Corporette.com

Updated: Oct 26, 2022 88 Comments · by

Suit of the Week: Brooks Brothers

Suit of the Week |

This post may contain affiliate links and Corporette® may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

I realize linen suits are not for everyone — but it can be great to have one in your closet for those days where you need to look polished and professional, but it's sweltering outside. (I also just did a mini-update to some of our favorite linen blazers out there right now; see the widget at the bottom.)

This light peach pinstriped one from Brooks Brothers caught my eye — I like the relaxed vibe, and I always think peachy pink is a surprisingly versatile color for suits — wear it with white, navy, black, gray, as well as more fun colors like reds and oranges.

To discuss: the untucked shirt! What are your thoughts, readers? It strikes me as a casual touch to the outfit, which is OK if that's what you're going for. I suppose my rules for untucked blouses for work in 2021 would be 1) banded tops shouldn't be tucked, 2) fitted t-shirts or sweaters almost never need to be tucked, 3) fitted blouses can be left untucked but note that it's more casual. I'd say unfitted, billowy blouses and tops should almost always be tucked. Readers, what are your thoughts?

The pictured suit is available in sizes 0-14, at Brooks Brothers; the blazer is marked 50% off to $214, and the pants are down to $149..

(Looking for something more affordable and/or in plus sizes? This linen-cotton blend suit at J.Crew Factory comes in pink, sizes 00-24, and is about half what the Brooks Brothers suit is.)

These are our favorite linen blazers right now…

Sales of note for 9.10.24

Sales of note for 9.10.24

Some of our latest posts here at Corporette…

RSS Error: WP HTTP Error: cURL error 60: Issuer certificate is invalid.

And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!

Some of our latest threadjacks include:

About Kat

Kat Griffin is the founder, publisher, and editor-in-chief of Corporette. You can read more about her here.

Comments

  1. Anonymous

    I made partner this year. It is exciting – except, I’m barely making money. Lots of divisions are slow. I’m working on my budget to make sure I’ll be OK, but I’m getting feedback from other partners that I am “too efficient.” I don’t have value-billing in my client agreements, I bill for all my active work time, and if I’m at my desk it truly does take me 0.2 hours to edit a template/form and send it to the client with instructions.

    Are there ethical, suggested ways to bill more?

    • Ellen

      AT my firm, we have value billing, which may not mean the same thing as at your firm. I typically do a job once for cleint A, and then allocate billing across to other existing cleints that may have that issue in the future. So if for my example there are 10 cleints that could have the issue, they all get billed for the work and I have 10X the billing, because the cleint will not be billed for the same work later. This allows us to front-end load our billings, and the more work I do that effect multiple cleints, the more I can value bill. That is how I made partner and am the biggest biller at my firm and have a share in Bridgehamton this summer courtsey of the firm! YAY!!!

      • Anon In House

        I know Ellen is our resident troll, but yikes. The only reason I’m responding to this is because I know people who have contemplated doing something similar, which is clearly unethical.

        • Anon

          Thanks for posting this. I’m an attorney but have never been in private practice, so I read this and was like… is this an Ellen thing or a real thing?!

    • Anonymous

      I assume you’re billing for every quick email and chat already? That’s the area where I lose the most time since I often think “oh that only took 2 minutes, so why bill.” It adds up.

    • Anonymous

      If it’s only taking you .2 to review a form, edit it, draft an email to the client, and send it. Slow down? That’s really fast! Read it through twice. Review your email again.

      • anon

        I agree with slowing down. You’re a partner. Don’t just edit the form. Think about the big picture–what is the purpose of the form? What needs to be in it? What doesn’t need to be there? Is the form easy to understand for the people who are going to read it and fill it out? Typically, editing a form is an associate task. The value you should be adding involves more thought, which may involve more time. The exception would be if you’re a subject matter expert and another partner asks you to review and sign off on one part of a form that’s relevant to your practice.

    • Anonymous

      From your description, you are not billing your time correctly. You should be billing from the time you turn your attention to the project to the time you turn your attention to something else. Instead, you’re billing for the time you’re actually typing, which is not correct. Your clients are paying for your mind not your hands.

      It took you time to determine you needed to work on the form; to think about what needed to be done with the form; to find the right form; to edit the form; to save the form in the right location on your system; to attach it to the email; to draft instructions to the client; to file your email in the appropriate client folder. There is no way all of that is taking you 12 minutes. Maybe it should really be .4 or .5 but that time adds up, especially when you do a lot of little tasks all day. You shouldn’t get to the end of a 10 hour day when you’ve been working diligently all day and have like 4 hours to show for it.

