Director Diversity Initiative

The Director Diversity Initiative is a joint project of the Center for Banking and Finance and the Center for Civil Rights at the UNC School of Law. A working group of academics and business professionals provides guidance and advice to the Initiative. The objective of the Initiative is to encourage boards of directors of public companies to increase their gender, racial, and ethnic diversity. The Initiative is supported entirely by revenue from program registration fees and sponsors. The Initiative has sponsored annual "Broadening Corporate Board Diversity: Earning a Board Seat" programs held each May, beginning in 2006. In addition, the Initiative has partnered with the North Carolina Bank Directors' College, jointly sponsored by the Center for Banking and Finance, the North Carolina Office of the Commissioner of Banks, and the FDIC, to provide scholarships to the Bank Directors' College to potential bank directors who would add diversity to bank boards.

The Initiative also maintains a computerized database of potential diverse directors. Corporate nominating committees are invited to contact Lissa Broome to identify board candidates from this database. Potential diverse directors are encouraged to register for inclusion in the database. If accepted for inclusion, they will receive additional instructions on how to enter their information into the database. This website is intended to serve as a clearinghouse of information about director diversity, with links to data on board diversity, and other organizations focused on board diversity. Please forward any information you believe should be included in this clearinghouse to Lissa Broome at lbroome@email.unc.edu, 919.962.7066.

History of the Director Diversity Initiative

The Director Diversity Initiative was formed at the suggestion of Henry Frye, the retired Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court and first African-American who served in that position, and Tom Ross, then the Executive Director of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation. The first meeting of the Director Diversity Initiative Working Group was held in May 2003, and the DDI's objective was described as increasing diversity on boards of directors of companies located in North Carolina along racial, ethnic and gender lines by identifying prospective directorial candidates, providing them with additional training, and helping to match them with public companies in North Carolina interested in increasing the diversity of their boards.

TheCorporateCounsel.net - Inside Track with Broc: Lissa Broome on the Director Diversity Initiative (1/6/14)

http://www.thecorporatecounsel.net/nonmember/InsideTrack/2014/01_06_Broome.htm