3. RHETORIC:
I
am sure that most of us have come across professional values for a successful
career, namely loyalty, compassion, patience, empathy, adaptability,
responsibility, accountability, flexibility, work ethic, integrity,
reliability, honesty, positivity, confidence, and self-motivation; they refer
to desired characteristics in a business world. The first group of values are
attitudes towards ‘others’ namely, company, fellow workers and team members,
clients, etc. Loyalty to company, compassion towards colleagues, patients to
understand others’ perspective, empathy to understand others’ point of view,
and adaptability to respond to diverse requests. The second group of values are
core personal values, namely, responsibility to complete tasks, accountability
to take responsibility for your actions and conduct, flexibility to remain
open-minded, work ethic to work hard, integrity to be dependable and honest,
reliability always follow through on your commitments, honesty by demonstrating
trustworthiness, positivity by being open-minded, confidence through
professional development, and self-motivation by being passionate about your
work. While most educators will tell you that these values ensure our livelihood,
the ILO–Eurofound study indicates
that the global status of work is shocking, “Earnings from work are not
sufficient for all workers to escape poverty, leaving part of the employed
population in the working poor category.”[1] Although the report
highlights gender and occupation-based discrepancies the findings are harsh. Why
after hundred (100) years of attitude development and skill education are workers still
struggling to make ends meet?
My
impression when I first reflected on professional values was one of surprise. I
intended to study architecture design, expect to develop my knowledge of
architecture design theories and uncover what international esteemed architects
knew. I was expecting to travel back home with knowledge that would thrust me
to prominence! Going through professional values, I did not understand the
common-sense everyday list of ethical concepts, working hard, reliability, accountability,
responsibility, patience, flexibility, honesty, confidence, and motivation. Did
I need to travel across oceans to learn a set of practical values? I was more
interested in expert knowledge.
[1] Eurofound and International Labour
Organization. Working Conditions in a Global Perspective, Publications Office
of the European Union, Luxembourg, and International Labour Organization,
Geneva., 2019, p.49.