[Closed] Ridiculous job titles.....

Not long, but:

World Development Officer

Only 16k a year, probably not enough.

World Development Officer

Only 16k a year,

Cheap world!

Best one; in small (solely London based) company - manager of team of 5 sysadmins deciding he was the "Global Head of IT Infrastructure".

...I've a friend who works in media and tech space. Lots of people with "Wizard", "Guru" and "Evangelist" in their job title...

Worked for a few Business Unit Managers in my time.
Didn't really think the acronym through.

I told one I wanted to be the Assistant Regional Surveying Executive.

Principal Health, Safety, Environment and Quality Advisor: Environment and Sustainability

What sort of a prize nobber would have a title like that?

I once met someone who worked for a bloke, lets call him Bert, and their business card said "Bert's Bitch" as their job title. They said they thought it was funny, their eyes said otherwise.

I currently work closely with companies that have an utterly non-technical CTO and a salesman with the title Director of Operations. They're not stupid titles in the right hands but in these hands they're just moronic.

Technical Project Manager always makes me smile. Reminds me of Boycott's assessment of a typical English all rounder, "can't bat, can't bowl" 🙂

footflaps - Member

Working for a small company, there is quite a lot of freedom with regard to job titles, so one of the Sales Support people has decided to become..

"Global Solutions Director, Strategic Business Development" [b]= Salesman [/b]

"Global Solutions Director, Strategic Business Development" = Salesman

He's actually a Salesman's sidekick...

The salesman's job title is "His Excellency Lord of All Sales Everywhere in the Royal Kingdom of the Planet Earth, Supreme Commander Terran Federation"

There was a famous guy at Google, where senior staff were titled 'Fellow'.

He adopted the title 'Jolly Good Fellow' and it stuck and became his official title.

Chancellor of the Exchequer

Or, my current favourite: Secretary of State for Work and Pensions

Knobbers.

footflaps - Member

"Global Solutions Director, Strategic Business Development" = Salesman

He's actually a Salesman's sidekick...

The salesman's job title is "His Excellency Lord of All Sales Everywhere in the Royal Kingdom of the Planet Earth, Supreme Commander Terran Federation"

The closest I got for a job title was - Evil Pointy Hair HR Boss.

(a reference from my IT guys based on Dilbert's characters coz I was evil-ler)

with companies that have an utterly non-technical CTO

Reminds me of Ed Candy, who was CTO of 3.

He was quite possibly the least technically knowledgeable person I'd ever met. Sort of person who would take a TV back to Currys because he couldn't change the batteries in the remote control.

He was asleep and snoring all through the wireless technology conference we were at and then work up to give a talk which basically went "3 is great" only with some slides and pictures of phones....

Technical Project Manager always makes me smile. Reminds me of Boycott's assessment of a typical English all rounder, "can't bat, can't bowl"

As apposed to just Project Manager, which means they haven't got a bloody clue what any of the people actually doing the job are doing but are happy to take the plaudits!!

[b]Erection engineer[/b].
All work considered,large or small.

I was approached a couple of years ago by someone who's email signature described him as

"Director Writer Joker Doodler W****r"

Its a shame people don't have their job title on their passport anymore 🙂

(I wonder if his wife posts on mumsnet?)

in my area there's the [url= https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_director ]Technical Director [/url](TD for short) but it's not a directorship and can be very low in the pecking order.

Executive Vice President, Talent Strategy.

That's Head of HR to us mortals.

Executive Vice President, Talent Strategy.

That's Head of HR to us mortals.

Talent and HR, two words you would very rarely associate with one another....

A friend worked for a small company and at one meeting everyone was told that they could choose their own job titles. One chose "starship trooper".

A young lad i used to work with wanted a job title, so I suggested

[b]T[/b]echnician of [b]W[/b]ater [b]A[/b]nd [b]T[/b]ransportation.

One of my colleagues has given himself 'New market research and development manager'. He is just a sales person.

Senior Odd Job Delegator.

Worked in one small company where someone had given himself the job title of "procurement director". His official title was Storesman!

ads678 - Member
As apposed to just Project Manager, which means they haven't got a bloody clue what any of the people actually doing the job are doing but are happy to take the [s]plaudits[/s]grief!!

Nothing brilliant here, Specific Techniques Engineer seesms to be as good as it gets - admittedly, we have no idea which techniques he's specifically engineering

'Business Continuity Manager' was (another) made up job & title for a prison 'governor' at our place.

Any job with Engineer in the title where the people are not Engineers e.g. Heating Engineer instead of Plumber, Sanitary Engineer instead of cleaner, Automotive Engineer instead of Mechanic etc. There is not one element of Engineering in any of those jobs.

Well I've been a 'Relationship Manager' which sounded like a sort of grey suited marriage guidance, but it was a account manager which again is a billy bullshit term for salesman.