      • Anon

        I think this is going to be the typical advice here, but I disagree. I can literally do all of that in 12 minutes. I know this because I can tell from the time the email comes in until I send it out with attachments. I don’t know what to say. I know I’m very fast and for me I either just intentionally slow down and re-read everything twice like the poster above says, or I just accept I’m going to have less time billed than everyone else.

        • Anon

          Honestly if I were your client I wouldn’t want you to spend only 12 minutes on all of that. I would assume you’re not doing it carefully.

          • Cat

            Yeah it’s a balance. As a client I don’t want outside counsel running up the bill unnecessarily, but I am also willing to pay for a thorough job. Like- at 0.2 I can’t imagine you actually give the fact pattern a ton of thought vs. the template – maybe some aspect of it should be changed or deleted rather than just the appropriate entity name plopped in? Have you had any ‘lessons learned’ from the last time using the template to suggest incorporating? Etc

          • Cat

            Hit submit too fast. If it’s such a no-brainer that you can do it in .2 I don’t know why I’d need outside counsel to do it at all… what’s the value add you bring?

          • Anon In House

            I disagree. I can definitely relate to OP on this. I’m in house and do a lot of work with forms and templates. There are definitely templates that it only takes me about this amount of time to look at. I run a comparison to our normal template (takes 10 seconds), then look at whatever has been changed (often only a few sentences), then save a new version and send back or send an email approving the submitted version. I am considerably faster than my coworkers, and my work does not have more mistakes than theirs. I am assuming this is similar the 12-minute scenario and it’s not something longer and more complex.

            Basically my only advice is to evaluate whether there are some tasks that you truly should be devoting more time to by checking over a few times. If so, by all means, do that. Otherwise, can you work out flat fee arrangements with some of your clients?

          • Anon In House

            Cat raises a good point that my department would never be sending my 12-minute forms to outside counsel to fill in or even check! My point was mostly that it is possible to edit or check a form/template in 12 minutes when it’s simple.

          • Anon

            I’m the Anon at 3:12 – (not OP) and I guess when I’m referring to this I mean standard motions from a template like extensions, enrollment, substitutions, dismissals, corporate disclosure statements, etc. Nothing with an actual fact pattern that needs to be changed out, but there are many simple motions that you work off of a form with.

        • Anonymous

          Can you tackle it on the client intake side with a schedule of set fees for certain tasks? That way you are off the clock.

        • Anonymous

          I’m the person you’re responding to. In that case, can you bundle tasks, either for each client or by task type? I know this is going against your training as an associate, but don’t respond to an email within 10 minutes. If you’re responding that quickly, you’re spending your day chasing emails. I’ve had those days, I feel like I’m
          on a hamster wheel and didn’t get any real work done. It’s terribly inefficient. Figure out a way to bundle tasks or clients or whatever makes the most sense to you. You’ll lose less transition time.

          • Cornellian

            3:47 anon: this is a really good point. if you respond to emails instantaneously and it takes 2 minutes, you start losing track of that time. If you can wait until 2 PM and then respond to any emails about that project, I think you’re more likely to give yourself credit for all of the actual time you spent.

          • No Face

            I think this is a very good point. Plus, I find that when I am really focused on my pending tasks for the same client/matter, I realize other tasks and next steps to move the matter forward. My best billing days are when I focus on a few cases. My worst are when I am bouncing between various small tasks.

          • Anon

            “you’re spending your day chasing emails”

            Amen to this. Even if you are doing them in 12 minutes, this is not a great way to work.

    • Cornellian

      I wonder if by “too efficient” they might mean that you’re not proactively finding work that clients might need done? I’m not sure what your practice is but in my transactional practice after 5 or 6 years I got better at identifying what projects the client had NOT asked us to do, but may want done. Obviously you need client sign-off to do more work, but they may be looking for you to be more proactive.

    • Anon

      @OP –

      I wanted to add something here. There’s a different between providing advice and counseling. You are providing advice and doing a task. This advice and task are exactly tailored to what your client is asking for. But also, what I want from my _valued_ outside counsel is to look around corners, anticipate issues, tell me that my form is fine now but there’s a coming update to XYZ statute which will affect it in June. Your job is to be a _trusted thought partner_. If your clients are sending you things that are really easily sorted that fast, then you are not staffing things properly, because a rote compare and add a bit project is appropriate for a senior paralegal or a junior associate, and even if you can do it in .2 and an associate would take .4, I would rather a .4 associate do it, because you are too expensive to be doing low-level work. Others have echoed the same above.

