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Diane Ragsdale on what the arts do and why

Artistic homes? Excerpts from a recent talk …

jeune luneLast week I gave a brief talk in Edinburgh (at an event sponsored by Mission, Models, Money) for a small gathering of leaders in the arts and culture sector. The aim was of the meeting was to examine and reframe thinking about building-based arts and cultural organizations. I happened to read a book on reframing over the holidays—Reframing: The Art of Thinking Differently, by Karim Benammar. Reframing is a technique that Benammar uses to help individuals and organizations ask themselves two questions: Why do we do the things we do? How can we do things differently?

There are four steps to the process:

  1. Determine a core belief
  2. Find supporting beliefs
  3. Construct opposites for your supporting beliefs
  4. Find a new core belief

Reframing is a process for, in a sense, challenging your current perspectives. For instance, I could start with a core belief like “Lack of a physical building is a liability for a performing arts organization” or “Cultural districts improve the cities in which they are located” or “Arts organizations require contributions to operate.” In general, it’s good to start with a belief that you are unhappy with as the goal of the exercise is to find your way to a new idea that you may wish to embrace. If you were searching for a new artistic director and having a very hard time finding someone you might choose to start with the belief: “Arts organizations require an artistic leader.” I decided to experiment a bit with this method in my talk, excerpts of which follow.

arts community

Part I – Artistic Homes?

The first step of this process is to identify a core belief. Let’s begin with what strikes me as a core belief motivating and justifying much of the facility expansion in the arts and culture sector in recent decades:

A BUILDING IS A HOME

A building will enable us to better support artists and serve the community.

The next step in Bennamar’s process is to identify supporting beliefs. Benammar suggests brainstorming as many of these as possible and then grouping them and coming up with four anchor beliefs. Here are four I came up with that seem to be true in my experience in the US (someone else might come up with a quite different list).

  1. A building enables artistic growth. (That is, more professional work, more work, larger-scale work, more diverse work, the development of new work, residencies, etc.)
  2. A building enables broader and deeper audience reach. (More audiences and more diverse audiences due to being in one location, having more seats, and being able to control price.)
  3. A building gives the organization greater control over its destiny. (No longer subjected to escalating rents, competition for dates and venues, or unable to plan due to risk of losing space.)
  4. A building creates a sense of community.  

The third part of this exercise is to challenge each of the supporting beliefs by creating extreme opposite statements. I spent some time thinking about these and came up with the following, corresponding counter-statements.

  1. A building leads to increased investments in admin and less artistic risk taking.
  2. A building leads to reaching a narrower demographic–primarily the cultural elite
  3. A building increases fixed costs and reduces flexibility and adaptability.
  4. A building changes the organizational culture from clan to bureaucracy, making it less welcoming.

These four supporting beliefs might lead to a very different core belief. For instance:

 A BUILDING IS A PRISON

A building will make it harder to support artists and serve the community.

The point of the exercise is not to identify which of these may be true. The point of the exercise is to dig down and understand where existing beliefs come from and, by going through the process, enable oneself to see the issue from a different perspective. With this new perspective perhaps an arts organization that was discouraged because it was lacking a building would determine to embrace its flexibility, and see its lack of space as a competitive advantage rather than a liability.

scylla and charybdis

Part II – Caught Between Scylla and Charybdis

So which is better? Owning a building or not owning? I’ve run two organizations—a struggling music festival that, when I first arrived, had just lost the lease on its administrative offices and was at risk of losing access to the venue where it held its annual festival; and a performing arts center that moved from renting funky digs in the university district to owning fancier digs in the fine arts district and that struggled mightily in the six years following that move to meet its income targets.

Either path can be treacherous.

Not owning can lead to a precarious existence. I suspect that, in the ephemeral arts, fear of vanishing overnight is quite often a key factor in the quest to own. Over several years I have come to think that, like the couple with the troubled marriage that, in denial and hope, decides to have a child rather than address their problems or get a divorce, arts organizations sometimes decide to concretize their existence in a new building at the point when they should instead be asking themselves why it’s become harder and harder to raise the annual budget, or get audiences through the doors, or whether they really have a viable mission.

The same can be true of cities. The new cultural facility—thanks to Richard Florida—is (still) often seen as the first step in the revitalization of a city in decline that has had a glimpse of its future and sees a wasteland.

