Mots Maudits #14: Métier

In his wonderful book on the English language, Mother Tongue, Bill Bryson claims that “200,000 words are in common use” in the English language compared to “a mere 100,000” in French. Of course, a lot depends on how you count the words — if you count all the possible verb inflections in French, that obviously bumps up the numbers significantly — but the case of “métier” certainly goes some way to helping me believe that statistic.

The most obvious translation of “métier” — when you are referring to what an individual does for a living — is “job”, but depending on the context, you could replace “job” with “profession”, “occupation”, “trade”, or “craft”, all of which convey certain specific nuances that make them more or less appropriate in a given context.

For example, it may be more relevant to write “learn a trade” when discussing professions that demand high levels of manual skill or mechanical know-how, whereas “learn a craft” might convey more romantic connotations about the given occupation.

Meanwhile, you might forgo all these options when translating “il est du métier” by saying “he is a business expert.” Likewise, “avoir 40 ans de métier” could be translated by “he has been (working) in the industry for 10 years.”

However, this term has taken on new meaning in corporate communication where “métier” is used to describe the company’s “job”, i.e. what business, sector or industry it is in. Moreover, when a company refers to its various “métiers”, this is generally best translated as “business lines”, “business units”, or “divisions.” Companies will often have a style guide stating their preferred usage in this case.

Another, slightly different corporate usage is when “métier” is used as a modifier, such as “utilisateur métier” (“business user”), which refers to a user of a software application, for example, who uses it to conduct the company’s business itself as opposed to a user who works in support services like the information systems department.