How Professionalism is impacting your job search!

We need to understand what professionalism means. It is as simple as one-two-three.

Professionalism

As a consumer yourself, wouldn’t you lose confidence:

• If the office of your financial advisor was piled with dog-eared, personal stuff?
• If an attorney had slurred speech or a flat voice?
• If a restaurant waiter appeared poorly groomed?

These are all breeches in personal professionalism and the individual will instantly lose credibility because the behavior is incongruent with their professional pretension.

And as an employer: If someone showed up for a job interview gnawing on some chewing gum, or showing no knowledge of your company, and speaking like a teen-ager.

Being professional means that you have paid attention to developing your:

1. Expertise

What you get money for. The stuff you know when you know your stuff. An expert is someone widely recognized as a reliable source of technique or skill. In addition, your personal behavior and character must support your claim to expertise.

2. Credibility

Communication Skills play a more detailed role in determining your credibility. It doesn’t matter if you have the expertise and character for your occupation if you are unable to communicate this to other people. How do you communicate your expertise? Understanding that what you say, how you say it and how you look when you say it – must all carry the same message. The professional considers all aspects of their communication connection to others for ways to improve:

(a) The Content: What you say includes your grammar and general language facility. The appropriateness of your comments and the language of courtesy is received and evaluated beyond your intent.

(b) The Tonalities: How you say something makes all the difference in the meaning received. A flat intonation of an otherwise straightforward statement can suck all the life and energy out, leaving a dreary flow of lifeless words.

(c) How you Look when you talk is the third and vital part of your speaking. It is a category that is actually quite wide and varied, from the care you took in combing your hair, to the wild flow of expressions on your face to the quality of the fabric of your suit. People are constantly looking you over for meaning and finding it.

It is of utmost important that these three components of communication support your professionalism, that they are congruent. Congruency determines if you are perceived as authentic which gives you credibility.

One issue is central: congruency
Two areas must be congruent: your professionalism and your communication impact.

Three aspects of communication must carry the same message. See above.

To learn how Dr. Fleming can help you to “Speak your Best” and improve your professionalism for job interviews, contact her at telephone number (415) 391.9179 or email [email protected]