Sure, here’s the cleaned-up version with spelling and grammar corrected:
CHUCKS (Charlatan/Huckster)
The standard for professional help in the world of dispute resolution is somewhat ambiguous. I am someone who focuses on minimum standards before I make a selection for help from a professional service (or perceived professional service since the word origin for profession is from professus, to be publicly recognized—only accountants, engineers, lawyers, and doctors). I steal from the words of Robert Genn, a practical artist blogger who distinguishes between the good stuff and the shit basically: “Be a perennial student. Know what ‘brilliant’ looks like. Be a discriminating connoisseur. Be both passionate and particular. Destroy your substandard work.”
That’s right: “know what brilliant looks like.” As a student and lifelong learner, there is no point for me to be mentored by anything less than the brilliant—why emulate shit? As a neophyte, however, it is a bit of a learning curve to discover who’s the wheat and who’s the chaff, boys/men, etc. Do your research, get to know your industry, do not be fooled by the crafty LinkedIn bamboozlement or the 10k Twitter followers.
Consultants and hucksters are selling themselves based on very thin amounts of information, and by which they are then experts that can serve a particular field or industry. The trouble with that modern information highway is that any fool can decide that they are going to have a specialized offering based on their shoe size and a recent dreamscape, and presto, they are an expert and someone, somewhere is going to want that shit. If you have not read Chris Anderson’s (editor of Wired magazine) The Long Tail, either read it or at least read the Wikipedia page.
It is quite remarkable how many “experts” claim they have skills and expertise that they don’t REALLY have. In particular, coaches (no disrespect intended to you, Sam), consultants and facilitators, vision or dream architects, and just insert whatever kitschy little play on words that infers that you might be immortal or superior on some level. Truth is, it’s just the kitschy little name that sets many of these charlatans apart from the next door LinkedIn neighbor.
These quacks are selling themselves through all kinds of great marketing approaches, and the reality is that they are actually selling themselves on a very thin baseline of credentials. Some have ZERO credentials, particularly in DR (see Erica Pinsky below). For those of us with credentials and that are the “genuine article,” we can take note of some of the sales tactics of these lesser qualified or differently abled parties that are making a living (I am assuming) or posturing as though they are making a living. If one thing is to their credit, it is the ability to sell themselves, in particular as knowledge workers with something of value to share in exchange for dollars.