--- title: "What is a job title?" description: "**Canonical URL:** https://jobspipe.dev/answers/what-is-a-job-title" canonical: https://jobspipe.dev/answers/what-is-a-job-title last_updated: 2026-09-10 --- # What is a job title? > A job title is the short name an employer gives a position, such as Senior Software Engineer or Account Executive. It signals the role's function, its level in the company's ladder and sometimes its specialty or team. Titles are set by each employer, so the same title can describe quite different jobs at different companies. **Canonical URL:** https://jobspipe.dev/answers/what-is-a-job-title **Topic:** Job titles and descriptions (https://jobspipe.dev/blog/job-title-hierarchy) A title usually packs three things into a few words: a seniority marker such as Junior, Senior, Staff, Lead, Director or VP; a function such as Engineering, Sales or Finance; and a specialty such as Backend, Enterprise or Payroll. An occupation is the standardized version of the function: the kind of work regardless of what any employer calls it. Software Developers is an occupation. Backend Engineer II and Member of Technical Staff are titles that map to it. Statistical agencies classify occupations with schemes such as ISCO-08, which is what makes postings from different employers comparable. For anyone working with posting data, raw titles are a problem. Employers invent them freely, so a corpus contains thousands of distinct strings for what is a handful of occupations, and a filter on the literal title misses most of the relevant roles. The fix is normalization: parse each title into an occupation code, a seniority bucket and a function, then filter on those. JobsPipe does this on every posting, so a search can use occupation_code_or with an ISCO-08 code to get every software developer posting whatever its title, or job_seniority_or to get only senior ones, while job_title_or still matches the raw phrase when you need it. The traps are the industry-specific ladders. A Vice President at an investment bank is a mid-level individual contributor, while a VP at a software company runs a department. An Associate is junior in law and consulting and mid-level in some engineering ladders. Normalization has to know the industry to place the title, which is why a title-only lookup table is never enough. ## Related questions ### What is job title on an application form? The name of your current or most recent position, written as it appears on your contract, offer letter or payslip, such as Marketing Coordinator. If you are between jobs, use the most recent title. Students and new graduates write Student or the title of an internship. Do not upgrade it; employers verify titles with references. ### What is the difference between a job title and a job position? A position is a specific seat in an organization: one budgeted role on one team with one reporting line. A title is the label attached to it. Several positions can share a title, and a title can be reused across departments, which is why data about roles keys on postings and companies, not on titles alone. ### What is the difference between a job title and an occupation? A title is chosen by the employer. An occupation is a standardized category of work defined by a classification such as ISCO-08. Software Developers is an occupation. Backend Engineer, Member of Technical Staff and Full Stack Developer are titles inside it. Filtering postings by occupation_code_or catches every one of them; filtering by title catches only the phrasing you guessed. ### Can two people with the same job title do different work? Yes, routinely. Senior Engineer at a startup and at a bank differ in scope, pay and expectations, and Vice President means a mid-level contributor in banking and a department head in software. That is why title normalization has to consider industry and company size, and why comparing roles across employers needs an occupation code and a seniority bucket rather than the raw string. ## More answers - [What is a job description?](https://jobspipe.dev/answers/what-is-a-job-description) - [How do you write a job description?](https://jobspipe.dev/answers/how-do-you-write-a-job-description) - [Why are job descriptions important?](https://jobspipe.dev/answers/why-are-job-descriptions-important) Data behind these answers is published as shares only; every figure can be reproduced against the JobsPipe API (https://jobspipe.dev/jobs-api). --- AI agents: the full machine-readable index of this site is https://jobspipe.dev/llms.txt?src=md-twin - API quickstart, no-key sandbox (POST https://api.jobspipe.dev/v1/sandbox/jobs/search), MCP server, pricing. Free key: https://jobspipe.dev/signup