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"Professionalism" and Ethos

Regardless of the complications associated with it, ethos is very important in the
business world because, in a sense, "professionalism" is nothing but ethos. Every day

that you actively affect a "professional" demeanor and appearance, you are, in a

sense, delivering artistic information through ethos—you are projecting an image to
which people respond and appreciate. In general, there's nothing wrong with this. If

people are going to take you seriously, then it is important that they perceive you as

an ethical and competent fellow professional.

How people initially perceive you and how their perception of you develops greatly

influences your ability to persuade them, if not their willingness to listen to you at all.
Learning to capitalize on your authority and moral character is important in all kinds

of professional exchanges. We will discuss how ethos and professional etiquette,

appearance and attire affect your ability to communication in greater detail in Lesson
3.

Pathos: Engaging Emotion to Persuade

Pathos refers to engaging emotions to persuade. It involves appealing to an audience
by pushing their "emotional buttons." Pathos could aim to make people feel angry,

sad or happy. Communicators will often use different emotions depending upon the
audience and what they ultimate want the audience to believe. Consider the

following three examples.

Example #1: International children sponsorship programs utilize pathos in their

television commercials to persuade you to sponsor needy children. They contrast the

close-up images of children's faces and eyes with depictions of the children's
deplorable situations, often including shots of their bare feet and empty bowls. In

essence, they are "pulling at your heart strings" with moving and saddening images

in an attempt to get you to act in a particular way; in this case, they want you to
sponsor needy children.

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