      Partners should be making me, my legal colleagues and my business look good to the Board by helping us be ahead of things. If you’re providing very little value-add by just doing a very rote task, then there’s no reason I’d be loyal to you or your firm (sounds like anyone can do it) and you should be worried about your book.

      If you don’t have clients where you are providing thought leadership and partnership via true counseling to, then you need to brush up on your BD skills and seek out clients with complex matters. .2s are not going to pay the bills long term. You need to do some work on who you are, what your practice is and how you are–long term–going to develop thought leadership and deeper and more meaningful (value-add) relationships with clients.

  2. Anon

    I love linen suits. Twice, I’ve gotten hired wearing a linen skirt suit during the summer.

    • Anon

      I love them too. Wrinkles are part of the look. Anyone who looks askance at that doesn’t understand linen.

      I home sewed my post-college interview suit. It was unlined deep blue linen. I got the job.

      • Formerly Lilly

        Agreed. Fabric purporting to be linen that doesn’t wrinkle should be regarded with deep suspicion.

  3. AnonATL

    Now that I’m vaccinated, I’m itching to make a big change to my hair. I have never colored it and don’t intend to anytime soon. That leaves me with making a reasonably drastic cut. It has grown out considerably during covid even with at home trims and is just a boring chest length now. It’s pretty thick and wavy.
    Where do you go for hair cut inspiration besides Pinterest? Or any suggestions on styles to search for?
    Low maintenance is best for my lifestyle. Im not trying to have a pixie that needs to be trimmed every few weeks.

    • Cornellian

      I’d follow the I G of a few local stylists and see if any one of them posts lots of cuts that you like, then let that stylist have sort of free reign.

    • Anonymous

      I did this a few weeks ago and got my inspiration from Pinterest searching terms like “short blunt bob with straight hair.” I chopped it off a few weeks ago into a blunt bob that falls between my chin and my shoulders. I absolutely love it. It feels fresh and new and so much lighter. But I don’t know if this would really count as low maintenance. I tend to get my hair cut every 2-3 months.

      • Anonymous

        +1 – I got a chin-length bob, kind of by accident (I swear we talked about it being a bit longer) and am shocked at how much faster it is to dry. I’m really enjoying it. And I don’t need a ponytail for it to be off my neck, which is nice as the weather gets hotter. I’m not sure how well this works with really wavy hair, but I imagine a good stylist could come up with a nice short cut that isn’t so high maintenance as a pixie. I’m guessing you will want more layers than someone with straighter hair.

    • Anon

      I like a short wavy bob like the pic someone posted above of Marion Cotillard. There’s a Gen z trend of curly haired people cutting curly bangs but I think that’s a bit risky and could go wrong in so many ways (which I say as a straight-haired fan of bangs)

    • Aunt Jamesina

      I find that looking up my face shape is helpful, as is looking up celebrities with similar(ish) features.

    • JD

      Since French women have such a great approach to natural and easy hair styles try this in google and look at the images: tendance cheveux 2021 femme. I always find something great. The cut, natural looking color.

  4. Anonymous

    I enjoyed this humorous, snarky take on reopening from SFGate – “Let’s Never Go Back to the Office.” There are some great points in there, but it’s also just plain smart and funny and I thought some of you would enjoy. I totally agree with the main point – that we shouldn’t go back to “normal” in cases where “normal” wasn’t that great. Let’s keep the best of what we’ve learned and gained from this horrible experience to make the future better.

    https://www.sfgate.com/sf-culture/article/return-to-offices-remote-work-after-drew-magary-16186401.php?IPID=SFGate-HP-CP-Spotlight

    • AFT

      Wow, so much good stuff in that article. Wish I could send it anonymously to the powers that be at my company.

        • AIMS

          But wouldn’t that require being back in the office?
          (I’m on team Office Flexibility but this is, to me, an example of why office life actually happens to be good sometimes).

  5. EB

    So I asked yesterday about gifts for someone graduating from dental school and the overwhelming consensus was that you don’t get a gift for an extended family member you hardly know. Well, in my effort to be somewhat anonymous and not too into the details, I don’t think I was accurate and it resulted in a bunch of responses of “don’t bother buying a gift for someone you don’t know.” Which I think were totally accurate and reasonable.

    But the family member is my younger, by ten years, step-brother, and although it is true we are not close because we never lived together under the same roof, I do think it would be nice to buy him a gift. Especially as I was invited to his graduation. So with those extra details, does anyone have any ideas for a nice gift under $200 for a young man about to be a dentist? I’m drawing a blank and really need help (clearly, as I am coming back for help again!!)

