Leaders — in government, businesses and nonprofits — shape our institutions and our collective experiences.  But, how do we know if they are representative of and responsive to the diverse communities that they employ and serve?

Over the past few years, we heard from community members working on equity, inclusion and justice: With all of the effort going into diversifying leadership and working for racial equity, who actually leads our institutions? Do they reflect our communities? And is this changing over time?

Using a community-informed process, we partnered with Wilder Research and Minnesota Compass to investigate these questions through Who Leads Minnesota. (Minnesota Council of Nonprofits, Minnesota Chamber of Commerce and the League of Minnesota Cities were other key partners.) The Who Leads site compiles self-reported data about Minnesota leaders, as well as information from the U.S. Census Bureau and the American Community Survey.

The findings so far may not be surprising — on dimensions of race, ethnicity and gender, our leaders look very different from Minnesota’s overall population. There is a whole ecosystem working for change, and Who Leads is one tool in the overall effort. But that’s not all! Who Leads also includes resources:

• Stories and ideas from those who have taken action, that demonstrate that change can happen in all sorts of organizations across a variety of sectors.
• Programs to keep deepening your own leadership growth through the Leadership Programs Resource Directory.
• Training opportunities to move racial equity forward with the Racial Equity Resource Directory.
• Find what really works (and what doesn’t) when it comes to diversity, equity and inclusion efforts in the Leadership Toolkit.