How
Do You Define a Professional?
By Walter
Hanig, President
Fellow
members,
By the time
you read this, I’ll have completed midyear performance reviews. (No,
we’re not on some strange Scandinavian calendar. Getting product
introduced successfully has taken precedence over personnel-management
matters.) One term I sometimes use in reviews is professional.
I’d like to spend this space explaining my idea of a professional.
My dad once explained that a professional was simply a label applied to someone who got paid for doing or producing something. Well, that’s certainly true, but I think of a professional as someone who brings certain attitudes and abilities to a situation, job or otherwise.
What are
these attitudes and abilities? In no particular order, here are some traits
that characterize professionals in my book.
- Pride
in their work and their profession, independent of the organization’s
respect for technical communications. Your product is unlikely to
have your name on it, but you know whether you’ve done the best
you can under the circumstances.
- Awareness
and acceptance of the constraints that may limit the quality of work.
A professional understands other departments’ policies and respects
those charged with following them, even when she or he disagrees. You
understand the goals of your immediate and broader organizations and
align with them. A great manual two months after product release does
not help generate revenue.
- Desire
to develop professionalism in others. The most valuable members
in an organization seek not to just improve their knowledge of products
and tools and procedures; they also look for ways to share their knowledge
and experience with others.
- Respect
for the other members of the immediate and broader teams. Professionals
assume that that everyone involved with the product development is essential,
from the system architect to the hardware lab tech to the IT whiz who
brings your system back to life.
- Independence.
A professional makes every decision as if she/he owned the company.
You’re willing to act now and deal with the consequences later.
In dynamic organizations (sometimes perceived as chaotic), doing nothing
in the face of challenges is at least as harmful as doing the wrong
thing.
- Initiative. Professionals deliver new ideas for more effective technical communications products or solutions to ineffective processes or contentious personnel situations without waiting to be asked.
I’m sure that each one of you can think of a current or past colleague who earned your respect as a true professional. Ask yourself what her or his valuable traits were. I invite your observations on the characteristics that define a professional technical communicator.
