Dr Edward Brooks, is the Executive Director of the Oxford Character Project, an interdisciplinary initiative with a team of scholars dedicated to exploring character and leadership in higher education, commercial organisations and international development. Putting character first, they want to see their work help build a more compassionate, just and prosperous world.

This interview first appeared in Issue 04 of The Beautiful Truth. Get your copy here.

HF: Universities are known for nurturing students’ minds and career prospects, not usually their inner worlds. Tell us how one of the most prestigious academic institutions in the world came to care about character.

EB: The Oxford Character Project began in 2014 as a response to widespread questions arising during the aftermath of the financial crisis. There were a series of leadership scandals not only in finance but more widely in business, politics, media, military and police. There was widespread discussion of a leadership crisis and a growing consensus that practices and patterns of leadership needed to be reconsidered.

Within academia, particularly here at Oxford, discussions focused on the role of higher education in developing thinkers and leaders for the future. Universities educate thinkers and leaders who go on to hold positions of responsibility across society. The pivotal question was whether we were nurturing wise thinkers and good leaders. That question, posed by a senior faculty member, ignited the conversations that ultimately led to the Oxford Character Project, supported by a generous grant from the Templeton World Charity Foundation.

HF: What a wonderful response to a terrible time: action rather than apathy. Not everyone is interested in character or even knows what it is. Tell us about your personal journey into the study of character and your interest in it.

EB: I studied history as my first degree and became interested in questions of character and leadership through exploring leaders of the past and trying to apply what I was learning on the sports field. In my twenties I spent some time working with youth in South Africa and developed a particular interest in hope and resilience which led me back to Oxford for a PhD.

The focus of my academic work at that time was on developing an understanding of hope as an active habit (or virtue) of character. I explored the history of hope and made a case for hope as a virtue – an excellence of character that can be cultivated through repeated practice.

I am still really interested in hope, particularly in the importance of hope in difficult times to sustain flourishing individuals, communities and institutions. Over the last five years I have been working with colleagues at Harvard University to understand and effectively measure hope and optimism, which is an essential precursor to policy interventions. We have collected data from university students and in partnership with a large engineering firm and have just started to release our work. What Works Wellbeing recently published an article, ‘Hope and Optimism: Distinctions and Deepening Conceptions’, if you are interested to learn more.

HF: Character is a broad term that many would say is relative to your personal morality and values. How do you define character?

EB: The idea of character is often referenced in relation to professional life and leadership, but it isn’t always clear what is meant. For example, the Financial Conduct Authority says that “it expects high standards of character… from those who operate in the financial services industry and will take action to ensure those standards are maintained.” Harvard Business School prominently advertises on its website its mission to “educate leaders who make a difference in the world” and goes on to state that “when we talk about leaders, we mean people who embody a certain type of competence and character.”

So is character about following the rules, or about being a certain type of person – someone who ‘fits the mould’? For some, the idea of character is instantly attractive; for others, it seems individualistic, illiberal and outdated. What precisely do we mean by character?

When we talk about character at the Oxford Character Project, we are talking about the personal dimension of life and leadership. A person’s character is the constellation of dispositions or habits that consistently shape how they think, feel and act. Character qualities can be positive (virtues such as justice, humility, hope and courage) or negative (vices such as greed, impatience and envy) but, really importantly, character is not set in stone. A person’s character is consistent across situations – one of our students described character as a person’s “heart print” – but it is always being developed.

Character is shaped by patterns of life, the people around us, the stories we tell, the spaces we inhabit, the highs and lows of our experience. Character always relates to culture, which can perhaps be thought of as the collective character of a group or organisation.

As Alison Cottrell, Former CEO of the Financial Services Culture Board and member of our industry advisory board put it: “The cultures we spend time in shape our character and our characters may in turn shape the culture, in particular if we sit at the top of the hierarchy.”

To focus on character in organisations is not about fixing individuals. It is about helping people to grow in a self-guided way, strengthening powers of perception, deliberation, motivation and action. It is about helping people to be the best versions of themselves and about (re)designing organisations so that they support rather than obstruct or undermine human values and purpose coming into their own.

The underlying hypothesis of our work at the Oxford Character Project is that leaders with character qualities such as solidarity, creativity, courage, humility and hope are crucial for organisations and society to navigate present challenges and flourish into the future.

HF: Interestingly, even with a seemingly agreeable list of virtues, there can be differing perspectives. Consider generosity. There are different opinions on the ‘right’ way to be generous, with religions and movements like effective altruism all taking a different approach.

EB: Yes, different ethical systems focus on different aspects of what it means to live a good life and develop their insights in different directions. Some follow a law-based approach, known as deontology, focusing on rules and regulations. Others focus on the consequences of actions, calculating and weighing up the potential effects. The effective altruism movement is in this second category. A third perspective doesn’t so much focus on actions but people as moral agents. This character-based approach is known as virtue ethics and its provenance stretches back to the ancient world.