On the flipside, one of my key observations from managing the performing arts center struggling to find sufficient audiences and resources to keep the lights on in its new building was that the new space was having a detrimental effect on both the programming and culture of the institution. The organization seemed to be calcifying from the outside in.

Part III – Concrete buildings vs. squishy missions

The newspapers are filled with both new arts facility success stories and new arts facility disasters (though the latter seem to get more attention).

When I was at Mellon, the Foundation supported one of the largest studies to date on the investments in facilities and cultural infrastructure in the US several years ago. The research study is called Set in Stone: Building America’s New Generation of Arts Facilities, 1994-2008. It was conducted by several renowned scholars, working under the aegis of University of Chicago’s Cultural Policy Center, and was published in 2011. (Find a quick overview of the research findings here.)

The research study included several case studies, which suggest factors that may increase the viability and success of a facility build, expansion, or renovation (which I’ve rewritten in the form of questions):

  1. Does the new facility fit into and enhance an organization’s ability to deliver on its mission?
  2. Does the organization have the capacity to operate in an enhanced and expanded space?
  3. Is the surrounding community engaged – will it support the longer term health of the organization and its infrastructure?
  4. Are there funding streams that can be identified and strengthened in the near and longer term to support the increased expenses related to operating and programming the facility?

These may seem like obvious questions but the Chicago study also suggests that once a building project gets launched it can be like a runaway train–difficult to stop, even when the organization encounters disconfirming information (that is, when evidence starts to mount that it will run into problems in one of these areas, or others).

And once the building is open?

Well, while buildings are concrete, missions are often quite squishy. Which is more likely to give when the two are in conflict? When the building demands more programming, more butts in seats, more contributions, more staff at higher wages, more electricity and water, more amenities than the organization can bear? Well, clearly some lose the battle (as Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Dance New Amsterdam, Dance Theater Workshop, and Florida Stage have demonstrated in recent years). But even those that do manage to meet the demands of their buildings often do so at the expense of mission or many of the lofty goals used to justify the facility expansion in the first place (as, for instance, was raised with regard to Arena Stage’s Kogod Cradle a couple years back in this article in the Washington Post).

Things were eventually turned around at the performing arts center mentioned earlier. How? If I’m honest, it was probably largely luck. We were also blessed with a dedicated board, phenomenal history of risk-taking, a clear and focused mission, affiliation with extraordinary artists, and a community of arts supporters. But what did we do in the trenches, so to speak, that may have made some difference? Looking back, I would say that the organization made a conscious decision to push back against the economic, social, and aesthetic constraints or demands of the new facility–to, in a sense, deny its solidity. We challenged a number of beliefs that seemed embedded with the facility and, by doing so, endeavored to reverse the calcification that was setting in. For instance:

  1. A black box studio is for presenting performance work that is small, or not quite ready for the mainstage.
  2. A lobby is where you buy tickets, have a pricey drink, wait before the show starts, or enjoy a buffet on opening night.
  3. People know what this building is and what happens inside.
  4. We don’t have a good space for doing donor events or parties.
  5. It’s a good strategy (artistically and financially) to rent the two spaces when we’re not programming in them.
  6. We must avoid wear and tear on the building; we need to keep it looking nice.
  7. A 300-seat space is problematic.
  8. We can’t modify the new facility.

DNA

Part IV - Purpose that transcends buildings

I have recently had another insight into the role of the building in the life of an arts organization. I was conducting interviews with a number of arts leaders recently and one of the questions I asked them was, “What, if anything, is baked into the DNA of your organization?” Some of them responded, The Theater or The Space.

Think about the implications of one’s building as one’s destiny, particularly at a time when:

  • Many artists seem to be eager to make work in ways that go outside of or otherwise challenge traditional space configurations;
  • Younger audiences seem to yearning for more dynamic or intimate interactions in the performance experience;
  • Economic inequality and cultural divides are growing and the arts palace can be perceived as a symbol of such disparities;
  • The trend is toward environmental responsibility and big arts facilities can be energy hogs that create piles of waste; and
  • Technology is enabling us to overcome, in some cases, geographic, time, and financial barriers that come with building-based distribution of the live performing arts.

Being physically tethered can keep arts groups psychologically tethered; it is easy to conflate the building with the organizational identity and purpose. It can difficult to decouple mission and space. How would you answer the question: What is your organizational purpose transcendent of physical space? Grappling with such a question inevitably forces us to bump into the larger question: What is the purpose of the arts institution?

