"Professional Ethics" by Dr. Shanmukha

An important lecture on “Professional ethics” was organised by MULISSA on March 14, 2008. The speaker was Dr. Shanmukha from Department of Education, Karnataka State Open University (KSOU), Mysore. Drawing from his wide experience in the field of education, Dr. Shanmukha said that there is a subtle difference between a job and a profession. He opined that a profession is skill oriented and requires more knowledge and commitment. Though both job and profession could earn livelihood for people, a profession is more service oriented and calls for intellectual calibre. Referring the courses in library and information sciences as a professional course, the speaker said such kind of courses emphasise on acquiring of skills required to carry out the professional responsibilities. He drew parallels from Medicine, Engineering, Education and Law to push his argument why Library and Information Science is also treated as a professional subject. He provided a number of examples from his personal life to show that how service is the motto of libraries. A person who works for a profession should abide by some of the “written” and “unwritten” code of ethics. He said the accepted behaviour with service orientations is the basis for all code of ethics. Code of ethics is self imposed, self regulated, self growing behaviour. He said professional ethics protects a profession in a long run.

Report prepared by B. Tejaswini