Most of the time I would tell an organization to choose titles that customers understand (because they’ve heard them before), but sometimes you are in a business that has a culture that just lends itself to creativity. When it does, go for it!
Two who have done it successfully are Disney and Storm Cloud Marketing. They use titles that beg for explanation. And when you hear the titles and think about what they might mean, they make you smile and take notice. You look up to the pros who hold those titles because they are just plain awesome!
For Disney, each person on the team is a member of the Disney cast, so you’ll see hundreds of titles that make you feel like you’re on a movie set.
As for Storm Cloud Marketing (a rising marketing firm in the Midwest) they created titles that are like no other. Here are their titles…
Dustin Storm, Chief of Stuff
Candace Storm, Mother of Dragons
Jessi Whitehead, Pink Ranger
Jon Macintosh, Digital Alchemist
Shane Ross, Professor Graphics
Oscar Gonzalez, The OG
You can go to the Storm Cloud Media Website here and read about what each title means. It will make you curious about what each of them does, and I bet they will make you smile.
ACTION STEPS FOR THIS WEEK
- What are the titles of the people in your organization?
- Does each title make sense and describe what the person actually does?
- Hold a meeting to see what each person thinks of their title?
- Experiment with some fun titles just to see where it goes.
- Bounce the titles off of someone outside the organization.
- If the outside person gives you a blank look, don’t use the title!
- If they smile and nod their head...consider giving it a try.
