Mustang, Bronco, Raptor, Explorer, Maverick. Ford has some great names in its portfolio, but it’s looking for more. If you’re good with names, inquire within. Ford is now hiring a “Nomenclature Strategist” who reports to the company’s Director of Global Nomenclature. Yes, this is a real thing.
Per the job posting, Ford is looking for someone “who can merge linguistic creativity with business strategy, delivering names that are not only memorable and meaningful, but aligned with our broader brand architecture and legally viable.”
It sounds like a tricky job, to be honest, and fascinating all the same. You can’t just pick a name out of a hat, stick it on the back of a car, and call it job done. Everyone at the company has to like the name, and it has to be available, too.
In the days of the Bronco and Mustang, one imagines Ford executives sitting around a boardroom table and spitballing until they ended up with something they liked. For the Edsel, Ford hired Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Marianne Moore to come up with names for the coming model. Moore pitched names like Faberge and Utopian Turtletop, but Ford execs decided to name the car after Henry Ford’s son. And we all know how that went.
Ford now has a global “Center of Excellence for naming and taxonomy,” and it handles more than just naming cars. As the job listing notes, the Center manages everything within Ford that needs a name. That could be things like Ford’s commercial-vehicle service, Ford Pro, or internal things that we outsiders never hear about.
This position is considered Leader Level 6 (LL6), which, according to a Ford new-hire document, means a salary between $112,000 and $212,000. But you need experience ot get the gig—specifically, Ford is looking for 6 or more years of working in nomenclature, so amateur namers need not apply.
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