Does your job allow tats?

My current job as a cafe server allows you to have visable tattoos even though the four I have are not visable anyways. I've been trying to figure out what kind of work I want to do and my family keeps telling me visable tattoos will make employers not want to hire me. Careers I am interested in going into include medical, working with animals, culinary, and possibly computers.

I would like to have more tattoos. More elaborate ones than those I have now. Right now I have a Wadjet eye on my right ankle, a cat on my left ankle, a dragon on the inside of my left ankle and an equal sign on my back, just below my neck.

I am considering many other tattoos, one I am certain I want. I want a large backpiece that is a dragon clinging to my back. It is my reward to myself once I lose the weight I want to lose. I would love to have tats on my arms and legs as well.

Would employers really not hire me because of some tattoos? Especially in the fields I want to work in? And these would not be offensive tattoos. We are talking artistic, meaningful designs.

Sometimes I hate society. :mad:

I've had the argument with someone over the "bias" towards tattooed folks.
I do not see it. I've seen nurses, doctors, chefs, servers, bank cashiers, bank managers, police officers, fire fighters, office workers, groomers, hair stylists, construction workers and others.. all with visable tattoos that I noticed. Obviously none of them had any issue getting hired.
I think that hand tatts, and facial tatts might detract from your image in some positions. Most manager type positions can wear long sleeves if you wanted to cover tattoos. A few places DO have policies that prohibit visable tattoos(I think one is disney.. but I'm not certain).
Overall, I don't think tattoos would stop anyone from hiring you.

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Originally Posted by Jay_Bunny

My current job as a cafe server allows you to have visable tattoos even though the four I have are not visable anyways. I've been trying to figure out what kind of work I want to do and my family keeps telling me visable tattoos will make employers not want to hire me. Careers I am interested in going into include medical, working with animals, culinary, and possibly computers.

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A friend of mine is a doctor and he has a tattooed wedding ring on his finger, because he can't wear a real one at work.

My sister has several tattoos, including one on her wrist, but the Block Buster policy states that employees can have no visible tats, so she wears a watch. (It is a temp job while she saves for Uni, anyway.) Although I have seen other employees at another Block Buster with elaborate tats and piercings, all quite visible. I guess it depends on the manager.

My sisters Tattoo artist works days as a legal aid, and although she has quite elaborate tats - including half-sleeves and full back - she has none visible when wearing regular business attire.

I doubt there are any laws about whether or not you can have tats, but whatever company you plan to work for can set their own standards and policies, and if you happen to land in one that is anti-tat, you won't have much of a leg to stand on if they decide not to higher you base on your tat-status.

It sounds like you have many interests and a lot of great ideas for future careers. However, it might be more advantageous for you to hold off on getting any major visible tats just yet, until you narrow down the field of interest and learn about the official (and unofficial) policies regarding visible tats.

You must be the change you wish to see in the world~ Gandhi
Powerful words. Are any of us brave enough for this challenge??

All my tats but one are visible. I have a full sleeve on my left arm, 3 tattoos on my right one, one on my leg and one in my mouth. I also have my ears stretched to an inch and an 8th right now. I can't find work. But then again I work for myself so life is good.

I manage a company that places over 40,000 people into jobs each year here in Central Florida. The basic answer to your question is "yes", some (many) employers do not hire individuals with tats - it is not against the law - no discrimination claim can be made for not hiring because of tats.

Based on my experience with employers and how they hire, their level of acceptance of tats is based on quite a few things:
1. What's the economy like? Is it an employee market (low unemployment rate, employers can't find enough people to fill their vacancies)? If so, the employer will usually be more lenient and hire an individual with tats cause he/she needs soemone.
2. Do you have much interaction with the public? Behind the scenes jobs tend to have more flexibility than ones that meet and greet the public all day.
3. Is it a large employer or a family owned small employer? Many times large employers have more strict rules to cover everyone.
4. How young is the management staff? Younger managers are more tolerent of tats than those that "grew up in the business world" when tats were taboo.
5. What part of the country that you live in. Many places are more tolerent than others

The advice I gave my daughters is to get their tats (one has 9 the other 4) where employers wouldn't see them just in case. So their tats are on their back, upper thighs, breasts, etc. No arms or legs.

You are very smart Jay_Bunny to think about it now. Good luck!

I ride horses, so it's a pretty non-discriminating job. You can either ride, or you can't. I have two tattoos, one of which MAY be visible if I'm riding in a tank top, but that's it, the other one is always covered by jeans. If you want to be a waiter and wear short sleeves, some people are really turned off by sleeves and that sort of thing. There are some jobs where it just wouldn't be appropriate to have tattoos, just think if you didn't like tattoos and you had to see them on someone, would you want them to be serving you food? It really depends on the job.

