Comments on: Developer, Designer, Director, Producer – Why Your Job Title Does Not Matter

By: Drew

Drew — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 04:52:33 +0000

As someone who’s an advanced user of Photoshop, HTML and CSS, but cannot write script of any kind without schloads of copy/paste, I don’t consider myself a developer. I do a fair amount of what many would call ‘web design’, but I have been known to create video, music, photos, copy, and beyond for online projects. Therefore I have dubbed myself “Media Designer”, which seems to better encompass my broad range of activities than “Web Designer”, which gives people the impression that I do “graphics and techy stuff”. I am not an “IT guy” at all, but rather an “arts guy” who uses technology as his primary tool.

By: Wardrop

Wardrop — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 13:50:23 +0000

Obviously, the longer, and harder to say, a job title is, the better. I’m currently working towards “Senior IT Web Information Development Analyst who Likes the Colour Blue”.

By: Luke Morton

Luke Morton — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 08:41:30 +0000

I like Web Explorer, but I keep to Web Developer most of the time. We can call ourselves whatever we want, but I think our previous experience counts more to winning a contract than what our job title is.

By: cranial-bore

cranial-bore — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 11:00:18 +0000

Whenever I say that I’m a Web Developer I unwittingly perform a typing gesture in the air. Often the response is “ah, you fix computers”.
For prospective clients though I don’t think a title has ever really come up. They know before they speak to me that I’m a freelance type person who makes websites.

By: fproof

fproof — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:44:14 +0000

After I worked for 3 years as an employee in the outsourcing business, I ended up with around 5000 personal business cards with 7 different titles.
I use them as post-it’s now.

By: zompus

zompus — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:37:28 +0000

“I make websites”. Good enough for me. >:)

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:23:22 +0000

When I describe what I do on a freelance basis, I prefer to just say I build web sites. I guess that would make my title Web Site Builder. That is all the web designers/developers are doing really. We are all just building web sites in one from or another.

I haven’t met a client yet that cares if I am a Web Developer or a Web Designer. All they care about is that I can build them the web site they want. While we all may have different area of knowledge and expertise, we are all just web site builders.

As long as I am not defined as a webmaster, I don’t care what you call me.

Scott

By: garethjmsaunders

garethjmsaunders — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 16:21:41 +0000

My job title is Assistant Information Architect/Web Manager.

I’m involved in information architecture, project management, design, image editing, content creation and editing, coding (mostly HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PHP), minor server management duties.

I simply tell people that I’m part of the Web Team. I am proud of that I have “Information Architect” in my official job title, though. And the forward slash!

By: Dorene

Dorene — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 16:01:25 +0000

Another issues with titles, is that if you are looking for work, it’s hard to match a job title for something with an obscure name. I find my current job hunt very time consuming, since I have to be creative with my search phrases. Personally my title has been Business Analyst, Consultant or System Analyst, but in each case, I was working on documenting requirements for software development projects.

By: nathany

nathany — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 15:47:31 +0000

Titles may matter for the guru/consultant types, and according to the survey, it certainly mattered in terms of salary and experience/age. But often we wear many hats, so it’s hard to sum up what we do with a few words.

Usually I just say “web developer” and stress that I’m not a graphics designer, or that I do more back-end programming. Though I suppose I’m a “Fronteer” as well, and basically go where needed, and have learned programming languages and tools just for a single project.