The Unprofessional

Highly inspired by Subroto Bagchi’s The Professional, I was riding on a wave of optimism of the highest order.  Hope you had noticed the ‘was’.   Suddenly, my perspective went to dumps after some turn of events – which when I investigated for the cause and effect, highlighted an area for serious discussion.

Professionalism is now taking a new connotation – “Shamelessness”.

Recall the Chennai floods, when a senior bureaucrat was stating to the Press in regional language, “Under the Orders of Amma, it had Rained”. What was the need for someone to go down on his self-esteem forgetting all that went into making a person of his stature.  On a different incident, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley – has openly accepted that bureaucrats are constrained by their position and so cannot respond to Political statements, “an unfair attack over disciplined civil servant”. Why should anyone allow the likes of Subramania Swamy to affect the ‘Governance’ through his individual mischievous acts. Raghuram Rajan, is someone who is lauded as a thorough professional and a genius in his area of expertise by all parameters, who was dispensed since he is outspoken – Raghuram Rajan.  Why should any Professional tolerate such evils. Why should one give up all self-esteem and join the sycophancy-parade.

In a kirana store, the traditional balance-scales for weighing provisions would have weights on one side (firm) and free-hanging on the other.  The shop keeper (read owner) will generally take his cuts in so many ways. To cite a few, (a) folding of the wrapper (b) throw in such a way that the scale drops more on the side where the items are weighed (c) placing a magnet.  In case of electronic scales too, he can play with calliberation.  Extremity of getting caught would result in that particular customer not coming back to this  kirana. Yet, customers who take on credit are still bound to come back.

You may now wonder how would we relate this scenario to Professionalism.  The ambitious (or should I say greedy) investor behaves more like this kirana-wala in many ways when dealing with his customers. Proclaims absolute transparency and using objective methods on all decisions and actions.   On the contrary, a decision is reached first, decides on data sources next. Then oscillations on the data begin. After so many iterations, and only when the desired hypothesis is arrived, actions are initiated. After all of these, everyone will be compelled to WOW and celebrate that such actions were objective and transparent.

Like in the bureaucrat’s case, anybody whose eyes are still fixated on the oscillations and iterations and not conclusion, will be considered outspoken and may have to face a hasty exit. Alternatively, one can survive by closing eyes on everything but the conclusion and nodding on everything like in the case of the Chennai bureaucrat.  Just to remind you, we are by no means discussing the kirana-wala, not really, but discussing the Professionalism prophecised and practiced by the many of our role-model Professionals.

I may be biased or blinded by behaviour in a particular segment, but so far all tilt the scale more towards The Unprofessional than The Professional ones. I wish and pray that my perception is not the truest and someone yell back in disagreement.