Character counts | Thomas Wright | TEDxUniversityofNevada

Business professor Thomas Wright describes what character is and why it matters. He gives a personal example to demonstrate the 3H - head, heart, hands - approach to character development. Thomas A. Wright is currently the Felix E. Larkin Distinguished Professor in Management at Fordham University. He received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. He enjoys conducting research and consulting on such topics as character-based leadership, optimizing employee performance, developing effective employee recruitment and retention strategies, and finding innovative ways to enhance employee health and well-being. In recognition of his career accomplishments, he has been awarded Fellow status in the Association for Psychological Science, the American Psychological Association and the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. The highlight of his professional career has been publishing a number of articles with his father, Vincent P. Wright .

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx.

[Character, not circumstances,
makes the man - Booker T. Washington]

I love this quote
by Booker T. Washington.

While born into slavery,
never knowing his father,

Booker T. Washington

overcame many dire circumstances

on his way to being the most prominent
and dominant leader

in the African American community,
during his lifetime.

Recognizing that character
is not only important

but it can be developed,

as a university president,

every week on Sunday,

he spent time with his students
at Tuskegee Institute

talking about the benefits of character.

I also am very interested in character

and have been researching it
for a number of years,

trying to get exactly what character is.

We won't have that definitive
solution today,

but what we can talk about
is what I've done with the US Army,

[which is that I] looked at the role
of certain character strengths,

such as honesty and self-regulation,

and how they compare and contrast
with personality traits and values.

The short story is,

character is not personality
and it's not values;

it's something different.

No matter how we slice it and define it,

we have a crisis in character today.

I'm a long-standing academic
of roughly 30 years tenure,

and I've noticed, very sadly, the increase
in student cheating over the years.

In fact, in one study, 88% of students
self-reported that they cheat.

More troubling, when asked
how often do they cheat,

the modal response was 100 times -

or more.

We have an epidemic

that many pious people don't talk about.

But there's many implications,
as we all know.

But this is not about negativity;
it's about redemption.

And there is hope, much hope,

and so today, my talk will involve
an aspect of this hope

in using what I call, and others,
the "3H approach" -

the head, heart and hands -
to character development.

I have a real example
of one of my students

who practiced what I call
"delayed integrity"

and actually turned himself in to me
after he had successfully "cheated."

By that, I mean he had not gotten caught.

All right. So why is this important?

Let me tell you a little bit
about the scenario of delayed integrity.

One spring semester,

I got an urgent email from a student,
said he had to talk to me;

it was very important.

When I prodded him about what
he needed to talk to me about,

he said, "There was a problem"

with the final exam
that he had just taken.

He came in the next day, sat down.

I could tell he was very nervous,
a lot of anxiety.

And then he blurted out,
"I cheated on your final exam."

Sat back.

He proceeded to tell me how he cheated,

and he said, "I'll take any punishment
that you want to give me."

Now I'm standing back.

You know, I'm a gray-haired professor,

so I've taught thousands
of students over the years.

I can tell you that I've never had
this situation, so it got my attention.

Let me give you a little backdrop
about the student.

Like most, he had started college
immediately after high school

but soon dropped out,
got a job, got married.

Well, his marriage didn't work,

but he had a beautiful daughter
and he was most proud of her.

So he realized now,
with his growing family,

that he needed to go back to school

so that he could get his degree
and progress in his career.

"But why did he do this?" is the 65-,
64- even, thousand-dollar question.

Again, this has never
happened to me before.

Well, it wasn't my dry lectures
and the assigned readings that got him.

One of the tenets of this class

involved having students
consider and reflect upon

what their meaning and purpose of life is

and then to write an action plan
of how they're going to address it.

Well, he considered me
a positive role model,

but much more importantly,

he wanted to be a positive
role model for his daughter.

In fact, he broke down into tears

when he said something
that almost got me crying:

"You know, Professor,

I don't want my daughter
to think her dad is a cheat."

Well, that was pretty heavy.

So, how did this situation resolve itself?

Well, he had a C
going into the final exam.

Now, by rights and university statutes,
I could have flunked him.

But that might not have reflected

someone who's a wanna-be
man of character, me.

He had already suffered enough;

he was crying in my office, etc.

So I said, "Let's figure out
another alternative."

So, we decided that he would
retake the final exam

and whatever he got,
that would be his final grade.

However, still
a little suspicious, I said,

"Well, maybe it won't be a written exam
since we had problems with that.

