Professionals in the Organizations who are responsible for Job Specialties

Abstract

With the development of the industrial society, the workers to be thought as new professionals who are 'professionals in organizations' appeared in the European and American society. These professional employees in the corporate America are argued for their control and utilization as the management problems in 1950s.

The author defines the professionals in the organizations as "white-collars who have autonomy and specialty for the work and evaluated as core-talent in the organization". The professionals in the organizations are different from the specialists /experts as they are positioned to be core in organizations and are different from middle-class managers who may not have specialties and autonomy to the job in-charge.

In this article, my research with in-depth interview to middle management in automobile industries examines that middle-class managers in Japan's big business are engaged in highly specialized jobs and can be regarded as the professionals in organizations. Based on the result, the middle-class managers in Japan's big business can satisfy the requirements for the professionals in organizations such as autonomy, specialties, and core-position. They are considered to be professionals rather than managers with their real role and recognition.

Among the requirements for the professionals, specialties for job are important to study existence of professionals in organizations and new concept of specialties. In the interview, I found the following indications that are effective to consider job specialties and professionals in organizations.

They are that widening job fields can be included to pursue specialties, job-specialties are also required to management and necessary information is not taken from outside professional organizations. The present meaning of specialties is limited to the systematical knowledge outside corporations, which is the reason why activities with outside professional organizations are not common.

The knowledge and techniques, which are regarded as specialties, are part of the specialties of job and limited to articulable knowledge. Most of the specialties of job are in tacit knowledge and they can be added to new specialties if they were changed to be evaluated.

The practical ability to attain corporate goal is also specialties. These specialties for work are the valuable professionalities in organizations, which are never grasped outside. The professionals in organizations also play the role of connecting among the organizations with the broad related knowledge. The inter-organization connecting ability can be important specialties as really necessary knowledge is highly complicated.

The vertical professionals who specialize particular work and the horizontal professionals who connect among the organizations are two types of professionals in organizations. A professional in the Legal department is an example of the former type and professionals in the HRD and Sales departments can be samples of the later type.

Professionals in the organizations are increasingly expected to play the role of taking these new specialties in corporate jobs.