      • NYCer

        +1. I would probably also add in a bottle of champagne, but the cash alone would be fine too.

        [I was one of the commenters yesterday who said do not give a gift, but changed my mind given your additional details. I thought you were talking about a random cousin or someone like that.]

    • Anonymous

      So that is totally different and a nice gesture. I would do a nice bottle of champagne and/or a gift card to a fancy restaurant. Or take him out to dinner yourself.

    • Cornellian

      I don’t know if this would come across as paternalistic, but I think a lot of people just out of school could use a consultation with a (fee based) financial planner. He may be juggling lots of debt but is presumably about to be pretty high earning, and I feel like dentists in particular fall victim to a lot of hare brained investment schemes for some reason. It may be more like 250 or 300/hour, though…

    • Anonymous

      Is he going into private practice? If you can find it, maybe help get a frame for his diploma?

      Or is he doing some sort of residency program at a hospital or nonprofit clinic? if so, I’d suggest a giftcard to a nicer shoe store. There’s a lot of standing and walking so comfortable

    • Too bad.

      That is a lot of $ for someone about to start a very lucrative career. Does he have a couple hundred thousand dollars in debt? Then give him a bottle of champagne and card + cash. Is he debt free? Then just the champagne and a nice card.

      • Anon

        This is stupid. She’s giving a nice gift, it doesn’t have anything to do with his amount of debt. Do you make every interpersonal relationship this transactional?

      • Aunt Jamesina

        The income can be very good, but dental school is very expensive and students typically come out with a lot of debt.

    • Cat

      FWIW it wasn’t common in my circle for anyone to get “gifts” for grad school graduation from anyone other than their parents. Siblings maybe would buy a bottle of something nice to toast with or take the grad out for drinks or dinner, not write a check.

    • Anonymous

      Some useful things: good shoes, support stockings, physio or PT classes to get a head start to avoid later physical pain from a physically demanding job.

      Fun thing: gift card to a magazine selling bookstore (or somewhere) so that he can choose some samples for waiting room magazines. A high-quality digital radio for his office (if US doctors use radio and podcasts in the background).

      What he’d probably appreciate the most: cash and a handwritten card congratulating him on his achievement, with best wishes for his next part of life.

    • Anon

      You are being very nice and there’s nothing wrong with it. I think cash is a great idea, as is the shoe gift card if you want something slightly more personalized/thoughtful.

    • Anonymous

      Is he going to need to buy professional clothing? If so, maybe a Nordstrom gift card and a note about giving up the hoodies.

  6. Anon

    I’m an attorney who supervised an extern last summer. I don’t teach at their school. They just sent me an email requesting a letter of recc, which was clearly meant for me (not just copied and pasted to a bunch of different people) and said “Professor (my last name).” That’s not a thing, right? Like, it’s not some new thing law schools are telling their students to do for externship supervisors? I would never have called an externship supervisor Professor. And it wasn’t like it was something they did all of last summer. This is the first time. I wouldn’t say anything to him, but am curious if this is a thing that happens anywhere in the US.

    • Anonymous

      Oh, come on, of course it’s an error. The kid is either trying to err on the side of being deferential or did a copy-paste.

      • Cat

        yeah this is 100% a “doing a bunch of requests at once, most of them are for professors, remembered to update the last name but not change it to Ms because this is the only request I’m sending to a non-instructor.”

        If the student caught after hitting send they are probably face-palming. The nicest possible response would be to reply quickly saying you’re happy to do it and totally ignoring the mistake.

    • Anonymous

      There seem to be a lot of questions lately in the vein of “here’s some random thing that happened to me once, is this a new trend?” No, it’s not. The working world is weird, people who are new to it make odd mistakes, and it just doesn’t matter.

    • Anonymous

      Do you mean calling you a professor? I’m sure that’s just a student error.

    • Anon

      When I was in law school, I had to email a judge and HAD NO IDEA how to address them in the email and had anxiety about it for days. I would give them the benefit of the doubt.

      • Anon

        I called the HR director at my first job Mrs. Lastname after quickly glancing at her hands and seeing the wedding ring. I am so embarrassed about that now! I had no idea how to handle myself at a business place.

        (She was nonplussed but said “Carrie, please call me Carrie.”)

    • Anon

      FWIW, my husband has sent emails to, e.g., law professors with “Dr.” as the salutation became it is so reflexive for him to address an academic that way.

    • Anon

      Yup, every time somebody younger than you does something it means that generation is dumb and bad at things.

    • Anon

      Point made.

