I like the Trivial

Mystery of the missing links
By Joe Dollar

Published: March 28 2009 01:06 | Last updated: March 28 2009 02:50

No one in the office likes Porter. He is socially inept and his intense inward focus has left him tone deaf to clients and the markets. At the same time, he claims to be a leader. I find this sort of vainglorious declaration exasperating. That, and his continuing devotion to cufflinks.

When it comes to work-wear, I think we are all pretty happy that we still have a uniform to wear (that is, we’re still employed). We want to focus on what is important: keeping our business going. Porter is the one guy in our office who doesn’t seem to get this, and his cufflinks and bespoke clothing seem out of tune with the seriousness of the times.

While most of us have our heads down and are desperately trying to raise capital, he is focused on his cufflinks. Few people in the office are wearing them these days. They seem, generally, a banished totem of financial excess. But then ours has never been an office of wardrobe flourishes. Occasionally, the crispness of a colleague’s shirt or the lustre of his suit might get noticed but generally we keep dandyism in check.

The younger associates sometimes get ribbed as they are more likely to dress aspirationally. Early in a career, we each experiment with a work wardrobe before settling into some version of the uniform, losing the desire to use clothes as a means of personal expression along the way.

A few years ago, the younger associates were walking billboards for a thriving economy but now seem to be advertising their frugality.

I float my theory of a new dress-Calvinism in our office to Peter. “I don’t know,” he replies. “I have seen plenty of blue shirts in the office, even some fancy stripy ones.”

“But don’t you think there are fewer cufflinks?” I ask.

“Well, yes, and thank God for that!” It turns out Peter has a particular antipathy to cufflinks as his family has forced a collection of them upon him.

“I don’t even like them,” he announced. “I don’t like them because they prevent me from getting gifts that I might actually like or want. My family has decided that I like to collect cufflinks and now I get them for practically any occasion. It’s not even giving me a gift. It’s giving my shirt a gift.”

I realise that Peter is not the best person to critique my theory so I move on to Graham. “I guess that at a time when bankers are being vilified, cufflinks are an easy target for muckrakers,” he says.

“I think your theory seems a little Jamesian, though: thrifty and honourable barrel cuffs v corrupt ancien régime French cuffs. Credit default swaps don’t wear shirts.”

“But if they did ... ” I try to interject.

“Your theory is too US-centric. I was just in London, and the City is both on suicide watch and in cufflinks.” Graham was right. I felt I had to abandon my thesis.

Days later, economic tribulation came home to roost. At a lunch for department heads, we discussed staff cuts, specifically who we would be letting go.

We all make an effort to defend good people in these meetings – it’s a balance of loyalty, friendship and business. Except for Porter, who is more rigid in his outlook, eyeing only individual revenue generation and return. I want him to protect the people that work for him, to fight for them.

But, sitting next to me in his cufflinks, he has never seemed more villainous.

Vanessa Friedman returns next week