“Where does the ‘Flint’ name come from?” is a common question from employees and customers alike. We asked one of Flint’s founding members and company director Keith Barker to share the story behind the Flint name.
The short story of how Flint got its name is simple. The name has its roots in the fact that the original three founders were all bald. However, the background as to why we eventually came up with the name ‘Flint’ has a bit more history than the fact that Alan Bryant, Peter Shiret and myself are ‘follically-challenged’.
While working at Cellnet (now called Telefonica O2) in the 1990s, I worked with another gentleman who, like me, had a receding hairline. As we were working closely, we affectionately started to call ourselves ‘Baldcom’. Years later, when starting to work with Peter, we joked about setting up our own venture and maybe calling it Baldcom, to honour the years-long tradition of the moniker.
From Baldcom to Flint
In the late 1990’s both Peter and I took a leap of faith and left secure corporate positions at Ericsson and Lucent Technologies to start a telecom consultancy company where we were soon joined by Alan. Alan was, of course, sporting the required mandatory company hairstyle.
As we came to formally register our own consultancy company the first name that came into our heads was, of course, ‘Baldcom’. Realistically, we knew that we could not use that name if we wanted to be taken seriously but we wanted to keep the theme and sense of humour that we had shared alive. We started to look for different variations on the theme, to find a balance between humour and professionalism. After spending so much time working with Swedish colleagues and discarding names like chauve (French) or glatzkopf (German), we came across the Swedish word for baldie, which is ‘flintis’ or just ‘flint’.
At the time the three of us were back consulting for Ericsson and, of course, our Swedish colleagues all found the name ‘Flint’ highly amusing. We had chosen a very neutral name for our company in English that reflected something about the three of us, which was not obvious to the majority…unless you spoke Swedish.
So there, in a nutshell, is how the name ‘Flint Consulting’ was born.
‘Flint’ Stands for Innovation, Capability, Quality, Personability and Fun
Although the Flint team has experienced exponential growth since Peter, Keith and Alan’s beginnings, Flint has always stayed true to its fun and playful nature. Our customers value our expertise, capability, and global coverage, but also enjoy our relaxed and personable approach, that runs deep within the company. A good sense of humour and knowing when not to take ourselves too seriously ensure that our interactions with co-workers, customers, suppliers, and partners are a pleasure. In this sometimes ‘robotic’ industry, and in a time where human interactions have been limited, some light-hearted fun brightens all our days.
It is important to note if you are considering working for Flint, that we are a lot more open these days to different hairstyles, so you really don’t have to be bald to work here anymore.
Want to convince yourself of our easy-going way and capabilities? Work on a project with us!
For more information, articles and updates follow us on LinkedIn.