I hate the bias against the tattooed that still exists today. People who have tattoos are not dirty scumbags just because they have tattoos :(
My husband is a tattoo artist, fulltime. He gets people form all walks of life; nurses, lawyers, etc.
But it sounds like the tats that you have/want are easy to cover up. Back pieces and ankle/leg designs are not visable underneath a normal workplace outfit of pants and a top. Granted, some girls like to wear skimpy tops to work, but I am not one of them :) If it concerns you, I would stick to tats that you can cover up easily (upper arm, back, etc)

It all depends on the company, I have a tribal sleeve (comes past my wrist), a partial sleeve(starting on the top of my hand), one on the side of my neck and my labret pierced and still have a job :D

The only place I know of that doesn't hire because of visible tattoos is Disney Land.

Worked a lot of places (Medicine, Law Enforcement, Food Service), have hidden tattoos, never had a problem :)

Just none on the face or hands

Some employers will not hire some one "excessively tattooed" because they dont want that representing thier company.
Tattoos are showing up on EVERY one these day. Not just trashy bikers and sailors any more.
The main part is, that an employer doesnt want to see naked pinups, rasicst tattoos. any bloody/violence typed ink..

Most employers Ive worked with though, have no prefferance to it though...

Im self imployed, and own a recovery/reposession business. So I dont have a problem with that. I have 2 full sleeves, one of my legs is almost worked to a sleeve, and various tattoos on other parts of my body. Because Im around office type and uppity white colar class people most of the time when i bring a car back to the lien holder I will get looked at differently because of my tattoos.

Oh well though. Its MY body...some one else shouldnt care whats on it. But thats just my opinion.

Im in the Military, I'm tattooed everywhere. I'd say, be sure to invest in long-sleeve shirts in the corporate world tho...

I have never had a problem finding a job, despite previous extensive body modifications. My only visible tat is on the back of my neck.

But I did have my lower lobes at an inch and half, as well as several other stretched piercings, nape piercing, etc.

i have worked as a manager, caregive, curator, writer, editor, academic, etc.

I think it just depends on where you work and what kind of job you want. I haven't worked for corporations, and now manage a lighting company in which most of my interactions are online, dealing with factories, importers, exporters, and distribution. So it is a perfect job for me. I am the only person I work with that doesn't have any exectation to dress up.

I used to manage a group home for adults with autism, and found that my pierced up tatted staff seemed to bring a different vibe to the job, and it worked out really well. My client's guardians were in their 70's and loved that their kids were surrounded by flexible, creative people....

But critical... tatted or not... the staff has to have the skills to do the job, that is where your credibility on a job site comes from.

Bruce

PS: I live in Montreal too... so an off colour look is the norm and can even be a hiring bonus, depending on where you are.

I have quite a few tats, most visible....Fortunatley I work in the entertainment industry...so its all good!

I think that as far as the job goes, you would just have to look into it a little to see what their policies would be as far as tats go. My job will allow tats (as long as they are not offensive, like advance recovery said, no naked people tats, nothing racist, etc.) but they will not allow multiple piercings or visible body piercings (like ones on someone's face....).

But just to throw the thought out there also, I would also look into policies of the school(s) that you may plan on attending as well. My sis ran into a problem here recently where her school (she is going to nursing school) does not allow any visible tats while going to clinicals. So because one of her tats is on her wrist (and she and parents have already shelled out $30,000 for her to go to school there) she is opting to have it laser removed, since it is in a place that would be real hard for her to cover it up with makeup due to having to wash hands and lower arms a lot for procedures, etc. And they don't allow the students to wear long sleeves under their scrubs. (It's all kinda silly if you ask me, I am just glad that I am going to nursing school somewhere else. That school has a sort of history of not telling you something important until the last minute.) Just something else to think about as well.

It also depends on what type of person you are, in a way, also. If you have the right kind of personality and skills for a job, you could feasably work your way into a position that someone with tats and a bad attitude would not, if you're tattooed.
I believe that there are lines that should not be crossed in body modification, personally. Do I hate people who go to the extreme? Nope; it is their body and life. But I personally would not get anything on my face, or my hands/lower arms. I can thus fit into the corporate world (my employer; yikes) as it serves me, while still having tattooes and exposing them as I see fit.

There is a person working at my local petsmart who seems to have tennis elbow, needs a wrist brace.. and has band aids.
Nope.. he has tattoos.
He has to cover them up due to the short sleeve shirt they wear.
He found flesh colored wraps and braces allowed him to cover up his many small tattoos that fell below his short sleeved shirt. BUT he has to wear a band aid over the one on his neck..
Every day he works.
Just an FYI

I'm a union construction worker. We do high end offices for lawyers and high end clients of the like.

So with business associates and clients constantly hovering arounds us. We don't allow tattoos. My boss is a stickler like that. I have 9 tattoos total. With 3 visible. But am constantly told to get rid of em. Haha

Tattoos are becoming more mainstream that's for sure. But profiling with tattoos is the same as racial profiling. Its wrong but it still happens.

I to work in the construction industry, i work in fancy offices build giant buildings for large corporations. I have tats on both arms wrists legs, i dont cover them up. You know i agrree with its also about personality and attitude that also gives people something else to judge you by.