Professionalism is one of those 'buzz-words'. I hear it crop up all over the place; whether it's someone talking about wanting to be a 'professional' in a certain field, a boasting 'professional' qualification on a CV, a commended quality of 'professionalism' in a colleague or a 'professionals only ' notice in the description of some job advertisement. As far back as I can remember, education, particularly at university level, has been promoted as being the key to one day becoming a 'professional' at something. I have been asked on countless occasions if I am a 'professional' musician, or if I just do it for fun. I have also heard people introducing themselves in social situations, describing themselves as a 'professional' artist, teacher or whatever.
But what the hell does PROFESSIONAL mean?! What does it really take to achieve this status? And is it really all that meaningful, in the end?
I guess one could say that a professional in something is someone who, for any specified activity, earns most of their main income and spends most of their time. If your main job, which you spend most of your time doing and for which you earn most of your money, is driving taxis, then you are a professional taxi driver. If it is writing books, you are a professional author. However, already I can feel the arguments rising within. One could say that, surely, to be a professional, a certain level of skill or a qualification must be required, and to some extent I can agree with this. For example, I don't think a professional doctor without a qualification from medical school exists, at least I hope not! And I don't think you could call yourself a professional carpenter if you didn't have those specific skills.
But here is where is gets cloudy. Because where is the exact line? What is the last qualification that one definitely needs in order to be able to call themselves a professional? I'm sure a P.H.D would be the cut off point for some fields, while a standard high school education is enough for others. And what level of skill does one really need? And who decides what level your skills are at anyway?! I could call myself a professional musician - I spend most of my time and get most of my money from playing the violin. But if I need to prove my skills as a violinist in order to achieve that professional status, who decides if they are good enough and what IS good enough? It's funny, because I am sure we can all think of someone in some career field or other (perhaps our own) who calls themselves a professional and yet, in our eyes, severely lacks the qualification and/or skills to be anything close to a professional.
I suppose that there really is no standard for 'professionalism' - each job is totally different and requires something different from each person, so the lines get altogether too blurry to be able to say exactly who and who isn't a professional. Why then do we place so much emphasis and value on being a professional? I feel like it has somehow come about and been passed down through the generations that one has to create their position in society by showing off their worth, and being able to label yourself as a professional automatically places you on a certain rung of the ladder. This is what we are told to aspire to from a young age and this is what I take issue with. There are so many people out there who do a WONDERFUL job at whatever they do even though they aren't considered to be professionals. I have been inspired many times and not just by what they do but by the people they are as well. And conversely, there are also so many hideous and incompetent professionals in the world! And if these are the people that young minds are looking up to, just because of this obscure and indistinct label, and if these are the ones who are supposed to be the goals and role models for anyone starting out on a career path, then I am terribly worried for my generation, the next generations, the future, for all of us.
I am definitely not innocent in this and I would hate this blog post to be taken as some kind of rant; after all I have also been raised in this society system with these values. In the past I have definitely set store by a person's 'professionalism'. But in this new year, I want to try to see past all of that and I would encourage anyone else willing to do so as well. I want to make music. I want to be a kind and caring and sensitive person. I want to meet interesting people and get inspired by the work and ideas of others. Absolutely none of this relies on being a professional at anything! I hope that this is the new set of values that we, all together, can springboard into our future.
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