''Dress for Success'' is a 1975 book by John T. Molloy about the effect of

clothing Clothing (also known as clothes, apparel, and attire) are items worn on the body. Typically, clothing is made of fabrics or textiles, but over time it has included garments made from animal skin and other thin sheets of materials and natural ...

on a person's success in business and personal life. It was a

bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...

and was followed in 1977 by ''The Women's Dress for Success Book''. Together, the books popularized the concept of "

power dressing Born in the second half of the 1970s and developed in the 1980s, power dressing is a fashion style that enables women to establish their authority in a professional and political environment traditionally dominated by men. History The term ''power ...

".1980s Fashion History and Lifestyle
/ref> Molloy's advice was unusual because they ran actual tests by showing drawings to people and compiling their perceptions of the impact of the clothes. In ''The Women's Dress for Success Book'', he stated, "This is the most important book ever written about women's clothes, because it is based on scientific research, not on

he author's He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...

opinion." What was discovered is still included in "advice" articles today: Dress like you already have the job. Respondents subconsciously judged the clothes to see that the wearer fit in with other employees. Molloy frankly stated that the attempt to "look like" current employees posed a special challenge for women and minority applicants in the contemporary (1977) reality of a white, male-dominated workplace.

References

External links

* Article discussing dressing for succes
Dress For Success in the Workplace
1975 non-fiction books 1970s fashion Self-help books {{self-book-stub