Calling yourself a CEO AIBU?

[Namechange144]

Sorry I’ve name changed for this.

Went to a new local cafe yesterday with a friend I’d not seen since before Covid. She quit her corporate job at the start of lockdown and started a gym - think group classes and some personal training sessions. Not a gym you’d go to independently exercise.

We got speaking to the cafe owner about the cafe and other things and he asked us what we both did, friend said ‘I’m a CEO’, I looked slightly surprised and said ‘a CEO?’ in what I guess was a slightly questioning tone. She then responded ‘Yes it’s a chief executive officer’ , I obviously knew what it stood for but I didn’t say anything else and the convo moved on.

AIBU to think you shouldn’t really refer to yourself as a CEO unless you are one in the traditional sense? Am I behind the times here, can you be a CEO of exercise classes? Surely you’d just say I’m a PT and have my own gym.
Friend is really nice so I feel like a bit of a bitch but I can’t help but think it’s a bit of a weird thing to say and wondered if it was just me that found this a bit odd.

I don't understand? So if you work for a family business, you're not allowed to use a job title because that's pretentious? That's ridiculous. I mean, calling herself Managing Director if all she does is sort the post out on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday would be annoying, but if she's running the family business then why can't she be the managing director?

I have dealt with a number of family owned business in my professional life. It never occurred to me that the woman whose job title was CFO shouldn't call herself that because her Dad was the owner. She was still doing the job and the responsibilities, had the qualifications and experience etc.

It’s just something people use to feel self-important. Super cringey tho.

🤣 I have a friend who's married to a Director. She automatically became Director but doesn’t do anything and she goes around calling herself a CEO too 🤣

Last week she called herself the Vice President.

My friend has a Phd and is actually a doctor. She never uses it but her stuck up pretentious boyfriend corrects people who call her Miss, eg staff in Banks/hospitality. They get very embarrassed, so does she. Its not even his title but he loves to piggy back on it. He doesnt have one btw.

That's really pretenscious.

I would say I am a personal trainer in her case or a yoga teacher etc. If I had to write it officially I would say Studio Director. Not CEO.

Ewww

@amijustparanoidorjuststoned Not disputing the casual conversation aspect. I totally agree with that.

But professionally, I think it's perfectly reasonable to use "Director". Stick it on your email signature or business cards, ensure it's there on your website etc.

I don't go by Dr generally, apart from when I read threads like this. Suddenly a flurry of things come addressed to Dr Madonna because if people are going to be sniffy about it I bloody well will use it.

Is she into all that "#GirlBoss" nonsense and does she say that she's "smashing life", "killing it" and did she "go on a journey" at some point? I think there's a subculture of people who talk like that who would describe themselves as a CEO and think nothing of it.

Yes, this has set off my MLM radar too. It’s very much the language of MLM and it’s how they hook people, “quit your boring job and be a CEO of your own business with unlimited potential”. If she’s started off a PT business you might want to check if it’s a cover for shilling Herbalife or Beach Body!

Off the top of my head...

1. You might feel you get more respect.
2. It doesn't identify your sex.
3. Might boost your self confidence.
4. Might get a complaint taken more seriously.
5. As someone said above, people would believe you're intelligent where maybe on you're personal appearance they wouldn't.

Yep agree, I work for a US company in the UK and we have several VPs (and a President). It’s the equivalent title to head of department IMO.

Well she is CEO of her business so who cares? It’s a corporate term, she’s being corporate for whatever reason she wants to be so respect it.

TBH, I'd have been a bit embarrassed for her after that response. It shows how insecure she is. Say nothing.

I knew someone who called himself the interim Vice President of his own business. Made me laugh, he was self employed and had no staff!

This. Exactly my thoughts.

And boss babe, badass, slaying it..

God I hate it.

As for introducing yourself when you are a CEO, just like with any other job, you introduce yourself with your name. If you have arranged a meeting, the parties will already know who is attending so once you introduce yourself with your name, they will connect you to the position they are already aware you hold.

@Triffid1 It's more that she's another person who talks about it a lot as if it's an achievement when I know that she's never worked for another company, and I'm pretty certain that if she had to compete in the job market, she wouldn't be able to get a similar position, IYSWIM. I wouldn't think she was pretentious if she didn't go on about it.

I'm President of the small business that DH and I own, but I don't shout about it and I'm not giving people the impression that it's the equivalent of rising to the top of a company through merit.

@Cameleongirl I sort of understand but I still think you're being unfair. Unless the family business has a turnover of £5000 per year and is really not a real business, if she's doing the job and the business is a successful business, the fact that she didn't get there via working her way up from her bootstraps is irrelevant. She's still doing the job.

Obviously, banging on and on and on about it is annoying but that's a separate issue I'd say.

@Triffid1 DD (17) and DS (nearly 14) will be asked to join our company as directors at some point in the next few years, for example, we've already discussed it with them.

@Triffid1 probably am being unfair, she's a nice person, just a bit tedious when she starts talking about her job. 😂

Sure. All are a deliberate attempt to mislead, though.

I thought you meant legitimate circumstances, where no one would imagine it to be extremely odd if they knew the truth.

I know someone who put "Humanitarian’ in her Facebook etc profiles. She had done some work with the Peace and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa many years before, out of University, a junior office role and by this point she and her husband were running a small film and production company. I thought it was ridiculously self-angrandising. She was no Blanca Jagger. She did eventually delete it.

YANBU.
Is it even accurate? To be a ‘CEO’ don’t you need like a board of directors? It definitely implies that you are in charge of a sizeable organisation, with other ‘officers’ below you, not a one man company.