Title Case: Thoughts on Why Titles Matter

It’s January 2019. You can’t scroll more than a thumb’s flick down any social feed without seeing some form of a New Year’s resolution. Everything from drinking more water to removing toxic people, they’re all there, many accompanied by a poorly phrased inspirational quote. It’s enough to make a certified not nice person like me forgo my Instagram comfort zone for a steely scroll through LinkedIn. Let me tell you, it’s no better there. The hollow motivational self talk may have been reframed into a nine-to-five friendly format. But it’s more or less the same throw-away sentimentality that will be chucked by week two of your new year new you diet, henny.

And that’s what got me to this place — this place being a blog, something I have never done. While perusing the social channel with the other other blue logo, I came across a post that stated (in a tacky font and color no less), “I don’t care about your company, title, or status. I care about your [enter three synonyms associated with being nice].”

I do not recall the exact verbiage, because as I already stated, I’m not nice. Click bait baked with Sweet-n-Lo isn’t something I would normally even notice. And this whole idea of placing importance on how you make people feel is hardly a new sentiment, which is reason enough to not share it. But the truly egregious thing here is that it’s a dog whistle reminding people who don’t have titles or status that they shouldn’t pursue them lest they lose the virtues that make people like them. And that dog whistle is disproportionally heard by minorities and women.

I am not advocating for blind ambition or doing whatever it takes to get ahead or modeling your behavior after a character on Billions. I am advocating for the ideology that being a good person should be table stakes. Again, it’s January 2019. Aren’t we all evolved enough to know — whether we adhere to it or not — that being a decent human being is the bare minimum? Yet here we are condoning the use of a professional networking platform to proliferate what amounts to motivational ventriloquism. Who is the intended audience? Because I can say with at least 78% certainty that the intended audience is NOT your manager, the president of your company, or anyone else for whom having their lunch order taken by a PA is daily fanfare.

Lack of sweet tooth aside, the audience for a post like that is me. And if you’re reading this, it’s probably you too. It’s a reminder that you should be happy with your current station in life. By positioning likability against leadership it implies that you shouldn’t care about success so much as you should care about your coworkers liking you. Or worse, that if you do pursue those things that it somehow makes you less virtuous, less likable. We didn’t make that comparison. They did. Kindness and ambition aren’t mutually exclusive. Except in the case of Male GeniusesTM (a topic for another day, looking at you Elon), or when they’re commingling in a thoughtless LinkedIn post. And since I am the intended audience, I’m going to go ahead and say that it’s complete crap to espouse this kind of nonsense on people who aren’t very far up in the ranks of their careers.

Earlier this week, I met up with a friend for drinks. As is the custom of my people, we talked shit on everything from Tinder dates to advertising. Like me, she is a freelance creative who occasionally finds the allure of a full time gig enticing enough to go through the agony of interviewing. As we were dissecting her decision to walk away from a coveted boutique agency in town, I asked her what exactly the role would have been. “Senior Designer,” she said. “Senior Designer?” I echoed back. Though I haven’t known this woman for more than a few years, I know her capabilities and work ethic. She’s a natural leader, endlessly positive and empathetic without being wreckless. When we first met, we shared laughs remembering the hideous portfolio books we had to haul around early on in our careers back in the time before personal brands and youyouyou.urls were a thing. She could tell I thought the position was below her. “Yeah, I mean it’s a pretty small place. I though I could move up really fast,” she explained.

“So?”

“So, everyone I talked to there kept saying how it was a no-ego shop, that they don’t really care about titles. How many times have you heard that: we don’t care about titles here?”

“Pretty much every interview I go to now,” I replied.

“But that’s the thing,” she said. “The person feeding you that line is almost always some White Male Creative Director who then proceeds to slide you his business card at the end.”

Sip sip, this isn’t cocktails we’re drinking. It’s tea.

That conversation got me thinking about the flat organization phenomenon. This woman and I met when we were both independent contractors at a certain giant search engine — a company that also happens to be one of the great purporters of the much lauded Flat Organization. When you interview there, everyone is quick to tell you about how their culture is so egalitarian, that ideas can come from anywhere and anyone, and how little they concern themselves with titles.

The dude with Director in his email signature doesn’t care about titles. Right.

In the words of Yeezus, “Having money isn’t everything. Not having it is.” Even Kanye knows this is bullshit. When someone says they don’t care about titles, what they mean is they don’t care about your title. At best this ideology makes them apathetic leaders. At worst, I would go so far as to say that the flat organization model is designed to retain employees while not advancing them thereby maintaining the existing power dynamics of privilege. After all, if big tech says you’re a violin player why would anyone hire you to be an orchestral conductor? And if the company culture is such that they tell you (and even shame you) about pursuing the next step in your career, then what is the logical path forward?

Here’s why you should care. Your current position determines myriad factors that will shape your present and future. It effects the salary you earn today. It effects your eligibility for future career moves and the salary that comes with it. It informs what rooms you get to walk into and with whom. And all of those things contribute to your station in life and your influence on the the world, especially in a world where privilege nearly guarantees those factors for some and not others. How could you not care about those things?

Let’s talk about another type of post that’s exceedingly common on LinkedIn: the one that pats the back of a company for placing a POC or woman in a position of leadership. I find these posts irritating for an entirely different reason. That reason being that THEY’RE STILL RELEVANT. It’s still uncommon to hear about women and black people and gay people in the C suite. (And don’t get me started on the Ryans and Bryans who inevitably comment on these things waving their “What about me?” banners under the guise of meritocracy. Have a seat, Bryan. In fact, have several.)

I am a freelancer — an employment type to which I am well-suited and which I very much enjoy. But I don’t always find my work challenging. For me this isn’t so much a problem as it is a reason to find meaning in other aspects of the work — stuff that goes beyond job description bullet points. More specifically, I have realized that I am deeply interested in finding ways to elevate other women and minorities in my field. And as much as I love freelancing, it’s not exactly conducive to getting my grubby little copywriter hands on the next rung. Professionally speaking, I haven’t had many female role models, let alone ones that were gay. We are just now seeing the first generation of women and minorities making it beyond middle management. That is where my personal interest in pursuing a title lies. I know that for all the volunteering and informal mentoring I do outside of work, that climbing the proverbial ladder is the most direct route to making the biggest difference in both my trajectory and others’.

It’s January 2019. Maybe our collective resolutions should be to cultivate leadership skills in people who don’t need to be told the value of being good. To reserve judgement on ambition, especially for those who have not historically been in positions of power. Or, to at least keep our shitty little inspirational quotes to ourselves.