Interestingly, much of the work of effective diversity provosts involves improving the
contexts under which women and people of color, along with other faculty, negotiate
their advancement into and through the academy. They are involved in troubleshooting
for individuals who experience marginalization and exclusion, which gives them access
to information and a way to connect particular instances to larger patterns. They create
and share information relevant to advancement, such as information about the content
of salary packages, tenure policies and processes, openings for new academic leadership,
and opportunities for funding, academic visibility, and collaboration. They help develop
research and teaching collaborations that will enhance the social capital of new entrants
to the faculty. They create new networks of graduate students, faculty, and academic
leaders, often organized around both professional advancement and support. They
generate system-wide options to solve recurring problems, such as job banks for dual
career families or developing opportunities for cluster hiring to overcome the problem
of tokenism within particular departments. They create institutional self-consciousness
about the role of unconscious bias in academic decision making by producing credible
information about the patterns emerging from individual decisions and by sharing
cutting edge research and best practices with faculty and academic leaders. They put
gender and racial dynamics on the table as issues to be addressed. They change who gets
to be at the table for negotiations and decisions, emphasizing the importance of including
women and people of color in leadership positions. They create accountability over
time for the processes, values, and outcomes of negotiations relating to faculty inclusion,
participation, and advancement. They use information to mobilize power and change.