Why the name 'C46'?
June 20th, 2023 | Katy Santiago, Founder
“What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.”
- William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
Colossians 4:6
Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.Naming a business
Have you ever attempted to name a business? I mean, really attempted?
Technically, the process is easy. You go to the site, enter your business information, pay your fee, and five minutes later you are a business owner.
It was the journey to deciding the 'business information' caught me a bit by surprise. How could someone possibly select a name that represents your offerings and , by some miracle, has not been registered as a business in your state. I thought it would be easy. It wasn't!
At some point in choosing a name I wanted to believe Mr. Shakespeare's quote, and align to the idea that a name is entirely irrelevant. Yet holding that belief felt dichotomous with my business background and all of those hours spent aligning to branding guides. A name is not irrelevant, a name reveals something about ourselves and our business.
What we wanted from our brand
As a consultant and coach, I make decisions that will ultimately influence others more than myself.
I wanted to select a brand that would identify the piece of me that shapes my approach to you.
C46 represents my acknowledgement that I do not currently possess and will never know everything or what anyone needs. It represents that I will humbly listen and maintain an insatiable curiosity for understanding the 'what' and 'why' of others true needs.
My C46 mantra is a piece of my professional origin story. Maybe not as cool as Thor's hammer, but definitely a weapon that I've carried with me at all times and could call on as necessary throughout my career and personal life.
The weight of responsibility
My professional career began in Human Resources.
In my early twenties, I settled into a position as the single onsite HR representative for a large scale manufacturing facility. As with any HR generalist position, I found myself being either directly responsible for or highly influential to decisions and actions that would impact someone's livelihood.
Portion of my work...
opened educational and internship opportunities that could change the direction of choices for their future educational paths and careers
curated programs to develop and grow people, allowing them to reach greater potential and access promotional opportunities
communicated offers of employment that would bring stable income and benefits to new employees
guide decisions to remove employment stability from other employees
I would rejoice in the growth of our people and I would also confidentially mourn the challenges that would certainly come to employee families following termination.
This work created a weight of responsibility. I felt that weight and wanted to do the best for each person I interacted with on behalf of my organization.
Humbly, I knew that I had not and would never experience enough in life to attain the wisdom to make every appropriate decision. I also knew that if I attempted to personally carry that burden, it would eventually crush me under its' magnitude.
With that perspective I turned to God in prayer and studied His word. He provided Colossians 4:6 - Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
Since 2012 these words have hung in my office, been written on the bottom of my desks, and are now represented as C46 in the name of my company.
This is me, because in me is Christ and it is His wisdom that leads my life in all that I do. As a leader, as a peer, as a wife, as a mother, and as a friend.
