Best hybrid job titles
Have you ever met a leadership expert?
What about a creative possibilitarian?
Which one would you likely start a conversation with first?
The beauty of a strong hybrid job title is that no one else has it. It's yours. Completely unique and authentic to you. It captures your essence and declares you stand for something, do something and believe in something in a unique way that's truly yours in the workforce.
How many Creative Possibilitarian's do you think exist? That's right. Exactly ONE, and she's wearing overalls. Her name is Emily Hope Dobkin.
The old question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” is done. The new way we need to question youth and anyone in a career transition is, “Who do you want to be in your work?”
Are you really the Magic-Maker or Captain of Empowerment? Then say that. Not because it sounds cool but because it exemplifies the TRUE you, and your hybridity.
The jobs of today won't exist in ten years, but your hybrid professional identity and hybrid job title are yours to invent, keep and change as often as you like without any debate about hierarchy.
Traditional job titles are not enough anymore!
If you're a polymath, multi-hyphenate or multipotentialite, then you need to consider if listing all the things you do, like to do, or want to do is helping or hurting you. How can you better clarify what your true value prop is? Hybridity might be the answer you’re looking for.
If you call yourself a leadership coach, designer, engineer, project manager, problem solver, or any number of general identity terms, then the question is…who are you really? You must get more specific to stand out and show your unique value.
Who are you is a question that points at what you choose to call your professional identity. Your formal job title doesn’t define your professional identity. Job titles are something give to you by a company, but your professional identity is something you decide for yourself.
Hybridity can be your competitive advantage, so disguising it under a traditional job title can hurts you because you blend in.
What is a hybrid job title?
Hybrid job titles are appearing more and more in places like LinkedIn headers and in the media to describe professionals.
A hybrid job title is a title that captures who you are when you integrate your multiple work identities together. For instance, when you merge being a marketer, founder, customer relations expert, and social media strategist, what do you get? What do you call that new identity?
In order to understand how to create a hybrid job title, you must know your professional identity or identities.
Professional Identity: Whatever you do that's your work, whether or not you get paid (volunteer work and internships count, but hobbies don't).
Hybrid Professional Identity: Who you are when you integrate your multiple work identities together. Different than having only one professional identity or many.
Hybrid Job Title: What you call your hybrid professional identity. A non-generic job title. Examples: Spiritual Spark Plug, Plantrepreneur, Chief Empowerment Officer.
When you put your hybrid job title into the world and start defining its meaning to others, that’s when you start branding yourself.
Personal Branding is the act of intentionality putting your professional identity (or hybrid professional identity) into the world. It’s about showing how you define your hybrid job title and what it means so others see you the way you want to be seen. Developing a hybrid job title takes your personal branding to the next level.
How to craft your hybrid job title
A hybrid job title will differentiate who you are and what you do so you stand out from the crowd and your authentic work self shines.
Importantly, this isn’t as simple as it sounds. Branding yourself is always hard because you can’t fully see yourself and the best language to use. Having peers or a hybrid expert (like me) provide guidance and inspiration is especially handy.
STEPS
KNOW YOUR PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY TYPE: (Check out this framework). First, you need to know what type of professional identity you are. There’s an adjustment period to using this new language. Once you start calling yourself a hybrid professional, you have to be ready to explain why and what that means.
GET CLEAR ON YOUR PROFESSIONAL IDENTITIES: You need to know the core identities you use in your work. These are truly the most important identities you have.
USE A VENN DIAGRAM: To see what’s happening between your professional identities, study the intersections by drawing a Venn Diagram. That’s where new juice and surprises are living that need to be realized, discovered, defined, and named.
HYBRIDIZE: Try creating a two word or three word job title with these tips.
ITERATE & TEST: Creating hybrid titles is a bit of trial and error. Even if you invent one for yourself tomorrow, you might try it for a few days and decide to rework it. That learning curve is part of the process of finding the title that truly fits you.
PITFALLS TO AVOID
There are a few traps people fall into. The biggest mistakes people make is to use trendy language or silly terms that don’t enhance your unique professional abilities, and may even detract from your personal brand.
