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Why Bending Spoons eliminated all job titles

4 points by taubek 18d ago

fuzzfactor 18d ago
When the primary mission is to eliminate as many jobs as possible, then job titles and descriptions would seem to be more superfluous compared to a normal company.
taubek 18d ago
Text from tweet: Why Bending Spoons eliminated all job titles: “At some point, we were looking for ways to streamline and simplify, and someone said, ‘Why do we even have titles? What's the benefit of titles?’” “Let's not be arrogant. There's probably some benefit. What's that benefit? We ultimately determined that the benefit was that people needed titles for bragging rights.” “So we just got rid of titles and told people, ‘You can pick your title for your CV, LinkedIn, whatever. We don't need to know. We don't want to know. We don't need to approve it. We don't want to see it. Just don't embarrass us." “If you're a new hire, don't say you're the CTO because then people will question our integrity as a company. But as long as it's broadly reasonable, we're good. We have never reintroduced them again. We don't have any titles.” “We never looked back. We probably saved easily hundreds if not thousands of person-hours in terms of defining different terms and having emotionally draining discussions with people. Never had a problem, not a single instance of someone complaining that we didn't formally assign to them a title ever out of, at this point, many hundreds, actually multiple thousands of people.”
pythonic_hell 18d ago
How does this work with pay bands? How does this work with expectations management?
- roryirvine 18d ago
  I don't think it changes the underlying role and grade structure - it's only about changing the job title. Doesn't really affect anything other than your email footer. It's actually the sort of thing that used to be common in small tech companies in the pre-dot com era. There'd be a budget for having business cards printed up, and people would get to call themself things like "Intrepid C++ Wizard", but from the point of view of the org chart / HR / payroll that they'd just be a senior member of the engineering team.
8by3 18d ago
I love being out of touch with the tech scene. I couldn't fathom what the link between paranormal powers and job titles could possibly be. One assumes they still have L7E whatever for the org chart and reporting software. It feels like a lazy publicity stunt. Also don't people think these kinds of company names will backfire? Spoon bending is a con, is everything that the company does also a con?
punkbit 18d ago
They've highlighted one of the reasons why some or many Linkedin profiles are fantasy

4 points by taubek 18d ago

When the primary mission is to eliminate as many jobs as possible, then job titles and descriptions would seem to be more superfluous compared to a normal company.

taubek 18d ago

Text from tweet: Why Bending Spoons eliminated all job titles: “At some point, we were looking for ways to streamline and simplify, and someone said, ‘Why do we even have titles? What's the benefit of titles?’” “Let's not be arrogant. There's probably some benefit. What's that benefit? We ultimately determined that the benefit was that people needed titles for bragging rights.” “So we just got rid of titles and told people, ‘You can pick your title for your CV, LinkedIn, whatever. We don't need to know. We don't want to know. We don't need to approve it. We don't want to see it. Just don't embarrass us." “If you're a new hire, don't say you're the CTO because then people will question our integrity as a company. But as long as it's broadly reasonable, we're good. We have never reintroduced them again. We don't have any titles.” “We never looked back. We probably saved easily hundreds if not thousands of person-hours in terms of defining different terms and having emotionally draining discussions with people. Never had a problem, not a single instance of someone complaining that we didn't formally assign to them a title ever out of, at this point, many hundreds, actually multiple thousands of people.”

pythonic_hell 18d ago

How does this work with pay bands? How does this work with expectations management?

roryirvine 18d ago
I don't think it changes the underlying role and grade structure - it's only about changing the job title. Doesn't really affect anything other than your email footer. It's actually the sort of thing that used to be common in small tech companies in the pre-dot com era. There'd be a budget for having business cards printed up, and people would get to call themself things like "Intrepid C++ Wizard", but from the point of view of the org chart / HR / payroll that they'd just be a senior member of the engineering team.

8by3 18d ago

I love being out of touch with the tech scene. I couldn't fathom what the link between paranormal powers and job titles could possibly be. One assumes they still have L7E whatever for the org chart and reporting software. It feels like a lazy publicity stunt. Also don't people think these kinds of company names will backfire? Spoon bending is a con, is everything that the company does also a con?

punkbit 18d ago

They've highlighted one of the reasons why some or many Linkedin profiles are fantasy