amateur vs professional

i was just reading a blog post by john august where he speaks about an amateur against a professional. he starts out with the generally accepted fact that a professional is one who gets paid for doing a particular kind of job, while an amateur is someone who does the same thing out of love. so, pay-package forms one of the major differences.

but, he later debunks the above notion with some really interesting points. he goes on to say that what happens when the amateur goes professional - does he stop loving what he does?

so, basically the difference between the two is of mindset. sometimes professionals do things amateurishly; e.g. an accountant misses a decimal point in the final figures. sometimes an amateur does things really professionally; e.g. an amateur's photograph making it to the Discovery magazine.

here's a small list of the qualities that can make an amateur look professional and vice versa:

a. presentation - writing a business letter with loads of typos

b. accuracy - a pharmacist doling out the wrong medicine

c. consistency - a fastfood joint stuffing different ingredients each time in a club sandwich

d. accountability - taking the bottomline

e. peer standards - going by the accpeted norms of people doing the same job, e.g. bar association

here's the link which has the entire post finely worded