Steve Jobs had his simple black turtlenecks, Twitter’s Jack Dorsey had his sharp Prada suit, and Mark Zuckerberg has his uniform of nondescript, plain gray T-shirts. At a recent Q&A session, someone finally asked him why he seems to have a lifetime supply of inoffensive, poorly fitting gray tees.
His answer: “I’m in this really lucky position where I get to wake up every day and help serve more than a billion people. And I’d feel I’m not doing my job if I spent any of my energy on things that are silly or frivolous about my life.”
Burn, Zuckerberg! Is it just me or does the mindset of the Silicon Valley Power-Schlub imply that caring about clothing or how you look invalidates your ability to work? Of course, male CEOs are far too focused on changing the world or building the next Big App to care about something as “silly” or “frivolous” as dressing professionally — they’ll just leave that to Marissa Mayer.
