An Examination Of Citizens’ Awareness And Perception Of The Estate Management Profession In Anambra State

2.3.3 RELEVANCE OF AWARENESS OF ESTATE MANAGEMENT PROFESSION ON THE ECONOMY

1.          TRUST

For the layperson even for experts, gauging the potential quality of the service offered by a professional can be extremely hard without the benefit of previous experience. The damage of choosing the wrong professional for a job would be immense. Professional bodies set standards, technical and ethical that must be achieved and they ensure that they are maintained and enhanced through the professional’s career. This supports the public’s trust.

11.         SOCIAL MOBILITY

The world may be becoming more equal, but societies are becoming less equal. The former is to be applauded; the latter is of increasing concern. Inequality is increasingly cited across the political spectrum as morally unacceptable, a threat to social cohesion and an economic milestone. The reasons are complex, but social mobility is one obvious issue that needs to be addressed if we are to correct growing inequality.

Importantly, when we examine how government seeks to measure social mobility, two  measures standout: access to professions and second chances.

Why is access to professions an important indicator? “There is evidence that a large number of the professions remain dominated by a small section of society and that in recent decades many professions have become less socially representative”. Therefore the presence of numerous professions including Estate Management profession play an important role in allowing people to progress in the labour market.

111.         POLICY FORMATION

Forming good policy is tough. Ideal policy manages to sensitively balance competing interests in the pursuit of the greatest good and it is seen and respected for doing so.

Increased awareness of the Estate Management profession will inevitably lead to the challenge of control and regulation of members of which in the long run would lead to the enactment of various policies. It is here that professional bodies can play a useful role as their membership represents the narrow commercial interests of an individual or a business and obligation of public interest.

2.4 THEORY OF PERCEPTION

What is Perception? Perception, according to Yolanda Williams, a psychology professor; can be defined as our way to recognize and interpret information we’ve gathered through our senses. Thos also includes how we respond to a certain situation with the given information.

Perception allows us to view things in the world. An example of perception of things we look at and how it can differ depending upon the person would be ‘The dress’. The dress that became an internet phenomenon overnight, because people couldn’t agree on what color it was. Some people swore that they saw a white dress with gold lace, while others saw a blue dress with black lace. Scientists studied the dress and came to the conclusion that the different perception in color is due to the expectation that the dress will appear the same under different lighting, explaining color constancy. People, who saw the dress as white and gold, probably saw that the dress was lit by sunshine, causing their brains to ignore the shorter, bluer wavelengths. The people that saw the dress as blue and black saw it lit by a false lighting; causing their brains to ignore longer, redder wavelengths.

Perception is often influenced or even biased by our expectations, experiences, moods, and sometimes cultural norms. This is where the mind comes in, not just the brain. We are even able to fool ourselves due to our expectations. Our eyes play a role in perceiving information to our brain, but really, our mind has the most power. Our perceptual set is the psychological factors that determine how we perceive the environment. As such our mind decides to retain information from the sensations we experience and evaluate them to different personal views.

In a situation where the information the mind retains is flawed, this compounds to what may be termed “wrong perception”, and that is what this study aims to correct as regards Estate Management profession.

2.4.1 PUBLIC PERCEPTION OF VALUERS

A distinguishing feature of a profession is its acceptance of its responsibility to the public. The clients of Estate Surveyors and Valuers consist of the three arms of government, private investors, the business and financial community, and others who rely on the objectivity and integrity of members to maintain the orderly functioning of the real estate business. The public interest is defined as the collective well-being of the community of people and institutions that the members serve. With respect to estate surveyors and valuers in Nigeria, the public often refers to them as either „estate agents‟ or „property valuers‟. Because of the level of ignorance among majority of Nigerians on the functions of the real estate practitioners, various questions have led to debates among estate surveyors and valuers. Such questions include: 

1. 1. Do readers and beneficiaries of our services really understand and appreciate what we do? 
   2. Are valuations generally “well regarded”?
   3.  Are members of the estate surveying profession adequately rewarded for their skill and the risk likely?
   4. With constraints of competition in an environment where consumers cannot evaluate or compare quality, are valuation reports a waste of money?
   5. Are most clients only concerned about the “bottom line” in terms of the benefit of the valuation figure to them or the cost of getting it?
   6. Is competition forcing efficiency, or does it lead to “cutting corners” among members?