Can I Set a more Casual Culture than my Boss?

I think it's dangerous. If you do this you run the risk of your team not meeting the group's quality standard. Results and presentation are not mutually exclusive.

I was in a situation like this. Boss was an "off the charts" perfectionist. In some ways, this was a huge help. I came to realize what an outstanding work product looked like and that some people would judge a book by its cover. After working for him I am able to turn out work products that meet very high quality standards for presentation.

In other ways, it was incredibly frustrating. I had people on my team delay turnging in work because they were 'afraid of the red pen'. It was also demoralizing to put a lot of work into something and have someone make stylistic changes that were subjectively better. (Marshall Goldsmith highlights this in What Got You Here Won't Get You There in a section called "Adding too Much Value".)

My strategies to meet standards and minimize frustration were:

• Understand what the non-negotiable aspects of high-quality were. Quarterly reports needed to be perfect. Customer facing work reports needed to be perfect. Internal communications, strategy notes, and working papers could be more relaxed.
• Know where these standards can be relaxed. For us, this was in areas that needed velocity. If something was a prototype or a mock-up I would explain, "this is a prototype. I will get this in it's final form before it's ready to deliver, but for this meeting I'd like to focus on the content". (Prototypes and mock-ups still had quaility standards.)
• Solve root problems of quality issues. We had an issue with getting reports to "look right". We ended up using a template (.dotx) and MS Office Styles to simplify getting things to "look right".

Dude,  your style doesn't matter.

The question should be "Would it be effective if my workgroup is more casual than my Boss likes ?"

Are you suggesting that because your Boss likes things very uptight - that you will are willing to behave with your Boss in the manner that he likes, but, you won't roll that down to your directs ?

Essentially saying that your don't expect your directs to behave like you do.

That can work in certain situations.  I wear long sleeve and tie to work every day.  But, I don't expect my directs to.  Because, I am professional librarian management and they are paraprofessionals.  So in that case yes, - there is a more casual standard for paraprofessional and other workers down on the Org Chart.

Once past a certain line up on the Org Chart - though a more "professional" behavior in dress is expected.

I'd suggest you think long a hard about it.  Ask your Boss why he has it a certain way ?  Maybe his way is better - or just as good.

Could there be a morale problem with the other peers ?  Will there be envy that your group gets to dress more casual than them ?    Relationships matter.

Will that effect relationships between your peer managers and the peers of your directs ?

Are those peers at a different worksite ?  Do they do different kinds of work ?

Is there any harm in doing it your Boss's way ?  Is there something ineffective about it ?

I know - not may answers - just more questions.

Sorry..

TJPuccio

I think the question is more than, "Can I have a different style than my boss?" or "Can I have a more casual culture than my boss?". You're also asking is "Can I change the quality standards?" That's harder. I'd approach it like so,

"Hey Boss. Some of these tasks are taking a long time to complete. I think that we can get more efficient with this work if we selectively looked at areas we can speed up. If we do that we may have to sacrifice a little in the quality of presentation. I'm confident that the contents of the materials will be accurate and that the presentation sacrifices won't be so great that it will affect the output. I have a few ideas, but I'm really interested in getting some of your thoughts on this."

If your boss is a reader instead of a listener (often the case with High Cs) I'd recommend sending this in an email and suggesting that you speak about it in a few days. If I had walked into my High C Boss' office and said that he would have felt like I "sprung it on him" and wanted an immediate answer.