{"id":686,"date":"2005-05-03T00:20:48","date_gmt":"2005-05-03T07:20:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp\/2005\/05\/deconstructing_the_symphony_at\/"},"modified":"2005-05-03T00:20:48","modified_gmt":"2005-05-03T07:20:48","slug":"deconstructing_the_symphony_at","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/main\/deconstructing_the_symphony_at.php","title":{"rendered":"Deconstructing the symphony (at least a fake one)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last month, I took part in a fabulous leadership roundtable discussion hosted by the Heinz Endowments<\/a> in Pittsburgh (which inspired me to talk about hammers and sponges<\/a>). Part of our assignment in advance of the meeting was to draft a short case description of an arts organization that reconsidered its business model in response to some struggle or another. The case could be real or imagined, it was just intended to spark a broad conversation among the group.<\/p>\n

With the kind permission of the Heinz Endowments, I’ve now posted my short case to this website: Radical Restructure at the Fictitious Symphony<\/a> is now available in web and downloadable form (under a Creative Commons license, so copy to your heart’s content).<\/p>\n

The case explores the history of the Fictitious Symphony, and its realization that its method<\/i> of addressing its mission may actually be a barrier to achieving<\/i> its mission…so it deconstructs itself into smaller pieces.<\/p>\n

Before anyone writes to pound me, I’m not<\/i> suggesting that symphonies actually attempt the strange hybrid model described in the case. I just intended to nudge a conversation about why<\/i> we frame our organizations the way we do, and why we often can’t see the many other ways of getting to our goals.<\/p>\n

The underlying thought is this: arts and cultural organizations have a mission (in this case, sharing live symphonic music with the world) and they have a means they’ve chosen to get them there (in this case, a full-time, resident, professional symphony). At some point, it may turn out that one no longer serves the other, and the organization needs to choose<\/i> which of those is more important. Either answer is fine, but I’m suggesting that sometimes there has to be a choice.<\/p>\n

Give it a read<\/a>, and please post a comment if it invokes a response (positive or negative).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last month, I took part in a fabulous leadership roundtable discussion hosted by the Heinz Endowments in Pittsburgh (which inspired me to talk about hammers and sponges). Part of our assignment in advance of the meeting was to draft a short case description of an arts organization that reconsidered its business model in response to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-686","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}