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
An administration official insisted that Biden and Harris remain committed to both human rights and immigration enforcement, pointing to specific efforts to curb extrajudicial killings and professionalize security forces.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 5, 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
Indiana’s rise has happened as college football’s gone sideways, shedding its phony amateurism for something professionalized and completely amok.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 20, 2026
Among the offices housed in the East Wing is the Office of the First Lady, first professionalized by Eleanor Roosevelt during her husband’s administration.
From Salon ● Oct. 24, 2025
Iberdrola, an electric utility giant, and others stepped up with generous corporate support, a $10-million media-rights package was signed and the country’s women’s league was professionalized.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 22, 2023
Around this time—1834—the word scientist was first coined, beginning an era that gradually professionalized the study of the natural world, and began to divide it into ever more specialized fields.
From "The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science" by Joyce Sidman
Backers, including venture capital investors and the YouTube star MrBeast, are now aiming to cash in by professionalizing the strategy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 15, 2026
The strategy is built on professionalizing law enforcement and implementing the sorts of data-driven and community policing models used in many U.S. cities.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 12, 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
It's not that love is not an important ingredient, but you can't manufacture love, and you should start with professionalizing the work.
From Salon ● Dec. 4, 2022
Irrespective of the professionalizing of philosophy, the ideas philosophers discuss are still those in which Western civilization has been bred.
From Creative Intelligence Essays in the Pragmatic Attitude by Boyd H. Bode
Random Word
Spin the wheel and learn a new word!
Get a wordDefinitions 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.
