Why I'm thrilled Mark Zuckerberg is annoying the bankers

&#62;"Mark and his signature hoodie: He's actually showing investors he doesn't care that much; he's going to be him. I think that's a mark of immaturity," Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter complained to Bloomberg's Mark Milian. "I think that he has to realize he's bringing investors in as a new constituency right now, and I think he's got to show them the respect that they deserve because he's asking them for their money."<p>Christ, what an asshole.<p>It's a negotiation tactic, one many of us use in interviews: by flaunting social convention and dressing down, you're signaling that you have leverage. Mark is the one being wooed, and not the other way around.<p>By whining about it in the press it just makes it sound like this fellow just isn't used to being the lowest status person in the room.

The idea that here, in the 21st century, any successful entrepreneur must garb oneself in rarely-worn, extremely expensive and generally inconvenient Victorian-era ceremonial dress in order to arrange a business transaction is utterly ludicrous.<p>I'm most effective when I'm at my most confident, and I'm most confident when wearing the clothing that I am used to wearing every day. That might be a suit, and it might be the affordable and well-designed utility clothing that 99% of humanity wears.<p>If it's good enough to wear whilst creating a company worth billions of dollars, it's good enough to wear whilst selling it.

I'm as sartorial as they come. My friends call me 'Swagnificent'; I typically wore tailored, French-cuff shirts, a fedora and suits to my former job as a sysadmin at a Big 4 firm. People regularly stop me on the street and ask to take pictures of me. TL;DR, I'm all for dressing up.<p>But something about this <i>delights</i> me. Imagine, walking into a room of self-indulgent, Wall Street pricks, knowing that they're tripping over themselves to get in on the action. I think I'd be tempted to rub it in. Ordinarily, someone approaches a bank out of their own necessity. Here, the tables have turned. And I love it.<p>Wasn't there a story a few years back about Microsoft calling Zuck for conference call at 9AM, and he told them he was still sleeping; and to call back?

I'm going to stick my neck out here and say that I think he's being rude and arrogant.<p>Yes, he's in a position of power, and could turn up to his meetings wearing only a cunningly positioned silk scarf, and it would have no effect on the banks' willingness to earn lots of money from overseeing the Facebook IPO.<p>But when you're in a position of power you also have a responsibility not to be a dick. I realize dress codes etc are a bit different over there in the US, but at work here I normally dress pretty casually.<p>However, if someone's coming in for interview, I will wear a suit. As I know the candidate's going to turn up in a suit, and it will make them feel uncomfortable if I'm interviewing them in shorts and a t-shirt.<p>The person in the position of power has a moral obligation not to make everyone else feel uncomfortable or stupid. A great example of this is Queen Victoria drinking from her finger-bowl after one of her guests did - in order to save them from any embarassment or discomfort (<a href="http://www.bobssermons.com/sermons/archive/030831.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.bobssermons.com/sermons/archive/030831.htm</a>).<p>And yes, bankers have acted arrogantly, and swanned around like they own the place too long. But its hardly a great example to set to just start doing the same yourself as soon as the balance of power tilts.

&#62;<i>"He's in a position most of us who have scrambled to find obscure documents in order to get a mortgage dream about: Telling a bunch of bankers to take it or leave it."</i><p>Um, banks are no different than your auto mechanic. They want and are competing for your business. You can always tell them take it or leave it.<p>People seem to have this bizarre mentality that you have to go begging to your bank for money, which is hardly the case. Personal business like mortgages and chequing accounts, and for that matter things as large as an IPO, are hyper-competitive. There is a lot of room to shop around.<p>What is it about banking that people find so intimidating and confusing?

"My name is Barack Obama, and I'm the guy that got Mark to wear a jacket and tie." <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/20/mark-zuckerberg-wears-tie-jeans-obama-interview_n_851746.html#s267561" rel="nofollow">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/20/mark-zuckerberg-wea...</a>

Zuckerburg is not annoying any bankers or the buyside, I assure you of that.<p>The only people mentioning it are reporters and sell side analysts.<p>(The guy he mentions in the article is a sell side analyst)

I'm not a huge facebook fan, but I have to agree. Since when is wall street in a position to say "we need to be taken seriously" after all the crap they caused first hand to things for the sake of making money.<p>Isn't all the faux-positioning and over-reverence to the banks the main problem with wall street anyway?

So Mark Zuckerberg wears the regulation silicon valley uniform to a meeting with bankers wearing their regulation wall street uniform? I'm not sure what the interesting content to this story is, but would be happy to be enlightened!

