On Professionalism

I was requested by a business partner and a friend to include in my blog the importance of professionalism. I was astonished with such request by the mere fact that all the partners are professionals – degree holders. For sure anybody would attest that when you are a professional, you carry with you the professionalism that your job dictates. But what about if he does not fulfill his obligations nor his responsibilities, can he be qualified to be considered as professional? The answer would be a big NO, for he is a professional only in words but not in deeds, for he does not carry with him the professionalism that carries with it. To justify such answer, hereunder are some concrete explanations and justifications:

A lot of questions come to mind when we talk about professionalism. But before we can delve on the topic, we need to know the meaning of what is profession and who is a professional. American College Dictionary (ACD) defines profession as "a vocation requiring knowledge of some department of learning or science" i.e., medicine, law, nursing, accounting, engineering, etc., whereas a professional is one who follows "an occupation as a means of livelihood or gain," or one who is "engaged in one of the learned professions."

Robin Downie (1990), a Professor of Moral Philosophy who has written extensively on the subject has developed six characteristics of professionals summarized as follows:

1. The professional has skills or expertise proceeding from a broad knowledge base.
2. The professional provides a service based on a special relationship with those whom he or she serves. This relationship involves a special attitude of beneficence tempered with integrity. This includes fairness, honesty and a bond based on legal and ethical rights and duties authorized by the professional institution and legalized by public esteem.
3. To the extent that the public recognizes the authority of the professional, he or she has the social function of speaking out on broad matters of public policy and justice, going beyond duties to specific clients.
4. In order to discharge these functions, professionals must be independent of the influence of the State or commerce.
5. The professional should be educated rather than trained. This means having a wide cognitive perspective, seeing the place of his or her skills within that perspective and continuing to develop this knowledge and skills within a frame work of values.
6. A professional should have legitimized authority. If a profession is to have credibility in the eyes of the general public, it must be widely recognized as independent, disciplined by its professional association, actively expanding its knowledge base and concerned with the education of its members. If it is widely recognized as satisfying these conditions, then it will possess moral as well as legal legitimacy, and its pronouncements will be listened to with respect.

Downie, R.S. Professions and Professionalism. Journal of Philosophy of Education. 24.2. (1990)

From the above definitions of profession and professional, what then is professionalism? ACD characterizes professionalism as being exhibited by one of the "professional character, spirit or methods" or the "standing, practice, or methods of a professional as distinguished from an amateur."

To identify succinctly who are the professionals distinguished from an amateur, we need to differentiate or compare one from the other:

A Professional	An Amateur
Learns every aspect of the job.	Skips the learning process whenever possible.
Carefully discovers what is needed and wanted.	Assumes what others need and want.
Looks, speaks and dresses like a professional.	Sloppy in appearance and speech
Keeps his or her work area clean and orderly.	Has a messy, confused or dirty work area.
Focused and clear-headed.	Confused and distracted.
Does not let mistakes slide by.	Ignores or hides mistakes.
Jumps into difficult assignments.	Tries to get out of difficult work.
Completes projects as soon as possible.	Surrounded by unfinished work piled on top of unfinished work.
Remains level-headed and optimistic.	Gets upset and assumes the worst
Handles money and accounts very carefully.	Sloppy with money or accounts.
Faces up to other people’s upsets and problems.	Avoids others’ problems
Uses higher emotional tones: Enthusiasm, cheerfulness, interest, contentment.	Uses lower emotional tones: anger, hostility, resentment, fear, victim.
Persists until the objective is achieved.	Gives up at the first opportunity.
Produces more than expected	Produces just enough to get by.
Produces a high-quality product or service.	Produces a medium-to-low quality product or service.
Earns high pay.	Earns low pay and feels it’s unfair.
Has a promising future.	Has an uncertain future.

The first step to making yourself a professional is to decide that you ARE a professional. Ask yourself, are you a professional?

On the other side of the coin, professionalism can be associated also when one is looking for a job through one’s common courtesy, professional appearance and speech habits.

In today's world, if you use common courtesy when dealing with prospective employers, you'll more than likely give yourself an edge over the many other candidates who fail to do so.  I realize this seemingly obvious concept is somewhat hard to believe, but it's true.  So as you deal with prospective employers, do the right thing and make yourself stand out from the crowd by demonstrating your class by thanking employers for their interest, being respectful to everyone you meet, in respect to people’s time, and being flexible. Most employers know that the people who succeed in business are the ones who are flexible and can deal with the daily curve balls life tends to throw.

Often job seekers are unsure about what appropriate professional appearance is, yet many of our employers listed it as an important factor in getting hired.  In an interview situation, you're marketing yourself as a product, and so you want and need to have the best image possible.  Keep in mind that projecting a professional appearance doesn't just mean on the interview.  You never know when you could be offered a job on the spot. So present yourself in a professional manner during your entire job search and even after you get hired.

You may look good on paper or in your suit, but if you're looking to nail your big interview, looks aren't everything.  How you sound is often more important.  But many job seekers let careless speech habits sink their chances of landing that great job.  The bottom line, you don't have to study elocution to speak well.  Simply slow down, take time to pronounce all the syllables and leave slang at home.  Companies want job candidates who are well spoken and articulate, and recruiters won't represent a job candidate if they don't match the client's profile.

As I look at it, before and after having a job, professionalism should be acquired by anyone whether he is a professional or non-professional. For the professionals, there lies heavier responsibilities for they need to act in accordance with what they have learned and achieved or else without doubt they will be questioned for they have pledge with dignity to abide with the existing ethics, methods, and procedures of their selected professions.

So believe passionately in what you do, and never knowingly compromise your standards and values. Act like a true professionals, aiming for true excellence, and true success will follow.