A dress-code gone awry
It seems that the Federal Aviation Administration tried to instill a fairly rigid dress code for their air traffic controllers and said controllers fought back in an interesting manner...
From the
Cleveland NewsNet 5:
Miffed By Dress Code, Male Air Controllers Wear Dresses
Air Controllers, FAA Joust Over Dress Code
Air-traffic controllers locked in a labor dispute with the Federal Aviation Administration are upset over a dress code and have shown their displeasure in colorful fashion.
Their union said there have a been a few occasions where male controllers complied with the letter of the guidelines by wearing dresses to work.
At the Cleveland-area air-traffic control center in Oberlin, a controller was told his aquamarine pants were, quoting now, "not gender appropriate" for a man.
The FAA said the dress code is meant to create a professional atmosphere.
When reading this article, I thought of an interesting parallel. These people's jobs are a lot like high-end software developers... Multi-variant problem solving, high stress, high precision needed.
At Microsoft, people were encouraged to outfit their office in whatever style they wanted, to dress however they wanted, to act however they wanted, just so they kept their code output to standards in quality and quantity. It works -- people are happiest working in an environment of their own making and happy people are productive and accurate people.
I bet that giving controllers a bit more autonomy over their workplace decorations and dress would go a long long way to relieve some of their stress and would result in a much happier workforce. A few nerf-ball fights after a particularly bad rush would be a great tension reliever.
Posted by DaveH at June 28, 2007 11:02 PM