I like this quote from another CNet article on the Facebook IPO:<p>----<p>In the case of Facebook -- whose T-shirt-wearing, 27-year-old chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, is said to appreciate status updates more than stock brokers -- it's unlikely advisors will be able to command the standard rate.<p>"These Valley types think this whole process could be automated and they don't have to pay 7 percent to these flashy, French-cufflink-wearing Wall Street types," said Eric Jackson, founder and managing member of Ironfire Capital, a technology-focused hedge fund, who has interacted professionally with executives at Facebook and other social-media companies.<p>----<p>I doubt the IPO process can be automated to any large degree (unless all the players somehow started thinking like engineers) but I'd sure be happy to see people try!

I've got a question for the repeated assertions that "JP morgan / GS / etc repaid their bailout money"...<p>They only repaid that money because the bailed-out AIG paid off their credit default swaps, right? So isn't it only true in the most narrow sense that they paid it back, considering that the gov't totally ate it on AIG?

An investment banker annoyed by Zuckerberg wearing a hoodie is equally impotent to someone who can't wait to see Zuckerberg "stick it to the bankers".<p>Focus on stuff that matters.

Even the almighty Steve Jobs when visited a Nobel award ceremony wore a tie. Bottom line it all depends on the importance of the event. You can't demand respect, you can only earn it. And the bankers haven't earn it a bit.

"Clothing is the outward expression of a man’s state of mind. It is his attire that tells the world what he thinks of himself." -Pearl Binder<p>"Dressing conscientiously is exalting in the act of being alive." -Gay Talese<p>It doesn't much matter what Zuckerberg signals or doesn't signal to Wall Street bankers by wearing a hoodie. It won't have a material impact on his company's offering.<p>Coco Chanel used to say that one shouldn't leave the house without putting some effort into one's appearance -- if only out of politeness. It is, after all, the rest of us who have to look at you. The most unfortunate part of this story is that Zuckerberg fails to realize -- or care -- that a little sartorial attention imparts respect for the people with whom you are doing business, both personally and professionally.<p>Whether he likes it or not, Zuck is now a high profile individual, with all the attention that follows suit. That's, in my mind, an opportunity to think critically about how he presents himself aesthetically. Contrary to what most posters here seem to think, fashion isn't binary: there are more choices than a hoodie and jeans or a suit. Putting some effort into his appearance doesn't mean he has to look like, or imply endorsement of, Wall Street bankers. If anything, purposefully flaunting that convention is the opposite side of the same coin.

There's an unspoken assumption behind all this, that I'm wondering about.<p>So, FB is having the usual IPO roadshow, but they're not doing it quite as expected. My question: Why are they having the roadshow at all?<p>Instead they could have done a few interviews with major business magazines (which I believe they did), put out what amounts to an annual report, to get people information, maybe even had a special hotshot-analyst-only webpage for submitting questions about strategy &#38; what not.<p>What does the roadshow get them that the above wouldn't have? The only things I can think of are time &#38; money spent, and lots of headaches.

The Wikioracle tells us:<p>---<p>Western business wear is standard in many workplaces around the globe, even in countries where the usual daily wear may be a distinctive national costume.<p>Some non-Western businesspeople will wear national costume nonetheless. A Saudi Arabian sheikh may wear the traditional robes and headdress to an international conference; United Arab Emirates diplomats in particular are noted for attending conventions of the United Nations General Assembly in full keffiyeh and thawb. Diplomats of the People's Republic of China are similarly noted for wearing the Mao suit to international events; Indian leaders often wear Nehru jackets, with Manmohan Singh wearing a suit-like combination including such a jacket with his Sikh turban. Wearing national costume in such contexts can proclaim national pride, or just <i>extremely high status which allows the wearer to defy convention.</i><p>---<p>Indeed, maybe that's what's happening here: the corporate chieftain showing his power among those in the room. Let Zuckerberg peacock; he is within his full rights to. Does a client have to dress however his banker does?

I don't like either (FB or Wall Street).<p>I will enjoy watch the two fight it out.

Big f-ing deal. This is basically a puff piece. I don't think he is annoying the bankers, at this point everyone expects him to wear a hoodie. If he really wanted to annoy the bankers he would have done google style Dutch auction ipo. The bankers really hated that.

Anyone who follows the console gaming market will instantly recognize Michael Pachter as a first-class media troll that says ridiculous things to get his name mentioned in articles.<p>It would probably be better to just ignore this guy instead of playing into him.

To me the big story of this IPO is that Facebook execs are giving tacit approval to large amounts of pedophilia and hate material that exist on the site because for them to remove it, they'd have to acknowledge it exists first, and they feel this could turn off investors.<p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bcs6pIslv1A#t=662s" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bcs6pIslv1A#t=662s</a> (Pedophilia Groups Invade Facebook)<p>And to think Mark actually single-handedly has the power to do something. Such poor character. And there's a ton of anti-semitic material too. Ewwww.

Why do companies put up with the 1-3% share of the bank for an IPO? What is the service the banks provide, and do they have more work if the IPO is bigger? Otherwise, why not give them a flat fee?<p>I suppose Facebook could whip up a trading system for "virtual FB shares" on top of FB on a weekend, no need for banks and stock markets at all? Some lawyers to comply with regulations, though :-/<p>They already have their own currency, so presumably also an infrastructure for transactions and so on.

