As part of AAM’s ongoing DEAI work, in 2022 and 2023, AAM Senior Diversity Fellow, Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole, hosted six roundtables that centered the perspectives, experiences, and recommendations of the following groups:

1. Emerging museum professionals, co-hosted by Grace Stewart, Assistant Director of Equity & Inclusion, AAM
2. Black, Indigenous, and professionals of color (BIPOC) in the museum field, co-hosted by Stephanie Johnson-Cunningham, Executive Director, Museum Hue
3. Museum DEAI leaders (including chief diversity officers), co-hosted by Mikka Gee Conway, former Chief Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging Officer and EEO Director, National Gallery of Art
4. Museum chief executive officers, presidents, and executive directors, co-hosted by Lori Fogarty, Director & CEO, Oakland Museum of California
5. Members of the Black Trustee Alliance for Art Museums (BTA), co-hosted by Brooke Minto, former Executive Director, BTA, and current CEO and Executive Director, Columbus Museum of Art
6. Attendees of the 2023 AAM Annual Meeting in Denver, CO, co-hosted by Dina Bailey, Chair of the AAM Board of Directors’ DEAI Committee

Using the 2022 Excellence in DEAI Report as a framework, the roundtable hosts developed several questions and discussion prompts. Examples of these questions included:

• What are your reactions to the report? Was there a part that was particularly interesting? Was anything confusing?
• If you were a peer reviewer sent to assess a museum for accreditation, what would you like to see as evidence of that museum’s commitment to excellence in DEAI?
• What do you find to be the greatest advantages and/or challenges to engaging in DEAI work as museum professionals?
• Which institutions would you say have strong commitments to diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion in museum work? Which museum professionals would you say are advocates or leaders with strong commitments to diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion?

During these roundtable discussions, multiple topics surfaced that impacted each affinity group, providing insight into the realities of current-day museum DEAI work, particularly in the years following the wave of institutional solidarity statements in 2020. The essays in this collection explore four of those topics that align with the Core Concepts outlined in the Excellence in DEAI report, and offer some “so now what” commentary, followed by additional high-level takeaways from the roundtables.

1. Accountability (Core Concept: DEAI work must be measured and assessed)
   Power
   Transformation
   Communication
2. Staffing (Core Concept: DEAI is the responsibility of the entire organization)
   Positionality of DEAI Roles
   The “Burden” of DEAI Work
   “Top-Down” vs. “Bottom-Up” Approaches
   Metrics for Determining DEAI Goals are Being Fulfilled
   The DEAI Challenge for Smaller Museums
3. Timing (Core Concept: DEAI is an ongoing journey without a fixed end point)
   Tension Between Going Too Fast and Too Slow
   Time Allocation for DEAI-Related Work
   Impact on Staff
4. Funding (Core Concept: DEAI demands an ongoing commitment of resources)
   Resource Allocation
   Financial Infrastructure
   Sociopolitical Climate

While each essay focuses on one of these four topics, two overarching themes were pertinent in all roundtable discussions:

• Tension: DEAI work requires holding the tension of multiple things being true at once and recognizing there is not an easy answer for every hard question. As Tema Okun has written, the belief that there is “one right way” to do things, or that truths exist on an “either/or” binary, are characteristics themselves of the white supremacy culture we seek to undo. As the museum field divorces itself from these characteristics, we can become more comfortable with the inherent tensions in DEAI work.
• Context: We have to be cognizant of our unique and shared history, systems, and the current sociopolitical climate. Increasing political polarization in American society adds new challenges to all aspects of museums’ DEAI efforts, as our cultural institutions become battlegrounds for politically motivated culture wars.

By sharing these essays, the AAM team aims to be transparent with the field about our process and progress. One important aspect of this transparency is acknowledging the emotional dimension of each of the roundtable topics, as participants expressed thoughts, feelings, and ideas in a confidential environment. In relaying the takeaways reported in these essays, the team took care to distill the insights while preserving the content, context, anonymity, and emotional intention of the discussions. Additionally, it is important to clarify that the takeaways reported in these essays are not directives from the AAM team on how to structure, implement or plan your museum’s DEAI journey. The reporting-out in these essays would not be possible without the time, energy, and input of the many museum professionals that took part in the roundtables, and these essays reflect the multitude of perspectives that each participant brought to the discussion.

By sharing insights from the roundtables and additional resources, we hope to provide support to those also committed to excellence in DEAI. Resources included in each essay are drawn from AAM’s DEAI and Anti-Racism Resource Library along with resources and individuals that roundtable participants felt should be recognized. AAM is one member of a vast and varied museum DEAI ecosystem, and the path toward excellence in DEAI in the field is one that requires the contributions and efforts of all of us. In that spirit, in these essays we also pose questions and challenges that the field will need to collectively grapple with and address, now and in the coming years.

As the AAM team moves forward with future roundtables and listening sessions, resource development, and information sharing, we welcome the input of fellow museum professionals in this field-wide journey. Please feel free to use this form to share suggestions, questions, comments, feedback, or your institution’s work.