Museum Board Leadership Report 2024: A National Report

Museum Board Leadership 2024 grades boards on a wide variety of policies, practices, and performance metrics. The survey was conducted in partnership with Slover Linett at NORC with support from Northern Trust. Key Findings included:

• Boards have made meaningful progress in diversifying their ranks, and still have significant room for improvement. In 2017, nearly half (46%) of museum directors reported that their boards were entirely white (i.e., no people of color). With this iteration of the survey, 27% of directors report their boards as entirely white.
• Boards and directors widely agree that diversity and inclusion is important to board performance. This sentiment has grown since the 2017 study. Directors’ assessments of board impact on organization performance corresponds with an increase in diversity across many demographic characteristics.
• Most boards have engaged in conversations about diversity and inclusion, but many museums have not followed up on these discussions with concrete actions to promote diversity. Only 39% of boards have modified recruitment efforts to reach potential members from diverse backgrounds, and 33% of boards have modified organizational policies and procedures to be more inclusive and equitable.
• There is relative parity in representation between men and women on boards, and a majority of directors are women. However, women are much more likely to direct smaller museums than men – about three-quarters of museums with revenues under $1 million are led by women directors.
• Boards widely can improve their performance regarding fundraising, outreach, advocacy, and government relations. Average director ‘grades’ for their board’s performance in these areas range from C to D+, and board members agree that these are the greatest areas in need of improvement.