Alone we are smart, but together we are genius.

SIIA members are united by a shared belief that diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are critical core values for society and our individual organizations. We believe achieving greater advancement in DEI is not only the morally correct course of action, but also research proves diverse organizations provide better business results. Embracing a diversity of perspectives fuels innovation while connecting us closer to our customers and the communities we serve.

For too long, underlying inequalities, racial biases, and discrimination have plagued the United States and communities around the world, denying too many the ability to contribute to and reap the benefits of the innovation economy. Removing these barriers to elevate opportunities for all individuals to participate will lead to the creation of new businesses and foster economic growth.

As business leaders, we recognize our responsibility to contribute to the betterment of society not only through the information, products, and services we provide but also as good citizens. We also recognize that while DEI is rooted in the need to address historic social inequities, we strive to create workplaces that reflect the communities in which we work, live, and serve our customers and where everyone feels empowered to bring their full, authentic selves to work. This means promoting a workplace culture that welcomes a diversity of ethnicity, gender, identity, nation of origin, and thought.

SIIA is committed to work with our members and within our organization to improve DEI performance for the benefit of our employees, the industry segments we represent, our nation and our world. Our efforts include:

• Organizational Policy. Ensure that we are an organization making progressive change toward diversity, equity, and inclusion through our hiring practices, culture, operations, and offerings.
• Member Experience. Assist our members in improving DEI outcomes through our content and knowledge offerings as well as by our example as a membership organization.
• Promoting diversity in our internal staffing, among our volunteer leadership, our speakers, and presenters, as well as our vendors and partners.

This includes but is not specifically limited to:

• Ensure the representation of diverse speakers at all SIIA events.
• Ensure diverse representation across SIIA boards, committees, councils, and working groups.
• Strengthen leadership and staff accountability and capabilities for inclusion and diversity.
• Enable equality of opportunity across our organization through fairness and transparency.
• Promote openness and tackle microaggressions.
• Foster belonging through support for multivariate diversity.

Promoting DEI is not just about words. It is about action. SIIA will seek to advance our diversity goals in 2021 by:

• Compiling data to identify metrics. We cannot know how to address inequities until we know what they are. We will capture data on demographics within the SIIA workforce and among speakers across our events to help us understand the diversity of our employees and speaker rosters and identify any areas of concern or
• Setting a specific metric by which to measure speaker diversity at our events. Once we collect data to establish a baseline, we will set a goal to measure our success in improving outcomes.
• Conduct a membership survey to help identify their needs as related to DEI and lead to the development of programming, and/or content to help
• Leverage our content channels to help educate and share solutions. Integrate DEI topics across SIIA content channels, including events, and our digital and print publications. Seek to include one DEI-related story per week/month for newsletters and per issue for Signature magazine, one of our flagship publications.
• Develop an award to recognize contributions to DEI by SIIA members. Award will be integrated into existing award
• Review our RFP and contracting processes to ensure we are providing partnership and vendor opportunities for minority-owned and operated businesses and organizations.
• Revitalize SIIA DEI Staff Committee. Task the committee with conducting an equity audit of our organization and develop specific metrics including questions to examine and hold us accountable in:
  • Organizational success in meeting stated
  • Our recruitment and hiring practices.
  • Ensuring diverse representation across our management and volunteer
  • Provide regular updates and reports to SIIA leadership and help support reports to volunteer