“To focus on character is to come back to the core concept of human being and becoming.”

These approaches do not have to be opposed to each other but can each provide a perspective on questions such as how to build a more generous and just society.

Our work here at the University of Oxford reflects a reorientation towards a virtue-based understanding of ethics, which seems particularly important in our contemporary technological context. Rules and regulations are surely important but constantly changing contexts and competing interpretations mean they are rarely sufficient to guide or build culture. Evaluating the consequences of actions is undoubtedly wise but consequentialist approaches struggle to take account of motivation, custom and context. To focus on character is to come back to the core concept of human being and becoming.

How is character developed in universities and organisations? What might it mean for individuals and institutions to intentionally focus on the cultivation of virtues? How does character contribute to ethical and effective leadership across contexts? These questions have been the focus of our work.

HF: Those are fantastic questions. Many people believe that by adulthood individuals are fairly set in their ways. But your project suggests that there’s still room for growth and change. Can you elaborate on that?

EB: An emphasis on character development during childhood is really important since many foundational habits and patterns are established in those early years.

However, while childhood is an important formative period, a person’s upbringing is not the sole determinant of their character. Philosophically, character development is viewed as a lifelong endeavour, a continual process of growth and becoming. The ethical life is characterised by ongoing development towards the good and human flourishing, transcending mere compliance with ethical standards. It’s about the continuous journey towards improvement and excellence.

When teaching university students, we focus on fostering ownership and personal responsibility for self-directed character development. It is socially expected that people will spend a lot of time and energy to achieve excellent performance in such areas as academic examinations, career development or sport. Our programmes help students and professionals to focus on the underlying pursuit of personal and ethical excellence: who do you need to be to do what you want to do? What does it mean to be the best version of yourself? How can you be a good friend, neighbour, citizen and leader? Who are you becoming?

It is not easy, but while cultivating virtues can be challenging, it’s possible to develop positive habits and mitigate negative ones. Popular works, such as James Clear’s bestseller, Atomic Habits, emphasise this habit dimension and how identifying concrete actions, repeated practice, and building environments can contribute to habituating positive traits like generosity. The cultural dimensions are particularly important to keep in view. Creating supportive environments in organisations and communities can help to foster positive habits, contributing to a virtuous cycle. Such collaborative development aligns systems and situations with the better angels of our nature, supporting individuals and teams to grow in accordance with their best rather than worst inclinations.

HF: The Oxford Character Project published the Good Leadership in UK Business report last year, which is incredibly insightful. The research is examining which virtues are valued in the context of UK business leadership. One intriguing finding was that values like kindness, creativity and humility weren’t valued very highly, despite their importance. What are your thoughts on that finding?

EB: Yes, it’s fascinating, isn’t it? Professionals from across leadership levels in 36 UK businesses were asked to provide descriptors of good leadership. Researchers categorised the list of 84 features into three groups: competence, interpersonal skills and character (intrapersonal) qualities. Interestingly, 52% of the descriptors fall under the category of character qualities – intellectual or moral attributes. Another group of participants categorised the features according to centrality, to identify the common paradigm or ‘prototype’ of good leadership. When you look at the top 20 most central features, 55% relate to character.

Among the character qualities considered central to good leadership are important virtues such as integrity, responsibility, honesty, resilience and respect. However, some virtues which are considered central to good leadership in the literature were at the bottom of the list. Kindness, creativity and humility were in the bottom five.

The absence of certain virtues like kindness and humility from the common prototype of good leadership may be attributed to the existing notions of leadership in people’s minds, perhaps reinforced within organisations. While the research didn’t directly inquire about the importance of these virtues, it raises questions about our prevalent leadership vocabulary, the qualities recognised and rewarded in firms, and those that are central in recruitment processes.

HF: Fear-based leadership is a classic approach, with the notion that being feared is better than being loved. Sadly, this style of leadership often gets results. So how do you convince leaders with this style that there’s a better way?

EB: Good character is not merely a means to an end but an inherent good, which is fundamental to a flourishing human life. Leading with humility, hope, courage and justice is the way to flourish personally as a leader and to further the flourishing of your team, organisation and, ultimately, society. In practice, however, it is difficult to move from aspiration to action, and leadership is hard. The pressure can be intense and decisions inevitably involve tensions and trade-offs. As we talk to business leaders, the questions they often ask focus on how character-based leadership operates on the ground: “What about character and performance?” and “Is this going to actually work in the real world?”

So how do we answer that in the terms of the framework of organisational performance? We start by showing how character and performance belong together such that sustained success in any field requires virtues of character: purpose to focus effort on the goal, courage to take on challenges and overcome the fear of failure, perseverance to keep working towards a positive outcome, empathy to understand others and work well as a team. We need to recognise that winning isn’t just about achieving short-term goals and so trading off character against success; it involves aligning with a higher purpose, building positive relationships, and maintaining integrity to avoid undesirable consequences in the long run.

