Archives for 2006

During the recent Grantmakers in the Arts conference in Boston, the issue of measurement continued to rise and fall in various sessions. After all, if arts grantmakers are in the business of positive change (or sustaining positive things), they inevitably wonder how they’re doing in delivering on that promise. Such evaluation requires both a target […]

Forbes has an opinion piece on board governance in the corporate world, calling into question Apple’s board appointment of Google’s CEO, while Steve Jobs is already a powerful force on Disney’s board. In theory, the article says, boards are supposed to be uniquely focused on the interests of a corporation’s shareholders, not playing multiple games […]

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking to a gathering of arts leaders from around the Midwest, hosted by the Alliant Energy Foundation and intended to build partnerships and connections in the arts across state lines. I went on a bit about my usual problems with the myths and metaphors of ”partnerships,” which strike […]

A few weeks back, my MBA program hosted fellow blogger Drew McManus for a mock orchestra negotiation exercise. The idea was for the students to play professional symphony musicians working on a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with Drew, who played the management of a fictious symphony. Drew went on quite a bit about the experience. […]

Finally getting back to my summary last week of Alan Brown’s ‘Architecture of Value,’ rethinking the RAND efforts on the values and benefits of arts experiences. Alan’s model suggests five clusters of benefits, radiating out from the individual and ‘in the moment’ to the community and cumulative. In a nutshell, the five benefits clusters are: […]

Continuing my summary of our recent alumni conference in Madison on The Rise of the Active Audience, our afternoon keynote meshed fabulously with Lynne Conner’s morning conversation (discussed here and here). Alan Brown is among the leading audience research consultants and consumer behavior specialists in the arts these days. And his library of reports and […]

So, what’s an arts manager to do if the premise of yesterday’s post is true (which it seems to be) — that the history of audience interaction with art has been more active than passive, and that the current emphasis on sitting quietly and receiving art is an anomaly? What, especially, are you to do […]

I just came out of a glorious weekend of thoughtful conversation among my program alumni, students, and guests, on the subject of the “active audience.” Our two keynote provocateurs, Lynne Conner and Alan Brown, pushed us all to rethink how we think about audience experiences. And the many students and arts practitioners in the room […]

It’s been a nutty week preparing for our Center’s alumni conference today. I promise to be back in business next week, with thoughts and details on what we learn together. See you all then.

I’m preparing this week to host the bi-annual alumni conference for the master’s degree I direct in Arts Administration. It’s always such a joy to welcome back graduates, to learn from them about their work, and to explore together a theme or trend that’s rising in our collective industry. Our theme this year, ”The Rise […]