Recently there was a post on our Facebook page asking for comments on “What is a Professional Real Estate Agent”. The post attracted a few likes and no comments and reached far fewer people than other posts.

This is regrettable, since we think that Professionalism is very important. So we decided to feature an article on the subject hoping to stimulate discussion.

There was a time when professionalism was a hot topic, it was a part of the philosophy that said true success had a lot to do with one’s character, one’s integrity, one’s beliefs and one’s values. It features very prevalent in business literature before the 1980s and is characterized by the phrase “My Word is my Bond”.

Sadly, one hardly encounters such parses anymore and advice coming from one of the case studies at the recent Best Practices Seminar, was ‘make sure you have a good legal lease agreement to protect you from…’, hardly ‘my word is my bond’.

It seems that the new unwritten philosophy of business is all about the Personality Ethic and is driven by ‘the bottom line’. It’s more about the number of closes per month and your image of success. While this is very important, it hardly captures the totality of being a Professional Real Estate Agent.

We believe that a Professional Real Estate Agent also encompasses terms such as Compliance to Regulations, Honesty, Customer Satisfaction, Morally Right behaviour, Ethical, Integrity and Contribution to Society. We believe a Professional Real Estate Agent embraces the Character Ethic in preference to the Personality Ethic.

In this age, when the Top 5 Global Banks could recently plead guilty to fraud and the upper echelons of the World Governing Body of Football can be rocked with accusations of fraud and financial impropriety, it may be well worth our time to revisit the concept of Professionalism and the Character Ethic in our career as a Real Estate Agent. Some key points would be to ensure that you seek your client’s best interest no matter how big or small the transaction; be on time for all appointments; work within the laws of the land; respect your client’s information.

Success is not getting one’s way by cheating and manipulating or serving the dictates of greed and advantage. Rather a truly successful person is a Professional who embrace the quality of Integrity and the desire to see justice prevail in the world.