title: Forming and developing your professional identity: easy as PI.
abstract: Health education and promotion specialists and professional organizations have worked hard to successfully establish and maintain the status of health education/promotion (HE/P) as a unique and essential profession and to solidify practitioners' sense of professional identity. A professional identity is critical to a person's sense of self: It is about connecting with roles, responsibilities, values, and ethical standards unique to a specific profession. Professional identity is a complex issue in the HE/P profession; the distinction between personal and professional identities has been debated repeatedly over the years (e.g., should HE/P professionals be role models for clients?). The purpose of this Tool is to explain the concept of professional identity; provide new, emerging, and experienced HE/P with a greater understanding of what it means to have a professional identity; present processes and benchmarks of professional identity development; and offer specific tips and strategies for developing and enhancing an HE/P professional identity.
authors.affiliation: University of Houston-Downtown, Houston, TX, USA Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, USA Michael E. DeBakey VAMC, Houston, TX, USA goltzh@uhd.edu.
authors.forename: Heather Honoré
authors.initials: HH
authors.lastname: Goltz
authors.affiliation: The University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA Texas A&M Health Science Center, College Station, TX, USA.
authors.forename: Matthew Lee
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Smith
mesh_terms: D006266:Health Education / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D011361:Professional Competence / Q000592:standards*; D012933:Social Identification; D000078329:Workforce
keywords: career development/professional preparation; health education; health promotion; workforce development