So one thing about the use of titles thing is: where I live we all call each other by titles unless we are close friends and family.

Anybody I have a professional relationship with, or a coworker, or a neighbor.

Like this morning I’m headed to the dentist ...

...with a private car driver I have known for a year and a half, and I said buenos días señor Ronny, and he said buenos días señora Abby.

If I just called him Ronny then since we aren’t super close I would be signaling a perceived class status difference also.
For sure anybody who is a professional person I always address with their title as well so as not to be implying a perceived intimacy that isn’t there.

Same if I’m referring to them in absentia, in which case I may refer to even my family and close friends thus, like
“My dentist, la doctora Marleni, is the sister of one of my best friends and the cousin of several others and our families have always been close.”

We also call each other titles out of affection and in a teasing way. I get called “boss” when it’s my turn to take blame or...
...buy the next case of beer.

Also there are titles for tradesfolk. I could be the boss but if there’s a construction guy fixing the walkway or something I’m gonna call him maestro out of respect for his expertise and because that’s his title.
Elders and particularly respected members of the community get called Don and Doña too, and that can be applied to people don’t have other titles formally but are movers and shakers and contributors.
A lot is communicated here by the use of titles — and the same is true in the English speaking USA except there we try to pretend race, class, gender, and expertise don’t exist unless it’s in service to entrenching the white cis heteropatriarchy.
So while it could seem like a blanket disavowal of titles is an egalitarian anti establishment position, that argument really only works when we’re looking at the people who are assumed to have the right to their titles — and NOT
when we’re talking about people who the racist sexist xenophobic drunk relative would call a “woman lawyer” or “lady doctor” and so on.
So also not “Black teacher” and like super bonus not when they’d get described as “Mexican woman lawyer” or “Jewish gay dentist” or whatever.

More from Life

1/“What would need to be true for you to….X”

Why is this the most powerful question you can ask when attempting to reach an agreement with another human being or organization?

A thread, co-written by @deanmbrody:


2/ First, “X” could be lots of things. Examples: What would need to be true for you to

- “Feel it's in our best interest for me to be CMO"
- “Feel that we’re in a good place as a company”
- “Feel that we’re on the same page”
- “Feel that we both got what we wanted from this deal

3/ Normally, we aren’t that direct. Example from startup/VC land:

Founders leave VC meetings thinking that every VC will invest, but they rarely do.

Worse over, the founders don’t know what they need to do in order to be fundable.

4/ So why should you ask the magic Q?

To get clarity.

You want to know where you stand, and what it takes to get what you want in a way that also gets them what they want.

It also holds them (mentally) accountable once the thing they need becomes true.

5/ Staying in the context of soliciting investors, the question is “what would need to be true for you to want to invest (or partner with us on this journey, etc)?”

Multiple responses to this question are likely to deliver a positive result.

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