Freedom, Inc_ - Brian M. Carney [73]
Regarding education and growth, in 1838, facing a lack of instruction in English composition, a group of students launched The Collegian magazine, which, under a variety of names, has survived until the present day. And regarding self-direction, although Jefferson founded the university on complete separation of church and state, in 1832 students initiated a movement to raise funds for the employment of a chaplain. The faculty and the board of visitors approved the initiative, and the faculty elected a chaplain each year, but he was paid by the funds collected by the students and had no official connection to the university. Overall, from what we understand today about the appropriate environment for nourishing people’s universal needs, the University of Virginia did not succeed at inspiring self-motivation.
But this story is not only an illustration of how a project for a freedom-based organization may fail to get people to join it and make them revolt instead. It’s also an illustration of how such a project can be turned around. Because it did eventually succeed—although Jefferson did not live to see it.
Soon after the 1840 killing of the faculty chairman, a distinguished judge, Henry St. George Tucker, was appointed to succeed the slain law professor. Gradually, Tucker became aware of the students’ festering resentment toward all the restrictions of their personal freedoms and successfully led the effort, with the faculty, to abolish them. Then, after dismantling the hated rules, Tucker started to build a different basis for relationships between professors and students.
He noted that the faculty always presumed that students were cheating on examinations (and some indeed did). But instead of reinforcing the surveillance, Tucker proposed a revolutionary measure that was very much in the spirit of Jefferson’s original vision of student self-government. This measure became known at UVA as the honor system.26 On a symbolic July 4, 1842, Tucker offered to build trusting relationships with the students: “Resolved, that in all future examinations…each candidate shall attach to the written answers…a certificate of the following words: “I, A.B., do hereby certify on my honor that I have derived no assistance during the time of this examination from any source whatsoever.” The students quickly embraced the principle and assumed total responsibility for the protection of this self-government freedom, and not only in the classroom. Following the Civil War, for example, the honor system expelled students caught cheating at cards, defaulting on payments of debts, and insulting ladies. More than one and a half centuries later, the honor system is still in place, self-governed by students, who, like their ancestors, continue to drink, play cards, and—of course—date, but who respect certain limits that they—not the university authorities—impose on themselves.
Tucker’s actions offer us two lessons. First, he rebuilt an environment that nourished students’ universal needs, and they responded in a way that would make Jefferson proud. Second, failing to build such an environment—something, alas, Jefferson did—leaves people unmotivated to take part in a liberation campaign. For a modern business parallel to the early years at UVA, consider the Danish hearing-aid maker Oticon.
A DANISH MIRACLE
A century and a half after Judge Tucker breathed new life into Jefferson’s vision for the University of Virginia, Lars Kolind decided to launch a liberation campaign of his own. His target seemed ideally suited for the purpose—an old, quiet company of medium size, set in its ways yet with tremendous potential for expansion and growth, if only it could shake off the shackles of its past.27
Kolind was appointed CEO of Oticon in 1988. Oticon was a leading European maker of hearing aids, but it was threatened by competition and technological change and reluctant to do anything to shake up