The Darker Side Of Being A Professional
Is there one? Well, that depends of course on where you work and who you work for.
Sometimes, what you and I might define as professionalism is far from being appreciated. If the organizational subtext does not promote professionalism, you might find yourself being tagged as a trouble maker just for trying to do things right.
J. Timothy King captured this notion very clearly in his article Be a Toxic Employee. And as the first comment on that article says:
“It has been recognized for some time that employee attitudes are key indicators of management failure.”
So what do you do when you feel you are experiencing the darker side of being a professional?
If you are trying to do the right thing, act as a professional and do a great job, but you are feeling that the cultural environment in your workplace prevents you from doing so… keep trying and be loyal to yourself.
Believe in yourself, in your skills and in your professional integrity. In time, many people will follow you. If they won’t, it’s their loss.
Good luck!
April 28th, 2006 at 2:16 pm
[…] Lidor Wyssocky talks about the dark side of professionalism. I was going to just leave a quick comment. But this subject brings so many thoughts, I could blog for a week just on these alone. Even narrowing the subject down to the most important point, it deserves a full blog post. So here it is. […]