In 2022, the Building Movement Project (BMP) published Trading Glass Ceilings for Glass Cliffs: A Race to Lead Report on Nonprofit Executives of Color, a study whose findings deserve to be more widely known. It confirmed what many nonprofit leaders of color already knew from lived experience – advancing to a leadership role, such as executive director (ED) or chief executive officer (CEO), does not end racialized barriers. In fact, it often intensifies them.
The report documented a persistent “glass cliff” scenario in which leaders of color are promoted into executive roles with higher scrutiny, fewer supports, greater workloads, weaker compensation, and more fragile organizational conditions than their white counterparts, particularly when they inherit white-led organizations or lead identity-based nonprofits.
Specifically, “The ‘glass cliff’ term was initially coined in reference to the phenomenon of women being put into leadership roles under risky circumstance, particularly as new business executives of already struggling or failing companies. The term is also commonly used to describe circumstances faced by people of color and other underrepresented groups who break through the glass ceiling but find themselves in precarious leadership positions.” (Trading Glass Ceilings for Glass Cliffs, page 22)
Some of the data:
- “The burden of making nonprofit organizations more racially equitable largely falls on people of color. EDs/CEOs of color were more likely than white leaders to report that they “often” or “always” felt challenged by the stress of being called on to push diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts in their organizations (32% and 20%, respectively).” (page 9)
- “Roughly one-third (34%) of EDs/CEOs of color reported that they were “often” or “always” frustrated by such inequities in their pay, compared to 21% of white executives.” (page 8)
- “Almost half (46%) of EDs/CEOs of color leading identity-based organizations indicated that they “often” or “always” felt challenged by a lack of relationships with funding sources, followed by 40% of other EDs/CEOs of color, 39% of white EDs/CEOs of identity-based organizations and 33% of other white EDs/CEOs.” (page 11)
Below is just one visualization of BMP’s findings. To dig deeper into all the data, download the full report here.
For nonprofits and funders, the takeaway is clear. Equity efforts that focus only on hiring diverse leaders — without changing systems, compensation, succession planning, board behavior, and funding practices — are setting leaders up to fail.
Board Building by Mollard Consulting aims to help fill this gap by power-sharing, providing training materials for development, and supporting board governance.
Since the publication of the report, BMP and BoardSource have collaborated to outline how organizations can avoid the glass cliff before, during, and after the transition of an ED or CEO. For our Board Building program, Mollard breaks this down into action steps for boards, including helping set a foundation for racial equity, determining equitable processes, and celebrating and supporting the new ED/CEO.
Building a better board is not just about bylaws and budgets. It’s about shaping how power is exercised, how accountability is shared, and whether leadership transitions are stabilizing or harmful. A board made up of aligned, well-trained members is one of the strongest protections against setting a new leader up to fail.
