 

[LadyD]

Have any of you heard about an experiment that was done with whites and blacks and hair?

Blacks were asks to pick out dolls that represented whites and they picked out dolls with long straight hair. When asked to picked out dolls that represented blacks they picked the same dolls.

When the whites were asked to do the same they picked dolls with long straight hair to represent themselves but when asked to pick dolls for the black people they ALL picked dolls with afros.

I found this to be so interesting and true. They know how our hair grows and they are not as turned off by it as we are ourselves. Now we all know that some of them don't like it but it shows that we have a bigger issue with it than they do.

 

[Caramela]

Professionalism isn't the texture of your hair. Professional hair, if such a phenomenon exists, is neatly groomed, clean hair. Just because your hair is straight doesn't make it professional.

 

[Syrah]

...and it's like what another poster mentioned when we had this discussion about black hair in Corporate America - it goes a lot further than black hair.

I typically wear my hair tied up in buns at work, simply because it's the lowest maintenance routine for me. However I have also worn braids, cornrows and curly hair (Curly pudding baybee!!) to work. The trick is - no matter what you do it had better be neat. I kept my cornrows in for 2 weeks maximum and maintained them well.

I've also found that doing things like :
- keeping my eyebrows well maintained
- wearing purples or studs as opposed to dangly jewelry
have also contributed to what I think is a more professional appearance.

 

[InJesusName]

grnidmonster...

How did you guess that I was in Pharma? I thank everyone for their support and feedback. I am going to try tree braids while my hair grows out, and just focus on being me. I believe India Arie said "I am not my hair" I'll keep you guys posted.

 

[blackbarbie]

Sounds like you work in my industry-Pharma. Everyone is expected to look alike-perfect and white. I waited until I was promoted several times and felt secure before I let my "nap flag fly". I wish I had done it sooner, my customers and peers were very accepting and said they really liked it. Surprisingly, it was my brothers and Sisters in the industry that appeared to be ashamed by my nappy blowfro. I don't care though, I think it's cool and it grew sooo much.

I was going to comment and say the same thing. When I was a recruiter in the industry, I spoke with a sister that had put in a lot of years in the industry and was pretty sharp. She was pretty cool and I called her on a lot of jobs. I never met her face to face but somehow we started talking about hair once and how she had been sitting all day getting it braided. I was asking her how often she got it braided and that's when she was telling me reactions of most of her customers to her hair vs. her colleagues. Pretty much the same as what you experienced.....Sad but true...

 

[LadyJay114]

You hit the nail on the head which is really sad and self hating in my opinion.

Co-sign!!!