Assemble a diverse team.

Recruit a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary and mul­ti­func­tion­al team rep­re­sent­ing the rel­e­vant exper­tise and orga­ni­za­tion­al func­tions (this might include man­agers, project staff with local knowl­edge, mar­ket­ing pro­fes­sion­als, gov­ern­ment and cor­po­rate rela­tions pro­fes­sion­als, nat­ur­al sci­en­tists, social sci­en­tists, and phil­an­thropy staff). Include indi­vid­u­als from major stake­hold­er groups and part­ner orga­ni­za­tions on the team espe­cial­ly if these part­ners will be need­ed to imple­ment strate­gies. Expect to make some changes to team com­po­si­tion through­out the process, as dif­fer­ent skillsets become more/less impor­tant for com­plet­ing the work.

Always aim for gen­der equi­ty and mul­ti-racial/­mul­ti­cul­tur­al inclu­sion. Be sure you include exper­tise to help the team assess pri­ma­ry inter­ests for peo­ple and nature, gen­der equi­ty inte­gra­tion, and, where appro­pri­ate, the inter­ests of indige­nous peo­ples and local com­mu­ni­ties. You may need exter­nal part­ners or col­leagues to help you fill in the gaps.

The Nature Con­ser­van­cy’s Gen­der Equi­ty State­ment, Lever­ag­ing Dif­fer­ence Mod­el, and Inclu­sive Group Norms Work­sheet are all help­ful tools for build­ing diver­si­ty on teams.