When did Job titles become so unfathomable?

[erikbloodaxe]

I'm old and remember when a job title informed anyone ( in that profession or not) of what they did. I've had to write DS's job title down and Google it (yes he explained but I was non the wiser ). So, in the interest of fun, will you say what your job title is and see if anyone can guess what you actually do (if you don't mind that is).

Our HR is now 'talent management' FFS. Makes us (bog standard mainly admin based roles) sound like the next Ed Sheeran, Sam Fender & Ellie Goulding.

EmSo many things now include the word “leader” in them. For instance I know someone who works in a store and she has said that all the title are like “team leader” I’m “leading the store” today etc.
Where are we going?

I wonder if it’s some kind of push to get more women into “leadership” by those making the changes by making out that the totally mundane management jobs they already do are actually highly individual and daring leadership roles.

It’s not just job titles, it’s levels that are utterly bizarre. A woman I used to work with became Vice President (I think) at Barclays, I thought wow. I googled it, it’s like assistant/manager level as far as I understand. Weird.

Sorry it was assistant Vice President.

Yes - the titles have become more grandiose. When I started work, you basically had “manager” for people who managed others and “head of” for someone in charge of a large department. There was only a handful or directors. Now everything has been elevated, so manager is no big deal, if you’re “head of” then you’re essentially head of your own work, and directors/associate directors are ten a penny. The actual directors are now “Chief” something.

I'm a bogstandard teacher but what I've noticed is on Mumsnet, (and it's usually when someone is complaining about perceived or otherwise ill-treatment in the workplace) everyone works "on a team" and "projects" which they show to clients. Everyone has a manager, but other people wander round critiquing their "projects"

I have this image in my head of everyone sitting huddled together colouring in and sticking glitter on things then showing their craft bits to the people colouring in on another table.

Or, everyone is sitting at the top of the Shard in a smart suit round a glass table in front of a plate glass window and there's a bloke standing up in a pale blue shirt talking about pushing envelopes and blue sky thinking.

Does nobody work the tills anymore? Or answer the phones? Is that a "project" as well?

So it has ever been thus OP, esp public sector where your role title has to reflect the importance of even the most lowly, entry level post. And numerous levels of "seniority".

it's kinda Associate Paperclip Analyst, who can aspire to being Advanced Associate Paperclip Analyst and Higher Associate Paperclip Function Lead.

for which you get an increment of £3.50 for all that extra (warning: new buzzword) capability

I saw ‘home delivery assistant’ advertised at our local newsagent. Yes, a paperboy/ girl!

it’s not just job titles though. I’ve seen entire four page job descriptions where I have no idea what the job is or what the person will actually do after reading them! of those was for my manager’s post!

I work on projects as part of a team 😂 I’ll be presenting to clients this afternoon.

Generally I work from home wearing jeans and a hoody, definitely not fancy.

OK guess mine. My job title is 'Operations Support'

I did offer more...er descriptive titles but...

I work for a US based companies we have lots of Vice Presidents, Directors and the like as well as lots of very long job titles. It's difficult to know who is at what level and what anyone actually does.

I worked in a very busy subway when I was a student and our job title was called a 'sandwich artist'. They probably still call them that as I haven't stepped foot in one in 12 years as the place gave me ptsd. My role was anything but a sandwich artist where we were constantly under pressure to move more quickly slapping tomatoes and lettuce, more like a factory worker working through a conveyor.

Does nobody work the tills anymore? Or answer the phones? Is that a "project" as well?

People who work in retail or in a call centre probably have way less time/opportunity to be on MN than those working at a pc or laptop on a project...

@PAFMO The last few companies I've worked at don't have any admin assistants - we don't even have phones to answer! We use Teams.

Not going to say as outing. I think this started many years ago as a way to give some people pay rises.

No takers i see.

My job title is 'operation support'

My actual job is drawing highly technical construction drawings in CAD. I wouldn't mind a more gradious title actually...

My job title could be outing (I’m the only one in our organisation), but it’s ‘ lead’ - it’s mid senior, I’m part of a ‘leadership team’ with senior leadership above and then the c suite. In our organisation the ‘lead’ part tells you roughly what I get paid, and roughly what level of responsibility and accountability I have. So from that PoV it’s useful.

I used to work in a university where we all had to make up job titles because the ones we did have were not descriptive and were totally about job mapping, e.g. I was ‘senior enterprise fellow’.

I’m also an MBA student, and I think this fashion for ‘leader’ in the title is to do with current thinking on leadership vs management. They are totally different mindsets, in my experience, and often people get promoted on the back of being good managers, but that doesn’t make them good leaders. A focus on leadership centres the mind on the qualities you should be looking for as a hiring manager, and what the rest of the organisation can expect from the individual. Obviously in some situations it’s fairly bonkers but it works well in the corporate world.

I know someone who works for an achingly trendy media agency. His title is Director of Sunshine.....

I moved into project management (within an IT department), and discovered a whole layer of titles all begining with P: project manager, programme manger, portfolio manager. I was hoping there was a more senior role, probably something like panorama manager or even prophetic manager - some one who magically knew which projects were coming up?

"I think this started many years ago as a way of avoiding giving some people pay rises."

😀

But project, programme, and portfolio are different - project mgr oversees a series of projects, programme mgr deals in collections of related and often interdependent projects, portfolio denotes a selection of possibly unrelated projects or programmes that are probably funded from the same place or fit within a theme. Those are totally sense making roles.

You’re pulling our leg…..

It is used in DH's company as a lazy way to inflate self-importance and indicate pay band (which then dictates benefits levels eg company car/car allowance), because just having a file of names with A/B/C etc against them to indicate the grade is too complicated. It generally works sensibly as the industry is pretty old fashioned, with assistant-, senior-, -manager, etc all as you'd expect, but they use Director to mean Regional Head of Dept (eg NW Sales Director instead of Head of Sales NW). So what is an actual director called? You also get anomalies like DH's job title. He is more senior than Senior, but under Regional Head of Dept Director, so has therefore been given a title with Manager in it. He is a standalone department of one! He has quite a collection of propelling pencils to keep in order, but no humans.

I have a trade. All of our job titles are perfectly clear and sensible, although we've had fun in the past Corporate wank-talking them up: Got a blockage? Best call the U-bend Technical Manager...

There's a difference between leadership and management though. A lot of workplaces acknowledge this and title appropriately.

Actually I wouldn't dismiss it entirely, I've seen a post advertised previously for an ideas architect. The post holder didn't require any architectural qualifications.