professionals

Professionalization is the psychological analogue of industrialization. If industrialization is the process by which a widget is standardized into a fungible unit of consumption, professionalization is the process by which a trade or craft is standardized into a fungible unit of production.

Consider the development of standard screw threads. For centuries, craftsmen inherited their trade from their father or a mentor in the form of an apprenticeship. As the industrial revolution unfolded, turning screws became an increasingly valuable skill an aspiring metalworker had to master. The value of the craftsman's skill was directly proportional to the number of machines he was able to service. In time, a market emerges for standardized screw threads as more and more craftsmen recognize that if they adhere to the standard, their screws can be installed in a greater range of ever-expanding machines, eventually eliminating the stubborn laggards who continued producing their outmoded legacy screws from the market.

Your value as a craftsman is now determined more by the quality of the screws you produced than by your proximity to the demand for screws. How do you maintain your market share in a flood of cheap, imported screw competition? One option is to form a screw producers' guild which can vouch for the quality of the screws produced exclusively by guild members. To obtain a guild membership, craftsmen must demonstrate competency in producing products of a homogeneous standard. Shortly thereafter, the guild begins an apprenticeship program through which young, aspiring craftsmen may learn the trade. In time, entering the screw industry is almost impossible without obtaining guild accreditation; the guild has successfully convinced the screw-consuming public through a series of clever public relations campaigns that only guild screws are worth purchasing.

Who benefits more from professionalization, the public or the guild?