In my new place I don't really have a job title my emails say "IT Solutions Manager" which me and the guy who designs our email footers came up with for a laugh, our new marketing guy has just sent out a load of press releases listing me as Sales Director.

I don't care about them and I hate making them up, but the problem is that is that when you tell someone you're the sales guy they only hear "teller of lies, half truths and rumor dressed as fact" when I'm actually professionally and personally a very honest person (but I would say that) it's drives me nuts, my boss will talk to someone he knows well and they'll agree something or other and then end by saying "I'll get the sales guy to call you", he might as well say "this is the name of the person to avoid, lie about being out of the office and mostly never tell them your real requirement - that's how they get you". The funny thing is that no one trusts salespeople but we're the ones that get lied to all day and it's seen as morally correct.

I blame second hand car sales, Window sales people but mostly massive tie-knot wearing ****ing estate agents - so many villains ruining it for the rest of us.

My sister's workplace lets them choose their work title on the proviso they can only change it once a year. They also have a policy of their emails ending with it abbreviated to it's initials. Her job covers loads of different stuff (small place) so she has lots of scope to play with words. So far she's used the following:

Media and Operations Oracle (MOO)
Business Operations Regulatory Encyclopedia Director (BORED)
Facilities, Accounts, Business (FAB)
Director of Universal Financial Fun (DUFF) - pregnant at the time.
Business Operations Yoda (BOY) - no longer pregnant 😆
Musical Utilisation Moderator (MUM)

Oh and yes the technicians in work, whilst highly qualified and experienced call themselves engineers when they just aren't - our client include aerospace engineers, design engineers who design bits for heavy industry and people who make bridges and such, they must thing we're taking the piss.

I normally don't approve of people writing "end of thread" after their contribution, but...

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/nov/11/who-is-shingy-aols-digital-prophet

END OF THREAD

Management Information Systems (MIS) used to be a popular thing, and I once met a guy who was in charge of it for his company. His business card described him as a MIS Manager. Which was quite accurate.

I was working in Barrow-in-Furness where they build submarines where there was a proposed job title of "Team Leader, Aft-Penetrations" until someone pointed out the double-entendre...

[I]Reminds me of Ed Candy, who was CTO of 3. [/I]

My wife did a contract there, she remembers asking after a meeting with him - and who is he?

Best job title was a guy I worked with in the US, MVVP (Most Valuable Vice President).

And yes, I did ask him if he'd given himself the title 🙂

My current employer has just created a bunch of Vice Dean positions. Is it only me???

Once went to look at a second hand car. The sales guy passed me his card - Dave 'the Maverick' Johnson..... I walked out sharpish

We have a lot of Champions (e.g. Caldicott Champion, Hand-washing Champion).

This creates the mental image of a slightly worried-looking middle aged nurse putting on armour and sword.

where they build submarines where there was a proposed job title of "Team Leader, Aft-Penetrations" until someone pointed out the double-entendre...

I wouldn't mind being his opposite number, Team Leader for penetrations 😉

I have had contact this week with a chap who self titles himself 'imagineer'. 😆

A friend of my missus works in middle management for a youngish tech company who were (within reason) allowed to choose their own job titles. His actual real job title is "End Of Level Boss."

This makes me happy.

I was recently offered to set my own job title. I suggested "Guru", "Technomancer" and "Thunder God," all of which were rejected.

All ours seem to be abbreviated to the initial letters, the best has to be TDM!

Adder Counter

In the US ski market, piste skis are sometimes called front side skis, as in they are for the "front side" of the hill, the more accessible side. Backcountry skis have a different name.

Which is why I had to chuckle on meeting the chap at K2 responsible for their backcountry ski segment. His title? "Head of backside development".

I knew a chap who was an assistant Regional Buisness Unit Manager

a spare bum, essentially...

He was sad

@Cougar that is wonderful, I'm going to ask for a change tomorrow.

My business card said Education Liason Officer. What this job title means is, the guy in printing can't spell Liaison. Other'n that it's obvious gibberish.
"You liaise with education?"
"Yes, that is what I do"
"But what does that mean?"
"Nobody has ever been able to explain it to me"

I used to be a Lean Champion and yes, skinny man in a suit of armour.

I also met someone once who was 'head of health and happiness'.

My favourite trend is for CEOs appointing directors above other directors. Those displaced directors then need to be made to feel better, so they end up with "chief" in their job title.

Anyone who is "chief" who reports to a director is very much not in the c-suite....

Grade inflation, VP, Senior VP, Executive VP, etc...

I also forgot, my boses job title is 'Scotland director'.
It was an awkward day when she met Nicola Sturgeon recently. 😆

Architect, designer, engineer. When buildings, 'designing' or 'engineering' are not involved. Quite ridiculous.

