
Ask HN: Appropriate title to brand myself as a consultant? - notduncansmith
I&#x27;ve been a designer and developer for my career, but I&#x27;ve recently started consulting and it&#x27;s certainly where I&#x27;d like to move my career.  I love designing, and I love writing code, but I&#x27;d much rather just consult for a living and do that stuff in my spare time.  I have a pretty wide range of expertise within the web software business, from marketing to application architecture to design to SEO to CRO, etc, and these are what I&#x27;ve been consulting on lately.<p>What should I brand myself as in order to convey that I&#x27;m a consultant, not a contractor?  I don&#x27;t know if I should still call myself a designer or a developer, or if &quot;software consultant&quot; should cover it.<p>What do you call yourselves?
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tptacek
This is easy: call yourself a Principal, which in technical consulting has the
meaning "Consultant/Owner", but conveniently leaves all the specifics out of
what you do.

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robbiea
Agreed. Principal works great if you want to brand yourself as someone who is
looking for longer term projects and you can do multiple things.

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tomek_zemla
I have a somewhat similar profile to you, background in computer science and
design and visual arts. I have been working independently for around 15 years
now and I ended up adopting a 'title' of Creative Technologist. I picked it up
because... I like it or to be precise I like how it reflects what my interests
are.

This being said, I don't think it does much to improve my business which is
based on word of mouth referrals and demos of my previous work. That's my
brand as the consultant. It's not really the title, but people mentioning my
name to new potential clients who ask for somebody who does creative
technology... I don't think they actually use the Creative Technologist label
in these conversations/referrals.

And in my last full-time job before before going solo I had a title of
Messenger. I was the connector between developers, designers and business
teams. I thought it was appropriate, but I don't think anybody ever used it in
conversation. It was a good conversation starter when handing in my business
card, though!

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taprun
This is a problem that I've been struggling with as well.

I started calling myself a consultant, but I've found that seems to be a title
that a LOT of hacks around here use.

I think the best approach is to make a name for yourself. Do people say "Seth
Godin, the marketer" or just "Seth Godin"? When you can say "I'm
notduncansmith", you can charge a premium, because no one else can say "I am
notduncansmith" (Uggh, did you chose your username for the sole purpose of
ruining my example??).

Long story short, when you get a reputation, title doesn't matter as much, and
you can just be you.

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notduncansmith
That's a good thought, and certainly my end goal. Until I get there though, I
feel like I should have some sort of concise way of telling people what I do.
"Consultant" does carry a certain connotation (and not always good), but it's
much better than "web strategist", which I feel is an apt description of what
I do but is within spitting distance of "Social Media Guru". Maybe I should
just fake it 'til I make it? That's how I got my start in this field.

By the way, I chose the username for a bit of pretend plausible deniability.
"Look NSA guys, that post was _clearly_ not written by Duncan Smith. It says
so right here!" My sense of humor.

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ja27
Senior consultant or even principal consultant.

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tptacek
If you're a sole proprietor, it would be pretty silly to call yourself a "Sr
Consultant" \--- Sr compared to what?

Principal is in fact a title used for Consultant/Owners.

Principal Consultant, on the other hand, is usually the next step after "Sr
Consultant". Unlike "Sr Consultant", you will not sound goofy calling yourself
that. However, if your consultancy grows and you need to create a ladder of
titles, you may want to reserve Principal Consultant for employees.

(I hate that Principal Consultant has that meaning; it makes no sense to me
that the owners of the firm are "Principals" and the most senior delivering
consultants "Principal Consultants" \--- what are they, the Presidential
Guard? But that is how it works.)

