Job titles aren’t always a good descriptor of what someone actually does all day, and trying to explain them to children with no context can be amusingly confusing at best.
That’s why a Reddit post I stumbled upon of a Senior Data Analytics Consultant asking ChatGPT to simplify their job for a kindergartener tuned out to be very entertaining.
ChatGPT answered that they “count toys and tell people which toys are played with the most.” Brutally effective, but apparently spot on, since the poster commented that “I’ve never felt so professionally attacked by such an accurate description”.
Naturally, I had to try it myself. So I asked ChatGPT, “Explain what a journalist does, but make it simple enough for a five-year-old to understand.” The answer?
“A journalist is like a storyteller who goes out into the world to find out what’s happening. Imagine you hear a loud noise outside, and you really want to know what it is. A journalist’s job is to go look, ask questions, and then come back and explain it in a way everyone can understand.”
While not quite my specific niche, the broad strokes for the whole profession are pretty good, albeit perhaps not quite so straightforward in the digital age. For fun, I then asked for an image illustrating that description of my profession and did enjoy the nostalgic, child’s view of the role.
Job market
I wanted to try it with other jobs, too. Specifically, those with titles that are confusing or broad. I started with a title I’ve heard a million times without ever hearing the same job description once, that of a management consultant.
According to ChatGPT, “A management consultant is like a helper who gives advice when things aren’t working smoothly. Imagine you’re trying to run a lemonade stand, but sometimes you run out of cups, or too many people are waiting in line, or you don’t make enough money at the end of the day. A management consultant is someone who comes to watch how you do things, figures out what’s slowing you down, and then says, “If you set up the cups here, ask your friend to help with change, and buy lemons in bigger bags, you’ll do better.” They don’t sell the lemonade for you, but they show you smart ways to make the stand work better.
The image it generated came off less inspiring than a little disturbing, but the point of the career certainly came across:
Next, I tried asking about what a CTO does as a five-year-old might understand it. The answer made it seem much more adventurous than I suspect it usually is.
“A CTO is like the ‘technology captain’ of a company. Imagine a big ship that needs to sail safely and quickly. The captain decides which direction the ship should go, makes sure the crew knows what to do, and checks that the ship is strong enough to handle storms,” ChatGPT explained. “That’s what a CTO does, but with computers, apps, and gadgets instead of sails and ropes.”
That’s exactly what the image it made showed:
Finally, I went with a title I’d seen but always found suspicious of being a make-work executive role without any real substance, “Vice President of Strategic Initiatives.” ChatGPT apparently has plenty of information on what this role entails, explaining that:
“A Vice President of Strategic Initiatives is like the planner for big adventures. Imagine your family wants to go on a really fun trip, but it’s not just about packing snacks and getting in the car. Someone has to figure out where you’ll go, how you’ll get there, what you’ll do once you arrive, and how to make sure everyone has a great time without running out of money or getting lost. That’s what this person does for a company.”
A surprisingly flattering way of explaining they do the planning for big projects, but more grounded than CTO as sailing captain at least.
Jargon jobs
Jobs often seem buried in jargon for one reason or another. But ask a chatbot to explain it to a child, and all that vanishes. What you’re left with is the core function. You tell stories. You solve problems. You keep the batteries charged. It’s incomplete, but not inaccurate at getting to the heart of people’s professions.
Some people in the Reddit thread took it as a punchline with the toy references, but I’d say it struck a balance between comedy and clarity that might actually get through to a kid. The visuals would probably help too.
In boiling jobs down for a five-year-old, you don’t lose the dignity of the work, you just reclaim some simplicity. You reframe what you do in terms of its purpose, which, when AI threatens to possibly eat far too many jobs, might actually help companies grasp why certain roles require humans. But don’t get behind the wheel of a ship just because you’re a CTO.
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erichs211@gmail.com (Eric Hal Schwartz)
