03/05/2018

The Conversation Before the Diversity Conversation

Boards comprised of more women have seen more success on the public policy, fundraising fronts

What can diversity do for a board?

In recent years both the corporate and nonprofit sectors have seen the virtues in having leadership that reflects the makeup of their membership, or of the country. Studies have shown that diverse boards make for stronger, longer-tenured CEOs. And it’s long been argued that diverse boards—be it in terms of age, race, or gender—help create the kind of healthy disruption that organizations need to bring in new ideas.

A new study from Indiana University brings a little more clarity to what kind of direct effects diverse boards can have. “The Impact of Diversity,” produced by the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI), with the help of Johnson, Grossnickle and Associates and BoardSource, uses BoardSource data and case-study interviews. Last month AssociationsNow.com’s Ernie Smith summarized a few of the findings—among them, that boards with more younger members and women are more committed and involved, and those with more women have seen more success on the public policy and fundraising fronts.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Associations Now.