Creating A Character Development Curriculum

Teaching character development in the classroom

At Make School, we talk to the best founders in the country. Surprisingly, we hear that the hardest part of their job is not coding or thinking about product. The hardest part is working with people: having a tough, honest conversation with a teammate, empathetically understanding users, forgiving a staff member after a slip up, having the willpower to get up early and work.

These abilities are critical to any founder. For career success, and often life success.

So, we’ve integrated these skills into our two-year Product College curriculum. When we teach product-building, for instance, we embolden students to ask successful entrepreneurs for advice (courage), do user interviews (empathy), stay disciplined to make a project deadline (willpower), be real with teammates if someone is slacking (honesty) — all while building their skills (deliberate practice) and maintaining their own wellness (work-life balance).

As we began to prepare our class, however, we noticed a lack of available character development curricula.

So, we built one.

We interviewed 30+ experts on how to develop your people skills. You can hear their tips, strategies, and tactics in our Positivity Podcast. Episodes include interviews with best selling authors, leading social science academics, as well as stories from tech leaders on how character furthered their career. They show you exercises you can use every day to develop your character traits. Think of it like a gym membership to improve your character: your willpower, empathy, honesty, forgiveness, inclusion, deliberate practice, productivity, love, and more.

Students can use these resources as a coach on the side as they build their products.

People with character development skills aren’t born, they’re made. You can build character like an athlete.

These resources fill a much needed gap in higher education. After all, a business is its people, and its people are most productive when their mental and emotional strength is fully realized. Which is why we believe that one of a founders’ highest priorities for themselves and their companies should be character development.

Want to get the most out of the Positivity Podcast? Check out these step-by-step instructions on how to use our podcast to develop your character.

Thanks to Komal Desai for contributing to this post. Published on the Make School Blog (https://www.makeschool.com/blog).