When I first ran across the term “Gracious Professionalism” in FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), it seemed a strange expression. Recently, I found Dr. Woodie Flowers, FIRST National Advisor indicating “Obviously it would not make sense to endorse ‘asinine professionalism’ or ‘gracious incompetence’…” In November 2007, Greensboro experienced the NC FIRST Lego League (FLL) competition at the Coliseum which promotes “Gracious Professionalism” in 9-14 age children. It promotes gracious attitudes and behaviors that are win-win. They learn and compete like crazy, but treat one another with respect and kindness in the process. FIRST stresses, “in the long run, gracious professionalism is part of pursuing a meaningful life.”
As I have thought about this it ties in nicely with “Quality comes from Ownership with Integrity and appropriate Resources in a healthy Paradigm”, a view which I feel is the essence of quality. Even if we have ownership with integrity and appropriate resources, we will fall short in quality if we are operating in an unhealthy paradigm. The Gracious Professionalism addresses the issue of promoting a healthy paradigm. Civility also plays an important part in promoting a healthy paradigm. We all have a responsibility for striving for a healthy paradigm.
If we had more dashes of “Civility, Gracious Professionalism and Quality” described above, maybe we wouldn’t be experiencing many of the problems we have in our community and world. Just a thought!
Post Script:
In the September 19, 2009 Greensboro News & Record, the article "Tone down the rudeness, Americans urged" caught my eye. Reading it made me think of this blog written over a year ago. I liked what I saw especially "Civility is about protecting all of us.... You don't have to be wrong to be right." This fits into what I discussed above regarding promoting a healthy paradigm. The Civility Project is a step toward this end. You can sign a pledge if that fits your desires.
Post Script:
While reading Sarah Osborne's article in December 2010 SELifeStyle, I discovered another website OperationRespect.org. Their Mission "To assure each child and youth a respectful, safe and compassionate climate of learning where their academic, social and emotional development can take place free of bullying, ridicule and violence." I add it to this since it promotes a Healthy Paradigm.
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September 23, 2017
Civility March Washington DC
I watched on CSPAN this event ... it is encouraging to see there are some trying to start a movement ... it is discourageing to see the limited number there ...
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I'm not sure most adults can abide by this standard. In order to convince the children that gracious professionalism pays off we need to convince ourselves. Let's approach the issue. One need to be prepared to help somebody else while expecting no foreseeable gain, doing it in a sufficiently pleasant way so he/she doesn't appear patronizing and also taking into account that his/her help could propel the helped knowledge above the helper's. This behavior cannot be enforced so its learning should be based on feedback. The only solution I see is that every nice such behavior should be immediately acknowledged and praised by an adult because, evolutionary, this behavior is sustainable only in controlled environments.
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