There’s a new corporate aesthetic in town, and it smells faintly of coordinated outfits, designer stationery, and oat lattes. Gone are the days when an office job connoted fluorescent lights, grey carpets, and a drone of routine. Today, showing up to work means showing up fully caffeinated and colour-coded. Gen Z is redefining the corporate world by turning what was once seen as mundane into a glamorized performance. It has its benefits – organisation, and romaticising the everyday – but is it all good?
Scroll on social media for just a few minutes, and it’s almost impossible to avoid a “day in my life” video. Somehow, the morning commute is coincidently captured in golden hour, desk shots are staged with perfectly aligned pens, and iced lattes are held in perfectly manicured hands. Even the smallest of moments, like writing a to-do list and typing out emails, are treated with precision. There’s a certain attention to detail where the 9-to-5 is no longer just a schedule; it becomes a story to be told. And like any good story, each visual, story, and TikTok isn’t just about showing what you do, but how beautifully you can do it.
In a Gen Z corporate world, looking organised is almost as important as being organised. Bullet journals, Moleskine planners, and pastel highlighters are all markers of subtle assertions to those around us that we have our lives effortlessly together – even if we don’t. But this is not to say it doesn’t have its perks: when every detail and deadline is visually structured, it genuinely can become easier to navigate the day with purpose. Intentionally designing our workspace and planning system creates clarity.
Accordingly, something empowering happens when turning a seemingly mundane routine into a ritual to be performed. Supposedly, it encourages a shift in our mindset: our work isn’t just a chore to complete, but an opportunity to express our own identity. Corporate outfits become a form of self-branding, curating your workspace becomes rewarding, and documenting productivity becomes a way to track growth. It motivates us to meet deadlines and embrace a proactive approach to professional growth. When each task is approached thoughtfully, the often monotonous process of planning and organising becomes a form of self-care.
But it’s not always this easy. The constant pressure to make the mundane seem glamorous can be exhausting. If your desk has to look Instagram-worthy, does the workplace not just become another stage for performance and perfectionism? And perhaps this is the point – maybe romanticising the 9-to-5 is a collective coping mechanism. After all, how much can someone truly love a repetitive corporate routine? According to the “day in my life” videos, quite a lot. But, beneath the planned captions and scheduled posts is a quieter truth: perhaps overconsumption is the hidden cost of this aesthetic. Endless planners, highlighters, and office sets encourage spending that has nothing to do with efficiency and everything to do with maintaining an image. Frankly, most days in the office are unglamorous. Sometimes your inbox is a battlefield, your desk is a disaster, and your coffee is split before you can sit down – it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that this is perfectly normal.
There’s a fine line between romanticising and humanizing the corporate world. The aesthetic can give us some sense of autonomy; by reclaiming a traditionally rigid and masculine system, we turn it into something personal. Yet, when the 9-5 has become a brand, the constant pressure to maintain the aesthetic can become a chore itself, and productivity becomes something to display rather than experience. Still, something is alluring about it all. Maybe it’s because it helps us find beauty in the repetitive and have control over systems that usually control us. Or simply because it makes the day feel a little lighter and more intentional. But truthfully, your job doesn’t need to be beautiful to be meaningful, and your life doesn’t need to be continuously curated to be full.