Today's world of rapid change and uncertainty requires teams and leaders who are nimble, resilient, and creative. And that means the belief that one "single story" or set of accepted practices best equips organizations for success is less and less tenable.

Association members, like everyone else, have become accustomed to the personalized, customizable services that new digital tools provide. Rather than serving one standard client, user, or visitor, organizations are increasingly learning that people possess a multiplicity of abilities, needs, and expectations. We might call this breadth of experience diversity, encompassing all the unique perspectives and talents that each of us brings to what we do.

Demographic trends reveal that the U.S. population is becoming ever more diverse:

• In today's multigenerational workforce, millennials work alongside generation X-ers and baby boomers.
• Our nation's share of people traditionally named as racial and ethnic minorities is rising, with nonwhite individuals projected to make up more than half the population by 2065.
• Disability rights advocacy and advancements in medical science have broadened what we understand as the spectrum of ability. Companies such as SAP and Ford now prioritize hiring neurodiverse employees, including people on the autism spectrum. Accessibility continues to be a tenet of universal design.

Understanding and reflecting these developments in decision-making, talent cultivation, and change management processes is essential to any organization's success in the 21st century.

A director of inclusion can lead an association's efforts to help the industry or profession it represents improve its commitment to D+I.

A Staff Champion for D+I

Leadership positions dedicated to responding to these changes and to increasing diversity and inclusion are common in the corporate sector. Industries from technology to food service employ chief diversity and inclusion officers to help companies achieve their D+I goals. For associations, these positions are still fairly rare, even though the goals are just as pertinent.

A director of inclusion can help organizations focus their efforts toward measurable outcomes in a variety of areas, from staff recruitment and talent management to business partnerships. A person in this role can work with HR professionals to promote effective strategies for reducing hiring bias and can conduct baseline research on compensation trends and employee mobility to help the organization understand the dynamics of today's workforce. D+I professionals can also help build strategic partnerships with diverse stakeholders that, ultimately, increase an organization's market share.

Consider the American Alliance of Museums, whose current strategic plan highlights diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion as a primary focus area. As AAM's first director of inclusion, I am charged with implementing this focus in our internal operations, in the support we provide for our members, and in the thought leadership we offer. I support our internal inclusion team by sharing resources on cultural competency, advising on inclusive hiring practices, and helping to build staff capacity for inclusion.

A director of inclusion can also lead an association's external initiatives to help the industry or profession it represents improve its commitment to D+I. My efforts in this area largely focus on making museum equity more scalable. Many individual museums are making phenomenal strides in D+I work, but individual successes have not yet translated into widespread progress or systemic change. Those working in the D+I space in museums too often face the old roadblocks, including noninclusive organizational cultures, a lack of diversity at the board level, and a persistent belief that qualified diverse applicants are "too hard to find." All of these challenges are interrelated—and surmountable.

To support the museum community in its D+I work, AAM devoted its 2017 Annual Meeting and MuseumExpo to advancing equity, convening more than 4,000 museum professionals to learn from industry experts and each other about ways to move forward. Meanwhile, a new report, titled Museum Board Leadership 2017, helps establish the current state of museum governance and identifies what gaps exist. This kind of benchmarking helps me and AAM set priorities for where to begin.

From Diversity to Inclusion

Associations can provide the tools, data, and training necessary to help organizations become more diverse at all levels. But more than embracing diversity, associations—and the individual and organizational members we represent—must move from diversity to inclusion. What good is it to recruit applicants across a spectrum of life experiences if we continue to deny them employment based on limiting ideas of "cultural fit"? What good is it to reassess and resist these hiring biases and bring diverse employees into our organizations if our workplace cultures are, ultimately, unwelcoming?

Inclusion is ongoing work. It is a both a goal and a process—and it's often uncomfortable. But it is an essential component of effective association leadership. We owe it to our members not only to emphasize inclusion, but also to help them move toward transformative, lasting change so that they can stay relevant and serve their customers and communities through the 21st century and beyond.