The Work of Inclusive Leadership

Abstract

Attention to diversity is more than measuring numerical representation of different groups in the ranks of leadership. We require a paradigm shift in our frameworks of leadership to incorporate how dimensions of diversity shape our understanding of leadership and influence styles of leadership and followership, and how bias influences the exercise of leadership. This chapter describes how inclusive leadership is enacted across multiple levels of system, including the individual, relational, and organizational dimensions. Leaders and practitioners need to develop capacities to assess and intervene. The chapter provides examples of how inclusive leadership is a relational construct, the consequence of mutual influence and collective adaptation to fluid environments. It also argues that inclusion goes far beyond merely developing “soft skills” of caring and compassion, to a need for courage and making tough decisions. Fostering deeper relationships, modeling courage, and embracing our humanity with humility are key ingredients of inclusive organizations.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 34 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.