The Definitive Guide to Power Boy Names
Posted on 01 18, 2007 under Predad by schneidermike | View Comments
We all want our sons to be successful, but do we really mean it? Today’s kids are walking around with names like Ethan, Logan, Hunter and Willem. While these may sound cool, chances may be better that you will end up with a Mixed Martial Arts dynamo than a dominant force financial success. According to the US Government, in 2005 the most popular boy names were Jacob, Michael, Joshua, Matthew and Ethan. Some of you are on the right track to having powerful kids, but some are flat out reading the wrong books, naming after the wrong relatives or watching too much TV.
There is a system for everything and like any system, if you put garbage in, you should not expect to be riding the gravy train out. So where should we be looking for inspiration? Actors? HARDLY! There is very little chance that your kid is going to be a great and powerful actor. Even if they are, they are then subjected to the fickleness of the public on a daily basis as well as constant hounding by the paparazzi. Who would wish that on their worst enemey? Paris Hilton maybe. How about U.S. Presidents? Senators? Congressmen? I don't think so. The best chance for success is in the business world. The most powerful people in the business world tend to be the CEOs of the Fortune 1000. That is where we wil look for inspiration. Here we can aim for CEO and be happy with senior management and thrilled with executive management.
{mosnooad}
First the caveats. This is based on Fortune 1000 company CEO data from 2006. The data may have decayed some since I found it. Analysis will be focused on the CEO's preferred name. If the CEO's name is Ronald James Ferguson and he goes by James, then James is considered his name. Spelling is also important. Mike and Michael, Greg and Gregory, Bob and Robert are all considered separately. This is just for fun. I would have also considered girl's names had there been enough to be significant. This is not to say that we should not look to women business heads to name our daughters, it is just to say that someone needs to point me to a list of the 200-1000 or so most powerful women in business and I will get on it.
When naming your son, keep in mind that the averge length of a CEO's preferred name is 5.69 characters.
The top Fortune 1000 CEO names are:
| Preferred Name | Frequency Occurring | Rank |
| Robert | 55 | 1 |
| John | 53 | 2 |
| James | 46 | 3 |
| William | 40 | 4 |
| David | 39 | 5 |
| Richard | 39 | 5 |
| Michael | 37 | 7 |
| Thomas | 28 | 8 |
| Steven | 24 | 9 |
| Paul | 19 | 10 |
| Stephen | 18 | 11 |
| Mark | 15 | 12 |
| Edward | 14 | 13 |
| Jeffrey | 14 | 14 |
| Peter | 13 | 15 |
| Gregory | 12 | 16 |
| Charles | 10 | 17 |
| George | 10 | 17 |
| Joseph | 10 | 17 |
| Ronald | 10 | 17 |
| Lawrence | 10 | 17 |
| Kenneth | 10 | 17 |
If you really want to aim high, here are the most frequently occurring names of the CEOs in the top 25% of Fortune 1000 companies in terms of revenue. (Quartile 4 is the top in my analysis).
| Name | Quartile | Frequency | Rank |
| James | 4 | 15 | 1 |
| Michael | 4 | 13 | 2 |
| John | 4 | 10 | 3 |
| Robert | 4 | 10 | 3 |
| Thomas | 4 | 9 | 5 |
| William | 4 | 9 | 5 |
| David | 4 | 6 | 7 |
| Richard | 4 | 6 | 7 |
| Steven | 4 | 6 | 7 |
| Mark | 4 | 5 | 10 |
| Stephen | 4 | 5 | 10 |
| Charles | 4 | 5 | 10 |
| Paul | 4 | 5 | 10 |
| Martin | 4 | 5 | 10 |
For those of you who cannot stand the fact that success is a side dish of conformity, at the very least consider the top intials: (Woo! Mine are in the top 3.)
| First | Middle | Frequency | Rank |
| R | L | 17 | 1 |
| J | M | 16 | 2 |
| J | W | 15 | 3 |
| M | J | 15 | 3 |
| R | A | 15 | 3 |
| J | A | 13 | 6 |
| D | J | 12 | 7 |
| R | D | 11 | 8 |
| R | W | 11 | 8 |
| J | P | 10 | 10 |
| J | R | 10 | 10 |
| R | C | 10 | 10 |
| S | A | 10 | 10 |
So when naming your son, put these names on your shortlist (at least for the middle name) and then make sure that he actually uses his power name for school and for work. You can still call him whatever you want to home. And there you have it. The Definitive Guide to Power Baby Naming Happy baby naming noodads!
