This is the second part of my long blog asking: why is diversity proving so difficult? The first part looked at some of the reasons why charities might have a tendency to homogeneity and lack of diversity. You can read it here.
This second part looks at what charities can do to become more diverse at a systemic level.
To tackle our failure to make diversity endemic in charities, we can start with three changes in our thinking.
1. Accept there is no single right way to do anything in charities
Charities are often like lemmings. They see something they like the look of, and all rush to do the same thing. Fundraisers in particular are like this – they all rush to do street fundraising, or bike events, or swap names of donors. It was this kind of behaviour that led to many of the problems in the fundraising sector.
Charities need to stop believing there is a single magic bullet which will sort anything. It’s easy to believe we are wise to this now but then I listen to the discussion about how ‘giving cash directly to poor people overseas’ is going to sort all development problems… and I realise it isn’t.
2. Realise that systems and processes tend to squeeze out diversity
My education in the world of communications had a mantra – ‘everything communicates’. The idea was that the things people or organisations do say something to people. My new mantra would be ‘everything excludes’.
Almost anything an organisation does can be done in a way that excludes people or includes them. The information asked for on an application form. The language used in a fundraising appeal. The pictures used in a social media post. The time and style that meetings are held. The list goes on and on.
To quote what the Red Queen said to Alice in ‘Through the Looking Glass’:
‘It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!’
If you want to make sure all your communications and activities build diversity, you will have to run twice as fast. But for the strength it will build in your organisation, it’s worth it.
3. Remember: diversity is the foundation of a better world
Perhaps the question before ‘why is diversity proving so difficult?’ is ‘what is the importance of diversity?’
If charities are to use diversity to change the world, then it needs to be embedded in organisations. Charities need to be diverse in their approach to hiring, to delivering services, to recruiting volunteers, to securing income and the like. Charities need to become institutionally diverse.
An organisation that is institutionally diverse is one in which innovating, trying out new ideas, having teams who reflect wider society, and challenging the norm are all part of what the organisation does without thinking.
What does diversity mean for governance?
So what does this mean for governance? At the Association of Chairs, diversity is, we believe, central to better governance.
That’s diversity of people, diversity of ideas, diversity of approaches and diversity of culture. As I said earlier, you can’t expect one type of diversity while implicitly, or explicitly, rejecting others. A diversity of people will bring with it a diversity of ideas and experience. A diversity of approaches and culture should attract a diversity of people. And it’s foolish to seek to have a diversity of people and then not listen to their challenges to the orthodoxy.
Diversity in governance: practical ideas
In practice this could mean a variety of things. But here are some of the cultural approaches to governance which could be adopted and may (and I only say may) encourage diversity and better boards:
- Have several co-chairs rather than a single chair
- Make all trustees a vice chair for a specific area of work (e.g. vice chair safeguarding, vice chair finances, etc)
- Hold meetings outside working hours
- Have paid trustees and chairs to allow people to make a career of being a trustee
- Have trustees who never come to board meetings, but do their work as a trustee through one-to-one meetings with staff, volunteers and other trustees
- Rotate putting together the meeting agenda and chairing the meeting between trustees
- Have job-share trustees
- Include a 20-minute session in every board meeting for disruptive ideas
- Let people talk to your chair, or another trustee, directly whenever you recruit new trustees
- Have apprentice trustees who are below a certain age, or new to being a trustee
- Allow non-trustees to join your committees and even your board meetings so they can see how you work, and what being a trustee is like
An experimental and necessary approach to diversity in governance
Some organisations are already putting ideas like this into effect. As that old adage from William Gibson goes:
‘The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed yet.’
We don’t need to reinvent the wheel to encourage and build diversity in trusteeship and governance.
Instead, we need to let a thousand different existing ideas flourish and then see which ones work, and which ones don’t.
Trustee boards must be institutionally diverse; to do anything else will mean we don’t do justice to our beneficiaries, our staff, our volunteers, the wider public and ourselves. We need to get to a point where we’re no longer asking ‘why is diversity proving so difficult?’
This blog was originally published in Governance & Leadership magazine.