The idea here is that character not only supports the growth of the firm and the bottom line but also transforms the overall definition of success within the organisation, aligning people and operations towards an organisational purpose that reaches beyond short-term profit.

Our research has also looked at the impact of character-based leadership. We recently reviewed 1,021 papers on character-based leadership in low and middle-income countries, published between 1990 and 2022. Of these papers, 720 focus on impact, and the picture is of a positive and multilayer effect, with positive outcomes for individuals (both leaders and followers), organisations and societies. The evidence shows that character virtues, when manifested in leadership, contribute to personal and organisational wellbeing and goals.

HF: Do you have strategies you can share with us to practically develop our character for leadership and for life?

EB: Certainly. In fact, this is what we’ve been working on since the early years of the Oxford Character Project. Our research is not just about what character is, but how it’s developed. I’m currently working on a book with Michael Lamb from Wake Forest University on this very topic, which will cover seven strategies for character development, building on previous publications.

1. Habituation through practice: Character virtues are habits and not simply ideas. They are developed not just by thinking but by doing – by repeated, goal-oriented practice, in a similar way to learning a musical instrument. Curiosity, for example, is cultivated by the practice of questioning, enacted repeatedly over time in ways appropriate to the context.
2. Reflection on experience: Developing character is not automatic; it involves intentional reflection on experiences. Scheduling times for reflection, even brief moments daily, helps assess and refine actions and intentions.
3. Engagement with virtuous exemplars: Role models – described as ‘moral exemplars’ when character is in view, are key to the cultivation of virtue. However, engagement with such exemplars must go beyond mere admiration from a distance to more active engagement and emulation. Learning from role models involves exploring and understanding what makes exemplars admirable and what it would mean for us to follow them in our own way. This is the case whether our exemplars come from personal, professional or historical domains.
4. Virtue literacy: Developing a vocabulary that goes beyond the instrumental language of skills and competencies is important to build perception of the ethical domain, understand one’s own character, and cultivate virtue. Understanding and defining important virtues like kindness, humility and generosity creates a deeper comprehension, expanding moral awareness and opening up possibilities for virtuous action.
5. Awareness of situational variables: Recognising systemic pressures, expectations, incentives and personal biases is important for strengthening moral muscles. Developing an awareness of inclinations and biases helps us to steer a steadier course, sticking to principles, making decisions and taking action in a way that aligns with virtue and is guided by practical wisdom.
6. Moral reminders: Utilising reminders like sticky notes, wearables or technological aids can bring values and virtues to the forefront of daily life. Both individuals and companies can employ this strategy to reinforce important principles.
7. Friendships of mutual accountability: Character development is personal but not individualistic. We are shaped by the company we keep and good friends can help and support one another to be the best versions of themselves. Building friendships that go beyond instrumental connections, where there’s a genuine concern for the good and growth of others, is crucial for sustained character development.

HF: It’s wonderful to have such practical steps when building character can feel so daunting. Sticking with the practical, can you share some examples of businesses that have successfully integrated character development into their corporate culture?

EB: I can think of lots of companies across a range of sectors who have, but none who have done it perfectly. In this respect intentional character development in organisations has much in common with character development at the individual level. It’s important to recognise that we’re all continuously evolving and the challenge is to be more intentional in identifying virtues to develop and making the most of opportunities for growth. When it comes to embedding character in organisational life and culture, it’s a prolonged commitment that runs deep into the fabric of an organisation.

Military organisations are helpful examples in this regard since many have a longstanding focus on character as an essential aspect of training and progression in leadership. In the US the armed forces have units or centres with a particular mandate to focus on research and the design of activities to support character and leadership development. However, despite such a longstanding commitment to character, these institutions and individuals within them do not always get it right. The work is to continually renew focus on the cultivation of virtue as a personal and organisational priority.

Now, regarding companies doing this well, there are various approaches. Some larger companies intentionally focus on character development and use strategies such as those outlined above to integrate a focus on character into leadership and professional development across the firm. In other cases, the cultivation of virtue is not yet a firm-wide priority but occurs as a personal commitment of individuals. One senior executive I know has identified a set of 32 virtues and selects one a day at random, identifying a salient quote, example or practice to apply. Others have daily practices of reflection, meet monthly with a small group of trusted friends, or set aside regular times to identify and stocktake on habits that relate to their personal growth.

One emphasis that has come to the fore in our work with organisations is the importance of role models. This is particularly true for those in leadership positions. A prominent theme in our research was the way in which senior executives and team leaders exercise an outsized influence through the example they set.

In interviews with over 120 individuals across different UK firms, individuals who authentically embodied the character virtues they advocated became powerful role models. This wasn’t limited to senior leadership; anyone within the organisation can take on this responsibility.