Yes I would like to comment on this! My gf has a dress code as a sales woman for a high profile company to wear at least 4inch non-platform heels! And the most challenging thing for her about it is that she has to stand up practically the whole day because she's standing at a standing counter without a chair in the near neighbourhood except in a room in the back where she takes her breaks. It's a high profile store so having a chair in the store for employees is just 'not done'. She's quite petite (5 ft 2) and she really likes to wear high heels most of the time to make her look and feel taller. So she has a lot of experience with high heels. She even trains her legs and feet every day for about 30 minutes to strengthen the calves, foot arches and a lot of foot musscles. She's also into ballet for 15 years so her feet are well trained for wearing heels for longer periods of the time. She walks around on tiptoes all the time when she's barefoot at home to increase strength in her feet and calves. It baffles me everytime she gets very high up on her tiptoes, she can go up very very high on tiptoes(see picture below).
It's a pretty well paid job and she thought it was worth a shot and the money to take this job/challenge to train her feet to get comfortable standing in 4 inch heels all day. She's a very tough girl who likes challenges like this. However the last thing she wanted is to destroy her feet in the long term! She read stories about women getting shortened calves from wearing heels every day which would make wearing flat shoes impossible so she wanted to make sure that that would never happen with specific calves exercises and by wearing flats during the weekends and at home once in a while.
She started the job 2 years ago and she bought some 'medium' budget 4 inch heels and it was truely a hell for her to reach the end of the day each day standing up straight even with gel pads. Then she searched the web and found out that expensive quality shoes like Louboutins are the most comfortable out there! She bought a pair of So Kates(which were an inch higher than the requirement!) and with a pair of gel pads it became surprisingly a lot more manageable for her to stand up all day. She LOVES the heels and I like the looks of them on her as well and she now wears them practically every day after 2 years of 'standing practice'.The first few months were pretty tough for her but she pulled through and eventually it became slowly but steadily more and more somehow comfortable as time progressed. She's not entirely painless now but it has become very well manageable for her she says.
The number one bottleneck will always be the balls of her feet, even after 2 years with the best gel pads out there the balls of her feet start to hurt a little when it's noon(after 4 hours) and from there this little discomfort increases slowly until the end of the day but she says it's pretty manageable now. What she tend to do the last few hours of each day is try to shift her weight regularly from one foot to another, shift weight from ball of foot to heel and back, shift each foot slightly from side to side...and try to distract herself! I have deep respect for her dedication pulling this off each day and every working day! I'm very proud at her. She even has gone a step further a few months ago and bought a pair of Hot Chicks which are half an inch higher. She wears them once or rarely twice a week but not longer than 4 hours(till noon) before switching to So Kates. The Hot Chicks are really tough for her but her goal is to master the Hot Chicks as well in the long term to manage a full day or even a full week standing in those as well! Her timeframe to reach that goal is summer '18.
So in conclusion, making an employee required to wear high heels is not for every average woman out there, especially not for women without experiece standing in high heels at all. Feet and legs must be well trained to fufill this requirement! Also very expensive high quality heels are needed to get the job done!