My good friend at Microsoft has the job title of "chief story teller" Its true you can see him on LinkedIn and guess what? ----yep there are lots of other story tellers above and below him in rank 🙄

The world of tech in which I reside is full of amazingly stupid job titles and I think only the media sector is potentially worse.

I briefly worked at 'gap' in my youth and was made 'hanger specialist' they had 4 managers and about 20 assistant managers and everyone got a stupid job title.
My current job is 'bike mender'

I would like

Global Officer for Harmonisation, Organisation, Management & Emoluments

Or

Vice Acting Chief Acquisitions, Territories International, Opportunities and Normalisation

One of our theatre orderlies calls himself a Trolleyologist.

I edited my job title to "Airbus Steering Committee (Deputy) Chairman" on the company messageboard/forum thing. So far no one appears to have noticed.

When I (briefly) worked for IBM, no-one could tell me what my job actually was, so I put "Last of the freelance hackers. Greatest sword fighter in the World" in my email sig.

No-one got the reference, and I was told to stop being flippant.

A friend was appointed to 'Assistant Head of Lower School'. Abbreviated to AsHoLS. He wasn't happy about that. At all.

bencooper - Member

"Greatest sword fighter in the World"

"...and you wrote the software."

Great thread I'm looking for an upgrade when I'm out of business cards
Currently only senior consultant but need something that covers does everything else too.

Oh and this one is just a bit insecure and try hard

Daenerys of House Targaryen, the First of Her Name
Queen of Meereen
Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar and the First Men (claimant)
Lady Regnant of the Seven Kingdoms (claimant)
Protector of the Realm (claimant)
Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea
Breaker of Chains
Mother of Dragons

I worked with a 'Domestic Violence Advisor' once who worked in an office of Domestic Violence Improvement Officers'. I really hope they have changed their titles now....

A medical mate of mine, when asked what he does for a living replies with....

Gusset Sticher

Business excellence manager, seems to be involved in everything.!

I used to have a colleague who began signing his emails "Regional Head of Sales" until the boss bollocked him. The same bloke paid £94,000 for a chalet on The Warren at Vulgarsoch, which only had two years left before the rules said it had to be replaced with a new chalet at God knows what cost. He also disliked driving an poxy Audi A4 and declared: "I won't be happy until I've got a beemer on my drive".

He didn't last long.

I'm still trying to figure out what 'Intelligent Customer' means after seeing it on one of our IT bods sig. Lots of champions where I work, pity most of them get given the title rather than earning it.

I know a bloke who has had these job titles in the last 18 months

Head of Digital Experience
Chief Digital Transformation Officer
Deputy Director Digital advocacy
Digital Czar

I expect him soon to be re-titled digital and replaced with a small chip that can count in binary. It would be about as much use.

I asked him what digital meant. He spent quite a lot of time talking about what he thought it was. At the end of which a) I was no wiser and b) he was clearly an idiot.

As a man in a company of exactly two, I describe myself truthfully as 'will do anything for food'

I'm still trying to figure out what 'Intelligent Customer' means after seeing it on one of our IT bods sig.

Back when I had an actual job, a document being prepared for our board by our administrator, showing proposed changes in staff structure, accidentally promoted me from 'Director' to 'Dictactor'.

Friend of a friend is a Fudge Packer.

We seem to have "Thought Leaders" at our place, which is a bit worrying...

Friend of a friend is a Fudge Packer.

a friend of a friend is a Chough Monitor

I was a 'Quality Coordinator' for a while, the old Quality Manager retired and the boss couldn't bring himself to pay me any extra when I took over...

We had a "Quality Tsar" for a while....

There used to be a role called Director of Chrismas (at M&S)

I wonder if they had a belly, a beard and a red suit

My job used to take me to meetings where I rubbed up against some of the big hitters in the local authority. There were some tremendous job titles, but one that stuck in my mind was "Director of Place".... it was something to do with the streetscene, housing and regeneration.

However, someone above mentioned champions. I have the honour of having met the local Health Board's "Breastfeeding Champion." She announced it at a meeting I was in with my line manager. She explained that as part of the strategy to improve local health she was part of the midwifery team and her task was to encourage new mums to breastfeed. Her colleague also present was working on a project in the same regeneration area to introduce Omega 3 supplements at primary schools. The breastfeeding champion explained that breastfeeding, especially int eh early stages had big benefits for children. I made the mistake of asking whether the benefits of breastfeeding could be introduced retrospectively, meaning that maybe Colostrum could be synthesised and made into a supplement in the same way Omega 3 could be given to the kids, but unfortunately the champion simply thought I was being rude. The incident led to a stern few words from my line manager.

My job used to take me to meetings where I rubbed up against some of the big hitters in the local authority.

You're a Lap Dancer?