Staying the Course

Vibert (Bert) Wailoo, CPA, MBA, CMA, CFF, CGMA, professor of accounting at Kean University, doesn’t do anything lightly. Take, for example, his running. After partaking in a half-marathon in his home­town of Maplewood, he opted for the next big thing — the New York City Marathon. Eight marathons and some additional half marathons later, Bert kept on running. But now, he prefers long walks and yoga instead.

Bert, a former cricket player having moved to the United States from Guyana in 1969, likens his interest in running to his ability to accept challenges. Sports, for the most part, came easy to him though he enjoys a difficult workout, meeting it head on and then moving onto the next challenge.

He remembers telling his wife, “I’m going to run a marathon.” She did not seem too excited about the prospect, particularly since it meant following him to California, Washington, D.C., and Canada. But she became his biggest supporter and he looked forward to seeing her at the finish line. To get through those marathons, he said “you practice but you can’t look at the road every step of the way. It’s 26 miles.” He added, “you need to know what is your pace and figure out how you are going to get there. If you look up at a hill, you are in trouble. I tell my grandson and granddaughter, who are runners, don’t look up the hill.”

Classroom Lessons

That methodical approach is what has kept him teaching accounting at Kean University for more than 30 years. Similar to running, Bert has a process for teaching in each classroom — making sure students know upfront that their job is to learn and his job is to teach.

He thoroughly enjoys breaking through to even the most difficult students about the virtues of accounting. And when students question his methods, he is ready for them. Just like in running where you have to have a goal and think about the steps taking you to the finish line, he said, problem-solving in accounting is similar. “You have to get the steps, like a budget. You have to decide the steps to get there so they are all the same.”

Perhaps most importantly, Bert has a knack for not giving up, which comes in handy when introducing new students to the merits of accounting — and certainly helped him as a runner.

For example, after working the “grave­yard shift” from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York while simultaneously being married and a father to two young children, he went on to attend college at Pace University, eventually achieving his B.A. and his MBA. “America has great specialization,” added Bert. “When I came to this country, I was thinking I was going to major in math,” he said, but accounting offered a lot of math-related courses.

Bert’s corporate experience also had a hand in shaping the kind of teacher he is today. After college, he began working in accounting at International Paper. The corporate world taught him valuable teaching lessons, especially in how to listen. International Paper had a policy at that time in which all new supervisors actually had to learn to manage by taking a course, so Bert went to school to be a better manager. “What I learned (and to this day I use it all the time) was you have to learn to listen to someone who is working for you until they stop talking,” he said, noting that’s how to fully understand their perspective when approaching a project.

Similarly, he learned it’s important to practice listening to someone that one does not like. “You will learn that someone can have a different point of view than you, but you can still learn something from them.”