A Tool One Foundation Uses to Ensure Diversity

When Yanique Redwood took the helm at Consumer Health Foundation in 2012, she thought the foundation was doing a good job of practicing diversity and creating an equitable environment, both internally and through its grant-making work. But she wanted the foundation’s practices codified “to guide the organization into the future as people change and staff change,” she says.

So she and the staff thought through all of the foundation’s operational and grant-making practices and created a list of diversity goals relating to the board, staff, vendors, communications, grant making, and investing. They submitted the checklist to the board’s nominations and governance committee to review. After an attorney examined it, the full board reviewed and adopted it in 2014.

The foundation now uses the document during its annual planning meeting and on an ad-hoc basis, Ms. Redwood says. For example, the director of finance turns to it when she is making decisions about which vendors to use.

Here are the decision-making guidelines that the Consumer Health Foundation created to promote and maintain diversity, which you can adapt to your own organization.