As part of my Incoming President’s Address at the 2019 ACCP Annual Meeting, I noted that in addition to the planned organizational efforts driven by my presidential theme, I wanted to make sure that other initiatives of importance identified by past ACCP presidents were not neglected. For example, the Presidential Task Force formed by ACCP President Jill Kolesar in 2018 was charged to “provide recommendations on how ACCP can help foster increased female leadership within the clinical pharmacy discipline, taking into account your own experiences and the current literature and data relevant to this subject (both within and outside the pharmacy profession).” In its final report to the Board of Regents, the task force, under the leadership of Dr. Judith Jacobi, presented findings that spoke well of women’s involvement in aspects of ACCP, such as Annual Meeting programming and the growing number of female presidents, but noted several other areas for improvement and provided recommendations for future action. Subsequent discussion by the board included the issue of how to foster female leadership, particularly within ACCP.

Let me update you on the progress so far (and areas for improvement) based on the recommendations from the task force. I want to thank ACCP staff, particularly Dr. Amie Brooks, for compiling the following data, which indicate the growing number of women in leadership positions throughout the College, especially over the past 5–10 years:

• ACCP staff members are predominantly female (61%), and women currently hold 56% of positions at the director level or higher (senior director, associate executive director, executive director).
• Women have held 55% of all College committee chair positions over the past 5 years and currently hold 65% of all chair positions.
• Women commonly fill elected positions on the Board of Regents. Over the past 5 years, women have held at least 50% of all board positions.
• A woman has led the College as president of the Board of Regents 60% of the time over the past 5 years compared with 40% when looking at a 10-year period. As background, the 15th ACCP president was Dr. Jean Nappi, the first female to hold that position, who served in 1994–1995. Five additional female presidents were elected in 1996–2015, and three successive female presidents assumed office in 2015–2018, a first for ACCP. The current president-elect is a woman.
• This trend is consistent across all elected officers of the board. Women represent 72% of the elected officers over the past 5 years compared with 54% when looking at a 10-year period.
• For at least the past 7 years, women have accounted for more than 50% of ACCP’s PRN officers.
• Women represent about 50% of all Fellows of the College, despite an early male predominance in the College’s 40-year history.
• Over the 10 years since the Leadership and Management Academy was established, 73% of graduates have been women.
• Faculty mentors of the FIT program are predominantly female (75%). (Of note, although only 7% of FIT participant mentees have been women, one contributing factor is the overall small number of mentees who have completed this program to date.)
• 68% of MeRIT mentors and 71% of MeRIT mentees are women.
• Four female leaders in the profession moderated and presented at the 2019 Annual Meeting session titled “Diversity in Pharmacy Leadership: Breaking the Glass Ceiling.”

During my presidential year, I also want to implement other recommendations of the 2018 Presidential Task Force in addition to appointing a new Presidential Task Force, with Past-President Kolesar as chair, charged to “develop an interorganizational plan that ACCP can propose to other professional pharmacy associations that will promote the advancement of women in leadership positions across the profession.”

As last year’s president-elect, one of my main responsibilities was to develop committee charges and appoint committee members, chairs, and vice chairs. With respect to committee membership, particularly committee chairs and vice chairs, I made appointments on the basis of qualifications (e.g., past service on committees) and statements of interest by ACCP members. As one testament to female volunteerism and leadership within ACCP, in the final appointments for 2019–2020, there are twice as many female as male committee chairs, and the vast majority of vice chairs are female. Furthermore, there is a mix of female/male members on each committee.

Another recommendation by the 2018 Presidential Task Force was to use a standard language format in all communications (e.g., women and men [not girls and men]; and introductions [all as Drs., Mr. or Ms., or all first names]). Going forward, ACCP will provide instructions and guidance to the moderators of all meeting sessions that are intended to minimize or eliminate any gender bias in their communications. These moderator instructions will include the following wording: “Please be mindful to avoid bias in speaker introductions. Specifically, we ask that you use standard language format when introducing all speakers (all as Drs., Mr. or Ms., or all first names).”

Binary (female versus male) appointed and elected leaders within ACCP are only one aspect of diversity deserving of discussion. For example, there are trainee and new practitioner considerations as well as race/ethnicity and gender identity/expression considerations. To address the former diversity issue, I have appointed at least one student, one resident, and one new practitioner to every committee unless membership was restricted by board policy (e.g., FCCP Committee, Nominations Committee). Making appointments aimed at achieving race/ethnicity and gender identity/expression diversity is more challenging because of limitations in our member database and privacy concerns. Currently, to streamline the membership process and honor many of the concerns related to information privacy, only minimal information is required to join ACCP or renew one’s ACCP membership. Therefore, ACCP’s database may not allow us to determine member-specific race, ethnicity, or gender. Regardless of such limitations, ACCP will continue to strive to make committee appointments that mirror our membership and ultimately attract members that better reflect the diversity of the patients we serve.