      To address a couple of points:

      The extern is older than me and are in their second professional career. It’s not generational at all.
      Sometimes career centers give weird or bad advice and wasn’t sure if this was one of those times. My career office told students it was normal for new employees to send detailed self-performance reviews weekly to their supervisors so we should do the same thing to start off on a good foot, even if we weren’t asked.
      They were a great addition to our team and I would never let such a minor thing change my opinion of them, nor would it ever affect how I responded to this request. I said yes immediately, didn’t mention it, and am working on a great letter.
      It had to be intentional- it wasn’t a form letter making the request, it included specific questions about me and how our work is going.

      • anon2

        As a former adjunct, it’s entirely possible that they assumed you were “hired” in a similar capacity and should be referred ot as professor. It’s something we’ve already spent more time on here than we ever should have. It does not matter. Write the rec and move on.

  7. Anon

    Randomly, I always thought that the Meghan Markle drama was all ginned up by the House of York (Fergie is thirsty / distract from the Andrew issues; not a cousins-animus thing at all). Today: there was an announcement that Bea is pregnant on the Harry/Meghan anniversary. Someone (Fergie?) is a stone cold b and is keeping score.

    • Anon

      Is this something people actually think about? It would never occur to me not to announce a pregnancy on someone’s anniversary. Heck, I don’t even know anyone’s anniversary. (I could maybe figure it out by looking back at stuff for the wedding, but never do and don’t tack them),

      • No Face

        I certainly don’t think about things like this, but the royals probably put more thought into these types of announcements than I can imagine.

      • Anonymous

        This.
        Bea has a lot of first cousins. It’s always going to be someone’s birthday or anniversary or their kid’s birthday or whatever.

        I suspect they are a family like any other in that the extended family (cousins) don’t spend a lot of time thinking about each other. I only have a few cousins and I don’t remember all their anniversaries even though I was at their weddings.

    • Anon

      She always was, for those of us old enough to remember her heyday. It wasn’t necessarily a drawback for her back in the day, she kind of had to be one.

    • Anon

      Whether it’s Fergie or The Firm (or probably both) spreading the H&M hatred, it’s important to remember that it lands well and consistently because of ingrained racism and misogyny.

      • Cat

        idk, Harry is doing a pretty good job on himself. For someone who so hates the media he sure loves talking about himself and his feelings… and calling the first amendment bonkers. Not sure we can blame Fergie for that one.

        • Anon

          The fact that you’re criticizing him for “talking about his feelings” is a pretty big point he’s making in regards to mental health.

          • Cat

            Nah just pointing out that contrary to what he said he wanted (a private life, not the “Truman Show”) he seems to like participating in the media and sharing extremely personal details very publicly.

            But I’ve not been impressed with him since he was partying in a N-zi costume and nicknaming his military friends based on their ethnicity so maybe I’m just biased…

      • Anon

        Nah, I checked the Daily Fail and it reminds the world: Slight to House Sussex by House York announcing Pregnancy on Third Anniversary (as if anyone cares about anyone’s anniversary except the couple themselves). It is like bad Game of Thrones. It is so petty of an act that I have no doubt that it is a Fergie-originated thing. I am sure that the couple has been out privately about expecting and that the flame-fanning is separate and orchestrated.

        This does not detract from Harry/Meghan’s ability to not quite get their PR quite right.

    • Anon

      Harry and Meghan announced her pregnancy on or around the wedding of one of Fergie’s daughters (can’t remember her name).

  8. Venting

    Trigger warning: stalking. Just wanting to vent because when is this bs going to end? Stressful day, I went for a walk along a river in my city which is close to my apartment. I’m 35, live in a safe, central, yuppie neighborhood with lots of kids. Wearing over-ear headphones, got an ice cream on the way. Winding my way through my neighborhood on the way home (shops, storefronts, mostly closed) I sensed a man walking fairly close behind me, confirmed in car/shop windows. I cross, he crosses, etc. This is far from the first time I’ve been followed, not only in this city but in many others, and just automatically did the ‘don’t head home, walk toward light/people’ thing watching this guy in the windows behind me. Finally when it was safe, I abruptly turned around in an occupied, lit space and said ‘stop following me’ and he looked flustered and responded ‘I just want to talk to you!’. Not only was I so angry at being followed once again I was even further enraged at the audacity that this dude thinks some woman walking around eating an ice cream minding her own business is available to chat up. I said ‘I don’t want to talk to you. Turn around and leave, I’m calling the police’ and he called me a b&$# and left. I am so, so tired of this. It ruined my walk, which had at first helped settle today’s stress, but no.

Back to Top

About

Work with Corporette®

Serious Stuff

work fashion blog press mentions