Inclusive leadership: Leaders as architects of inclusive workgroup climates

There are many aspects of leadership that influence the inclusion experiences of employees. At the individual level this includes their ability to connect with and motivate followers from diverse backgrounds and their understanding of their own identities vis-á-vis those of others. At the organizational level this includes their unwavering commitment to weave inclusion principles into the core values and practices of the organization. In our chapter we focus on leadership at a more intermediary level of analysis: the workgroup. Given the enormous role that workgroup climate has on employee behaviors and experiences in general, and that inclusive climates have on employees’ experiences of inclusion in particular (Nishii, 2013), we define inclusive leadership as the leader behaviors that create inclusive climates. We argue that inclusive leadership involves developing shared motivations, norms, and accountability structures that clarify for employees what inclusion means, how they stand to benefit from it, and the role they play in co-creating their own and others’ experiences of inclusion.