University Grooming Etiquette Considerate Actions Business Social Etiquette Lessons

Outclass the Competition

by Harold Almon

Carry items in your left hand. You can carry a woman's heavy package, coat, or suitcase as the occasion arises. (Omit from carrying a woman's purse.) You may carry a bag strapped over your right shoulder. Avoid carrying a back pack over your lower back (and causing you to having to give it another name.)

Offer to carry anything for a person who is old, sick, or who is carrying a child. Offer your seat to any senior person in your company.

Offer your arm, or take the elbow of a companion, but only if that person needs assistance in crossing an area, at a curb, or on stairs.

Carry money in a money clip for tipping, taxies, and for mad-type emergencies.

Carry a pencil and a pen with as much metal in each as possible. Carry a fountain pen when you can. Even a non-expensive one can leave a good impression.

Carry a timepiece: a wrist watch for work, a pocket timepiece for formal and social occasions. A timepiece can be handed up from father to son. It is about the totem not the time.

Perform small services. Offer to open a window, and/or tell someone the time, when the desire for each is identified.

You might carry a cellular telephone. It is another kind of totem. It can be about the time. Each person may have need to track it. It may be about an emergency: place an “ICE #” In Case of Emergency contact number in your contacts. Use lock out codes in case you lose it. You may add to it a GPS in case you or it gets lost. It could list a REWARD# to call to have your telephone returned to you.

A cellular telephone is to be used in private as much as possible. When engaged in a conversation, step outside out of earshot of others or step inside into an empty bathroom or stairwell to enjoy your call. Thank you. Notification of an incoming call is to be by vibration. (I am going to go ahead and hold on to this dream.)

You can stay “miked.” Any wire is to be worn under your clothes, and ideally any ear piece is to be worn in only one ear, or stored behind the neck.