24 April How Are You Doing With Your New Year’s Resolution … It’s Just the Start of Spring?! April 24, 2018 Executive Message diversity, Donna S. Collins, Executive Message, inclusion, OAC, Ohio Arts Council 0 Here we are at the end of April and I’m wondering how you’re doing on your New Year’s resolutions. Yes, that’s the question, and when I asked this of my colleagues last week I was met with answers like, “What resolutions?” “What year?” and “Are you kidding me?!” However, the question remains. My resolution was to be an active participant ensuring the actions of the Ohio Arts Council fostered an inclusive culture where uniqueness of beliefs, backgrounds, talents, capabilities, and ways of living and working are welcomed and leveraged for learning and informing better business decisions. The idea for this resolution came from T. Hudson Jordan, director of global diversity and talent strategies at Pitney Bowes, Inc., way back in 2011. Her article Moving From Diversity to Inclusion seemed right on target. Today she is with American Express and I wonder how her thinking and writing on these topics has evolved, I know mine has. This past January I remember reading Susan Neal’s article in which she wrote about the ten hot leadership topics for 2018, most if not all directly impact the arts: data, culture, employee engagement, analytics, automation, artificial intelligence, robots, digital transformation, diversity, and empathy. Susan wrote in her list: Diversity: Although it has been a hot topic before, focus on diversity as a workplace issue was further fueled this year by tribulations in the technology industry—including the now-infamous Google memo. Beyond the controversial headlines, top influencers continued to tout the benefits of building and retaining diverse workplaces to drive innovation and business growth. Diversity promises to become even more relevant and important as organizations begin to take a fresh look at their approaches to leadership potential. Here at the Ohio Arts Council we are always looking for ways to enhance our culture to ensure diversity and inclusion are the norm. We’ve hosted two staff meetings led by Chiquita Mullins Lee to discuss diversity and inclusion, shared scholarly and anecdotal information, and incorporated ideas shared into our daily practice. We know our leadership on the issue matters across Ohio’s arts sector. That’s why our grant guidelines include the following statement: The OAC believes that all persons deserve the right to take part in the arts and culture and all other aspects of living a vibrant and creative life in an environment of tolerance, equity, and inclusion. Historically underrepresented groups … deserve full access to, and representation within, organizations and institutions seeking to provide arts and cultural services and experiences in Ohio. The OAC will continue to work to ensure that it models such inclusiveness, devotes time and energy to this ongoing dialogue, and remains open to expanding its understanding of and response to these critical issues over time. The update on my resolution is this: I’m still learning, evolving, and seeking to be as informed as possible so that your Ohio Arts Council fosters an inclusive culture where uniqueness of beliefs, backgrounds, talents, capabilities, and ways of living and working are welcomed and leveraged for learning and informing better business decisions. Yes, four months in and I’m making progress. How about you? Until next time, Donna S. Collins Executive Director Comments are closed.