This is ridiculous. The whole thing. The way he dressed probably says none of the things they think. That is typical behavior for a self made man who had to actually create something of value to make a buck instead of having to do social jockeying to get hired. Different worlds. The bankers live in a monkey sphere where pecking order is incredibly important. Mark does not. "There is always room at the top" and all that.

The average IPO proceeds for the past two decades have never exceeded 100 million and have been hovering around 70 for a while. At 3% that means the typical cut is $2.1 million or less. Facebook plans to raise $11.8 billion, which at 1% would be $118 million. Compensation of fifty times normal implied by the 1% figure thrown out in the article still seems pretty high.

Microsoft made him wealthy. People became amazed and dazed, willing to give him more money.<p>Good on him for not caring. FU money. He suckered Microsoft and that's enough. He's set for life.<p>But it's not the hoodie, it's who's in it.<p>If he's rejected by investment bankers, it's not because he wore a hoodie. It's because of who he is. Wearing hoodies to meetings is but one very small part.

must be a slow news day

What he wears should not matter, except he has a dress code for people who come interview for a job at Facebook. So, he certainly deserves a ribbing for believing he is above his own rules.

Awesome. I take this as a sign things are changing. I can't wait to see the day when technology companies are the top of the food chain, and bankers are second.

Did this guy just type 2 pages about a hoodie? (and 167 people found this interesting?)

Zuck is about to step into (F*ck You Money ^ N) so what else would you expect?

<i>We're Facebook. We don't wear suits. We don't even own suits.</i>

Has anyone ever seen Steve Jobs where a suit and tie?

Suits are so passé.

Aren't people reading a little too much into this? He probably owns one suit and forgot to get it pressed.

Of course if he was a real maverick he would tell the bankers and the stock market to stuff it.<p>He has more customers on his site than the Nasdaq has share buyers/sellers. If he decided to reinvent stock markets and simply sell shares directly to facebook members then you would see some panic!<p>After all if shares are all traded electronically why do we need a room full of scrolling displays pretending to be ticker tape and opened by a bell? Why not have buying and selling shares in any company a feature of facebook ?

The bankers might return the favor with downgrades and other stuff soon enough (and yes, he will have to care once the stock goes down, no matter what he says).<p>Some occasions call for slippers, others for khakis and others for a suit and tie. Wear an ill fitting suit to show that you're not comfortable in one if want, but wear a freaking suit. You're asking strangers to buy with their hard earned money about $10 billion of your $100 billion pie. Show some respect for the occasion.

Okay, look.<p>I look like fucking Bob Marley, I just fucking do. This hair is a fucking baby, but makes me flow like Spike Spiegal. I am not kidding you. I wear what I wear because, quite frankly, I found most of it. And I'm not letting it go. It's my "brand" or whatever trash-jargon concept you wish to apply. And I develop web apps. (these realizations were documented in hindsight to the following:) (But just a tad before: I actually had a client ask, "So what's up with the hair?" This "style" occurs naturally. I do what I can with what I've accepted about my personal image and what I am willing to accept of it.)<p>I took a job at Waste Management in Houston Corporate Headquaters with KF and BG. KF a hip, young but distinguished-looking 30-something, and BG another minority like me. We worked with git and I drew all sorts of nutty information architecture concepts upon a dry-erase board wall on the 17-th floor. Downtown Houston. We did front-end development. The teams wiped out now, after about a year. I believe I triggered part of that. And then they threw SharePoint at us. We were expected to devise a CSS system around trashy SilverLight modules and around some SilverLight developers bogus understanding of front-end considerations. And then the Enterprise CMS with no documentation and no "technical vision."<p>Garbage. In a world like this, why should Zuckerberg care? Developers have seen the dirty laundry of these rotting industries, and they're going to wear it.<p>The day it struck me is when I decided to take my morning stroll around the office, to strike up that Office Space tone for the day. So I could write my some-number-of-lines-of-code. My coffee was stale and depressing. As I turned the corner, a VP, along with others, about their own morning stroll, shouts at me, "Whoa! Hair!"<p>You just can't fucking win with these fucking suits.<p>I am preparing to compute in hostile climates (cold and hot climates, urban noisescapes, parking garages, etc.). I am preparing to compute in space.

What Zuckerberg chooses to wear to a meeting with bankers should not matter at all. If anything it's a kind of reverse IQ test for those he's meeting with. It doesn't say anything bad about his own. It might about theirs, if they have a problem with it. If he went totally naked, that would be different. But younger generations of workers are increasingly casual, and that's a world I for one welcome. Substance matters most.

annoyed by a hoodie? they are going to make a mint from this deal.<p>bankers win again :-)