Should it be “President Biden” or “president Biden”? Is the “social worker” coming to the meeting, or should it be “Social Worker”? To learn when to capitalize job titles in business writing (or any other document), read our guide below.
Typically, job titles that come before names are capitalized (unless there is punctuation separating the title from the name). In these cases, the job title functions as part of a proper noun formed by the title and name:
President Biden has won the election.
Head of Sales Mark Smith will be interviewing for the position.
But beware of commas! As you can see, the job title below is not capitalized as we’re using it generically, not as a proper name:
The graphic designer, Sohaila Hussein, is very good at her job.
We’ll look at this and other exceptions again later in the post.
Other situations in which you may need to capitalize job titles include:
The Queen will be opening this leisure center.
Have you written to the President yet?
Yours faithfully, Sarah Brown, Assistant Principal
Melanie Ferrer, Speech and Language Therapist
May 2019–July 2020, Customer Services Assistant
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Is it serious, Doctor?
Office of the Vice Chancellor
Finally, if you’re an employee, make sure to check your organization’s style guide (if they have one) for specific details on capitalizing titles within the company. For example, some companies prefer to capitalize job roles as a matter of respect. And if your boss prefers to see their title capitalized in official documents, it is usually wise to follow their example even if it means bending the standard rules!
When job titles are used descriptively or generically within a sentence, they are not usually capitalized. This applies to formal writing, job descriptions, cover letters and resumes, and pretty much any other form of writing you can imagine. For example:
Our chief editor, Simon Crystal, has an office on the second floor.
Mrs. Osborne, our assistant chef, makes the most delicious lasagna.
The receptionists at this company leave a lot to be desired.
During my time as a sales manager, I was responsible for 15 employees.
I would make an excellent staff nurse as I have great interpersonal skills.
In other words, when a job description is used in a sentence and does not stand in for (or form part of) a proper name, your default should be to use lowercase letters at the start of each word. However, as above, you may want to check your employer’s style guide for advice on capitalizing specific job titles.
In summary, the rules for capitalizing job titles are:
We hope this post has clarified how to capitalize job titles in writing. But if you’d like an expert to help you perfect your writing, why not try our proofreading service?
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