The Computer Guy Identity Crisis: Choosing A Job Title
By: Matthew Rodela on January 5th, 2009
Categories: Computer Repair, Lists, Phase 2:Trial and Error, Techie Woes
Throughout my years in the IT industry I’ve held many positions and titles. Some are fairly accurate descriptions of what I was doing, and some were decidedly very un-acurate. Now as I start my own business, I’m stuck with the task of giving myself a title. As it turns out, it’s a little harder than I had anticipated.
Growing Up Geek
When I first fell in love with computers, I was in elementary school. My parents got a big hunky IBM clone (I don’t remember the brand) complete with two fancy 5 1/4 inch floppy drives. I loved to play around and find ways to break or confuse the programs. This started a long love affair with breaking and fixing computers. At that point, and all through school, I was a true computer geek. I used computers for the sheer novelty of it.
Flash forward to my time serving in the US Army. I wanted to flex my computing prowess and volunteered for various computer-centric tasks like creating databases and such. I then got the opportunity to help network a new office from the ground up. After that, I was officially appointed the unit’s assistant IMO (Information Management Officer), and was tasked with helping people in the unit with various computer issues.
I loved that job, and found I really had a knack for troubleshooting. So, after I got out of the army, I took a job as an intern at the Help Desk of a pharmaceutical company. Within 4 years time I was hired on full time, promoted to a Level 2 Analyst, and promoted again to my current position in the computer industry, Enterprise Systems Analyst.
Every time I was presented with a new position and name (Geek, Assistant IMO, Helpdesk Intern, Helpdesk Analyst, Systems Analyst) I was basically doing the same thing, fixing computer problems.
What’s in a Name?
When I had the idea to start my own computer business, it never occurred to me that I would need to define my job title. In fact, it wasn’t until I started writing this blog that I realized I needed to figure out what to call myself. So I came up with a list of names that I’m considering using to refer to my position as an independent computer guy, along with how I feel about each one:
