what is professionalism?

What does it mean to be professional?

Is it the ability to meet deadlines and dress in the right clothes?

Well, there’s a difference between professionalism  and being professional. Professional means delivering on expectations, whether you’re a concierge or a tattoo artist. Being a professional means getting paid for your work.

Being approachable and accepting of new ideas/ideology as education in any field is not stagnant, but ever evolving.

Being professional is adhering to values expected by your client, maintaining state of the art skills, and constantly challenging yourself. Professionals exceed expectations.

it’s a term way overused sometimes, but for some people it means: Which attributes define one as a professional?

·       Professionalism

·       Honesty and Integrity in all things with time change

·       Positive (attitude) towards the challanges

·       Providing 100% Customer Service

·       Passion for work

·       Persistence

·       Productive

·       Listening to customers (listening not speaking much)

·       Improve skill set of technology in your field (you are in the java development field and also have branched into distributed computing)

·       Delivering what you have agreed to

·       Not being afraid to charge for the level of work you do and knowledge you have

(I think IT people never afraid to tell their manager that they wants promotion.)

Staying at the top of the game in your designated field means a consistent learning curve of which we never top out. But keep educating ourselves with the times and new technology.   
There is a distinct difference between professionalism and being a professional at any one thing.  Different skill set or higher education does not make you a professional, necessarily. 

Exhibiting professional traits (professionalism) includes teaching and giving/sharing proper credit where it is due. 

It is also looking like a professional in dress, speech and attitude.  Outward appearance counts with face-to-face interaction. Don’t allow the fact that you work for yourself (as in: at home) be a deterrent to looking professional when meeting with clients or potential clients. 

There is a great big business world out there in which people strive to seem ‘professional’ in what they do each day.  To fit into the ‘scene’ you have to appear to fit with your outward appearance.