It will be an oral."

So he spent his time, came back in,

and I could tell,
a little ways into the questioning,

that he was very nervous,

and that's understandable
given the trauma this had transpired.

After all, he was a nontraditional student
and he was crying in my office.

But he eventually
did well enough to get a C,

and we both agreed that a C
was an appropriate grade.

But there was more to this.

More in the sense

that it's been deemed worthy enough
to talk to TED talk,

which I'm very happy about.

So we undertook an independent study,

and I generated a number of questions,

and the student went and researched them,

did such a fine job

that our results were published
in a journal of management inquiry

and offered us several insights.

One insight, that I just want
to mention in passing, is very important.

Remember I said
up to 88% of students cheat?

That only leaves 12% that don't.

Out of that 12%, we interviewed
some of the people,

and they felt stigmatized.

Some of their fellow students
would make fun of them,

call them "Goody Two-Shoes,"
and this, that and the other thing.

The simple scenario is -
and I hope all would agree -

that as a society,

we can't have people being stigmatized
for doing the right thing.

That's not where we want to be.

The other one, insight, that I received,

was giving me more insight
into the 3H that I mentioned:

the head, heart and hands.

Let me spend just a minute or so
talking about that.

The head approach is the typical approach

that someone like myself
grew up on as an academic:

lecture format, one-way communication.

In this particular scenario,

we talk about why it's inappropriate
to cheat or wrong to cheat,

and then we quote Plato
or Aristotle or Immanuel Kant.

Well, the rubric that we can use
is "you think as I say."

The student is outside the box,
so to speak, right?

This student told me

this had no effect at all
on his decision to turn himself in.

The heart approach,

which can be looked at
with the saying "you feel as you think,"

gets emotion and feelings involved.

This was a little better,
the student thought,

and it mirrors some of the technology
that is coming out of the social sciences,

but still wasn't enough.

What was most important
was the third, or hand, approach:

"You do as you feel."

This student said this really got to him,

coming up with his purpose
and meaning in life.

For instance, he said, "Hey,

my purpose is not to be considered
by my daughter a cheat."

Well, he almost had me crying on that.

This is an approach considered in tandem
that gets at the whole person,

so we're not just talking
about the intellect,

we're not just talking
about the psychology or the emotions,

we're not just talking about morals,

but we're talking about behaviors.

And he had a behavioral plan
that was very important for him.

He considered me a role model, as I said.

Also, more importantly,

he wanted to be
to his daughter a role model.

So, what can we learn about this today?

I want to give you a take away.

Well, there's lots of different role plays
that I use in my classes and elsewhere.

One of them

is called the three positive things,
good things, in the morning approach.

Simply stated, every morning,

What are three things
that you have to be grateful for?

Well, this morning, for me,

I have good health,

I have a loving wife,
who's in the audience, and family,

and I'm here at TED Talk.

It's a good day, right?

(Applause)

I present to you that others, all of you,
can incorporate the same approach,

can do it - it's easy.

But it's not that easy.

Let me use myself as an example.

While I was preaching
this to my students -

the 3H approach, the gratitude,
three good things -

I wasn't practicing it
for a period of time.

So, I'm a person who's been
physically active his whole life,

but with that physical activity,

I have a number of sports
injuries and surgeries.

So instead of practicing what I preach,

I would wake up,
and I'd turn to my wife and say,

"Oh my back hurts,"

"Oh, my foot hurts,"

"Oh, my knee hurts,"

until finally, gracious woman that she is,
she turned to me and says,

"Why don't you practice
what you preach to your students?

What's wrong with you?"

I says - I acted very innocently -

I said, "Well, what do you mean?"

She said, "Say something positive
when you see me in the morning."

Good advice.

(Applause)

So to my credit, after that little blip,

I have been positive as I go forward.

All right, to wrap it up
with Booker T. Washington

and the quote,

and pardon me, I didn't show you
the head, heart and hands approach.

Booker T. Washington was correct.

He's left a legacy.

So the students that went
to his Sunday morning, Sunday afternoon

character-themed discussions

had children of their own,

and his legacy has remained
for over 100 years.

He has an excellent book on character;

I would suggest that
if you have a mind to it,

that you look into it.

And I would offer
as my fourth thing I am happy, too.

I am glad and I appreciate very much

and I am thankful
for your attention today.

Thanks.

(Applause)