For instance, using the words guru, strategist, analyst, and coach to your title are very common. Use these words sparingly in your hybrid title or get really specific about what kind of “coach” you are to differentiate why you’re using it. After all, the world doesn't need more strategists, but maybe the world does need acrobatic strategists or firefighting strategists. See the difference?
How to start using a hybrid job title
You can be a Chief Fire Starter, Creative Sustainabelist, or Edu-tainment Officer. Hybrid job titles aren't about power dynamics or hierarchies. They're about people. They reveal your uniqueness.
As soon as you realize you have multiple professional identities that you’re weaving together into some new extra special combo, it’s time to find a name for your hybrid professional identity.
You can start using your hybrid job title as soon as you feel confident and comfortable with it. For most people, it’s awkward or strange to use at first, and it takes them months of practice before they can say it out loud with true conviction.
Take your time. Play with possible versions of your hybrid job title. Before posting it on your profile, business cards or personal website, try saying it out loud during networking and professional settings to get comfortable with it.
Look for a reaction of intrigue from the people you share it with. When you consistently receive this reaction, that’s a sign people are curious to know more about you, and you’ve struck the right chord. Then, start using your hybrid title more publicly.
BONUS!
Plenty of workers have a formal job title, like Director of Sales, and they still have a hybrid job title. The way this works best is to use your formal title beside your hybrid job title. This shows how you see yourself and expands other people’s understanding of who you are in your formal role.
For instance, it might sound like this: “I’m the Director of Sales but I call myself the Chief Fire Starter because I’m able to kick things into action and get a lot of leads quickly.”
Goals of a hybrid title
Use this DIVINE Framework for a set of six strategies to create a killer hybrid job title.
The goals of a hybrid title are:
to be authentic to you
demonstrate your uniqueness
avoid personal blanding
not be too bizarre, outlandish, corny or trendy
and be sticky/easy to remember—something that catches people’s attention, makes them wonder, and increases the chances they want to know more about you.
When creating your hybrid title, you want to call yourself something that people haven’t necessarily heard of before but still accurately represents you. The reason for this is to make you stand out from all the workers with the exact same title!
When you find your hybrid title, it will feel good to say out loud because it represents the truest version of you when all your “multi-hyphenated” identities merge together.
Your hybrid title becomes the through line of your work history. Now, doesn’t that sound amazing to discover?!
Finding this is a dance between playing with language, poetry, synonyms, and actual work vocabulary.
Real life examples of the best hybrid job titles
There are a number of examples hybrid job titles across LinkedIn. Below, are a set of hybrid titles people are using to communicate their professional identity and value prop.
You be the judge of whether you like them and why.
Hybrid job titles should spark a reaction in you and cause you to pause and think:
“What is that person trying to express about themselves? Why does one strike me and the other doesn’t?”
In the case of Emily Dobkin, mentioned at the top of this post, she called herself a Creative Possibilitarian. However, in her actual LinkedIn header, she lists several hybrid titles.
This shows she’s experimenting with new language to find the right words that truly convey her professional self. This is perfectly normal to do when someone is in a stage of defining their hybrid professional identity. Iteration is part of the discovery process, and yes, you can invent new words for yourself!
In a message, Emily wrote, “Learning more about hybrid professionals has allowed me to more fully embrace such titles.” She is taking pleasure in the creative process of designing her truest and most authentic title for herself.
Take a look below for additional inspiration. Which are the best titles in your opinion?
An entire company uses hybrid job titles
The entire team at People Rocket uses hybrid job titles that are based on each person’s specific background, skills, and talents. This is a genius way to recognize that their team is full of uniqueness and makes each person feel seen for who they truly are (not just another generic job title).
Additionally, as a company, People Rocket focuses on innovation consulting, so their clients see that they’re getting a rich set of professionals who truly stand out as innovators.
In this case, People Rocket uses hybridity in their team to leverage this as an asset for their clients.
Here’s one example of a hybrid title and a short description that explains who Abigail really is. Visit the People Rocket team webpage to read many more examples like this:
ABIGAIL ORRICK- CURIOSITY ARCHITECT
“Abigail uses the power of interviewing and facilitation to develop relationships and uncover stories in data. She gives organizations the tools and confidence to thrive in the face of change.”
