What your professional business title says about you does not depend on your education level. No matter what there’s a job out there for you. Now not all of us are CEO’s, but would you really want to be a CEO if you found out what it truly meant….? Here is the true meaning of behind your business titles.
Administrative Assistant
Secretary, office manager and so forth are all fancy words and euphemisms for Everyone’s Bitch. I learned about this one back in the day as an intern in New York City. They give you this fancy title like “Social Media Strategist” and next thing you know you are hanging drywall, cleaning up spills, modeling clothes and inevitably sleeping your way to the top to get the prized title of CEO. But, not so fast.
CEO
On paper this is the highest acclaim a professional can achieve. However, it stands for something far more than we typically think. In reality it stands for Cocky Entrepreneurs Only. The narcissist of the company or the sociopath. This is someone who needs complete control and will do anything to have it. More than likely they will commit and illegal act to preserve some sort of self-identity. This person is not to be trusted. My brief tenure as CEO of My Own Life, LLC. left me in rehab trading gold stars for loose cigarettes. There is nothing more patronizing than receiving a gold star for being good at the age of 26.
Vice President of (Insert Ambiguous Title Here)_______
This title is given to someone who just needs validation. They are so insecure with their own self that they need to feel some sort of power do to the lack of power they feel in their everyday lives. See Dwight from The Office for poster child. Anyone can be a Vice President because they really aren’t in charge of anything. Just like Joe Biden, a professional VP is a glorified babysitter with an inferiority complex. To be fair I would never have lost my virginity if it wasn’t for that5. (See administrative assistant above).
Digital Marketing Strategist
The lower down the totem pole we get the more arbitrary and ambiguous the titles become. A marketer is a “strategizer” by trade so of course no need to be redundant here. But as far as millennials are concerned this sounds like the greatest job ever. “You get to play around on the Internet All day and get paid for it?” DEAD. ASS. WRONG. In reality you do spreadsheets and pitch ideas that no one cares about. And the only time you are on the Internet you are looking for ways to hack your company’s privacy settings to find porn. You have a lack of self-worth that is deflating by the hour except for the brief (and I mean brief) moments of ecstasy when you finally find a way through your company’s privacy settings. I like to call this position “Vice President of Catch 22”. Every day you are stuck between a rock and a hard place.
In conclusion, be your own boss. Start your own company and take back the workplace. Make the workplace great again” and change your name. I already have.
Tweet @StarterNoise or comment below to let us know what positions you think have a hidden secret meaning in the workplace.
Humility is not his strong suit. He graced CollegeHumor.com with his talents in New York City from 2013-2014. He is self-proclaimed “narcissistically humble” (Has been nominated by Webster’s for ‘Adjective of the Year”). A lover of oxymoron’s but hates morons. Has worked for publications such as CollegeHumor.com in New York City and the PBH Network in Brooklyn.