professionalize
Americanverb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of professionalize
First recorded in 1855–60; professional + -ize
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
British-born businessmen Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne said they each gave £36 million, equivalent to $48.7 million, to Reform UK to help professionalize the upstart party ahead of the next general election expected by 2029.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 12, 2026
Harfuch "sought to professionalize, to modernize the intelligence agency to go after crimes," said Gerardo Rodriguez, an academic expert in national security who met Harfuch in 2018.
From Barron's ● May 10, 2026
One of the efforts to professionalize the process is ICEList, a web database created by Dominick Skinner, an Irish activist based in the Netherlands.
From Slate ● Jan. 28, 2026
There’s also a movement to professionalize the field of animal-assisted therapy and ensure the animals involved are treated in a safe and ethical manner.
From Seattle Times ● May 4, 2024
Shawn wanted to professionalize the operation, to invest the profits from the Malad job in new equipment; Dad wanted things to stay the same.
From "Educated" by Tara Westover
As U.S. foreign policy became more professionalized, some historians have argued, the role of overseeing and executing it became a better fit for capable administrators than aspiring presidents.
From Slate ● Apr. 6, 2026
Zahn wanted to convey the pressure college coaches face in the increasingly professionalized world of college football.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2025
“These are highly professionalized individuals with a lot of experience in bargaining and conflict negotiation.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 21, 2025
So by the time they launched their foundation in 1966 — and even more by the time they professionalized it in 1977 — they were pretty experienced philanthropists.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 18, 2023
Could I run some sort of after-school program, a professionalized version of what I’d done for Czerny at Princeton?
From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama
Delo said the funding would allow Reform to spend £1 million a month professionalizing the party ahead of the 2029 election.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 12, 2026
Their job satisfaction worries me, even as I’m encouraged by how steadily the field is professionalizing.
From Salon ● Jan. 5, 2026
But experts question whether her strategies — expanding community policing and professionalizing cops — would transfer to a national level.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 30, 2024
In the seventeenth century, as its enemies grew stronger, the empire became more inward-looking, focusing less on external expansion and more on resolving domestic affairs, professionalizing its bureaucracy, and conducting internal reforms.
From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022
In 1996, the government focused its attention to implementing an ambitious economic reform program and professionalizing its parliament.
From The 1998 CIA World Factbook by United States. Central Intelligence Agency
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
