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Many organizations in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors have begun to take action to address the systemic racism entrenched in their processes, systems, and structures. This has included commitments to elevate initiatives for equity, diversity, and inclusion. Data indicate that such good-faith efforts are often not as successful as leaders and organizations had envisioned. Our assertion is that if we really want to address systemic racism in organizations, we must first attend to the people who work there. This is because their individual and collective character, revealed through behavior, drives and determines organizational processes, systems, structures, and culture. The purpose of this article is to connect character to the creation and sustainment of organizational cultures of equity, diversity, and inclusion with a specific focus on anti-Black racism. Character is not a subjective, amorphous entity but manifests as a set of observable behaviors. We explain that character equips people with consciousness and the conduct to embrace and cultivate equity, diversity, and inclusion in their organizations and in their lives. We provide concrete examples of the dimensions of character in action using brief illustrations.

With the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, leaders across all sectors worldwide face enormous challenges. How they behave and the decisions they make will separate the bad from the great. In 2010, the Ivey Business School established the Ian O. Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership with a mandate to focus on leader character. Its research resulted in a framework consisting of 11 dimensions of character and supporting behaviours that were identified as foundational to good leadership. COVID-19 is revealing things about the citizens of affected nations as well as their leaders. The singing Italians, for example, serve as a powerful reminder that we can find creative ways to remain connected as medical experts urge us to remain apart. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the dimensions of character with concrete examples of the behaviours that leaders and citizens alike are manifesting during the pandemic. The authors believe it is of paramount importance to raise awareness of the construct of character and its dimensions—not just to ensure it is brought to the forefront of leadership education and development, but so it can be used by citizens in their everyday lives and as a tool by which they measure, vote for, and follow leaders.