Excellent advice. I just flew down to Florida and spent the week there (came back a few hours ago actually) meeting with our business partners. They were all dressed pretty well, although still business casual. This is stereotypical but since I'm on the IT side, I'd imagine that's probably why many people here don't dress very well even given the same dress-code across the company. As you said X2, dressing better doesn't mean you're dressed up more. Much appreciated.
Considering it's casual Friday and I just flew back here hours ago, I didn't really make the effort to dress up. Will start Monday ;)
At my previous firm, it was business casual and only the senior managers and partners wore the suits. But one thing a former collegue and I were recently talking about was that people who were on the fast track dressed like the partners at our firm. It all depends on your environment.
All the guys looked really nice. The only thing that would push them into your "dressy" catagory would be a blazer. The guys always wore ties and nice ties. But the rest of the outfit would be the nice dress pants, which could be part of a suit, nice dress shirt (think Boss, I'm not familiar with men's clothing but I know most guys wore Hugo Boss and they were not only white, lots of different patterns, etc. And Pink is nice on a guy), a nice tie, an expensive watch (splurge a little), nice cuff links, nice socks, and definitely pay attention to those shoes. Amazingly, everyone wore the same brands from the entry level associate to the senior managers. Maybe the parnters wore more expensive clothes than us peons. In some corporate environments, your appearance matters a lot. If you were a woman, I could tell you all the right brands, for the right look for the next level but honestly, I don't know anything about men's clothing.
I would've felt quite awkward in that environment to wear a suit. I have worn suits for presentations and client meetings but when at the office, I would discard my jacket, it just felt too "uptight". But then I switched firms and it was business attire so jacket on always.
If you want to look nicer, don't wear khakis and don't roll up your sleeves. Opt for nicer dress shirt and dress pants unless even this would make you stand out (try Nordstrom, Bloomingdales, Brooks Brothers, I forget the name of that men's store, they have nice shirts for good prices, I will let you know when I remember). These will last a good while.
Dress the way that makes you feel good about yourself. We spend almost half of our waking hours at work and sometimes even more. Why shouldn't we look good during those hours? I think feeling good about how you look can make you happy and in turn make you more motivated and productive at work.
I have seen people at work in dress pants and sneakers and if that's what makes them feel good about themselves then why should you think twice about dressing up.