Czar of what?

A friend’s posted item on Facebook tipped me off to this phenomena, and although I’ve certainly noticed the abundant emergence of the word “czar” in more and more job titles, it hadn’t struck me as all that strange until I starting thinking about it. Car Czar, Energy Czar, Data Czar, ECommerce Czar, Climate Czar. It’s one of those words that sounds funny after you say it a few times. I went to indeed.com and typed in “czar” and lo and behold, there were 19 czar jobs.

Simply Hired has even graphed it out and says that the average czar earns $88,000! Not too bad, and Czars typically have perks too, like a palatial estate and personal chauffeur.

I personally like the New York Times definition that “‘czar has become the default term for a quasi-bigwig troubleshooter whose mission is ill defined except that, well, it’s important and someone has to deal with the mess.” You can read the full article here where you’ll discover endearing titles Czars give to their loved ones, like czardines! It’s even been suggested that the Obama administration is “addicted to czars“, although in this case there is more to it that a simple title fad.

I’m going to spend some time pondering a title change myself, although I guess I’d technically be “czaritsa.”

The interview of your dreams…or maybe not.

It’s Thursday, which is almost Friday and hence almost the weekend, so I thought we could take a break from all seriousness and enjoy a little Monty Python. If you’ve been on an interview lately, this may make you feel better about the result.