Title Inflation

 

In the July 2006 issue of Inc. Magazine, there is an article on job titles and why not to casually hand out "flashy titles".  This is really on the money, especially for growing organizations.  To placate an employee, folks often give them a title that they're truly not qualified for or that comes with responsibilities that they don't manage.

 

This can come back to bite your organization in so many ways that you don't ever want to go here.  It can also come back to hurt the employee's career development in a big way, but usually over such a long time frame that it isn't clearly noticeable or the employee is willing to take the risk that it won't.  Of course, I'm not simply preaching the theory; I've "over-titled" people and have had to mop up the consequences and it's just no fun.  If you want to chat about it so you can more clearly hear about the pain, drop me a line.