For decades the goal of the nonprofit arts sector was institution building. We celebrated each time an organization could beef up its administrative staff; increase its budget; buy, build, or renovate a facility; and survive a leadership transition. But if we are trying to find new ways forward it could be beneficial to put on the table for reframing some of our most fundamental beliefs about organizing ourselves for creation and distribution. Beliefs that:

  • Artists need to be part of institutions in order to create great work or find an audience;
  • That building infrastructure and forming arts institutions leads to more stable and increased resources for artists;
  • That organizational growth and professionalization is always good for art-making;
  • That the facility is an asset.[2]

It seems we have been walking around for a long time with an idea that says that owning a facility is better than not owning a facility; that a stable postal address better serves the art, artists, artistic process, audience engagement, and organizational health.

But is this true?

Given the world we live in today, why is bricks-and-mortar permanence still held to be the ideal? Which is most likely to thrive in the future—to be sustainable, to be better able to respond to artist and audience needs and influence the culture-at-large? A flexible, stealth, recyclable, pop-up cultural sector or one constituted of an array of permanent facilities clustered in the arts district? 

It’s a sincere question.

Here are five more questions to consider:

  1. What is one of your core beliefs about buildings? What do you learn if you reframe it?
  2. Is it possible that we have too many unsustainable arts facilities? If so, what should we do about it?
  3. Who is better off and what is improved by a new arts facility? Who and what are worsened?
  4. Has your building become a prison? What can you do to change this?
  5. Why the quest for permanence & existence in perpetuity? How else might we think of our relationship to the world?


[1] From Wikipedia: Scylla was rationalized as a rock shoal (described as a six-headed sea monster) on the Italian side of the strait and Charbydis was a whirlpool off the coast of Sicily

[2] In her paper Four Horseman of the Nonprofit Financial Apocalypse, Clara Miller identifies four factors that seemed to increase an organization’s risk of financial collapse during the recession. As she put it in the article, “Like flu sufferers, organizations with preexisting conditions were more likely to be vulnerable.” What is factor number one? Too much real estate. While leaders and board members often believe that owning a facility will give them the capacity to borrow money or otherwise leverage the asset, it may actually make organizations more fragile during a recession. Those counting on rentals, for instance, find that other arts groups are scaling back programming or are unable to pay rental rates; audiences may decline or scale back on purchases; restaurants, bars, and gift shops may go from being income generators to needing to be subsidized.

 

Innovation to what end?

map guy 2Happy New Year! This is a condensed and slightly adapted version of a short talk I gave in October at an event called Blowup: Innovation in Extreme Scenarios, hosted by a hub organization called V2, located in Rotterdam.

INNOVATION TO WHAT END?

I predicted in an article I wrote in 2005 that “innovation” would become the next buzz word to emerge in US funding applications and I was right. Predicting the rise of innovation hardly required super human insight.  The whole world was striving to innovate—even before the great recession. And over the past few years the hunt for the next great product for the as yet untapped market has become ever-more-desperate.

Speaking of the recession, in 2008, Paul Light, a professor of public service at NYU wrote an article in which he speculated four possible futures for the subsidized sector in the US arising out of the recession:

four scenarios

  1. Rescue Fantasy: nonprofits are saved by significant increases in contributions;
  2. Withering Winterland: organizations starve themselves into a weakened organizational state;
  3. Arbritrary Winnowing: survival of the largest, oldest, and best connected organizations; and
  4. Transformation: a redesign of the sector that leaves it stronger, more vibrant, more sustainable, and more impactful.

At the end of the article, Light predicted that if we let the future take its course it would result in a Withering Winterland or Arbritrary Winnowing and noted that the benefits of transformation could only by reaped deliberate choice. The same prediction could have been made about the future state of the Dutch cultural sector following the government cuts in 2010.

And what picture is emerging in the arts and culture sectors (in both countries)?

bad scenarios

From what I can tell it appears Light’s predictions are panning out.

I have been a critic of the broken-record calls for innovation in the arts sector from governments and private funders; however, I propose to forget about the motivations, expectations, and rhetoric of those holding the money bags for a moment. Instead let’s ask ourselves whether Withering Winterland and Arbitrary Winnowing are the future scenarios that we want for the arts and culture sector. If not, then transformation may be our only choice. And yes, transformation, requires new ideas, new ways of thinking, creating, and distributing, new conceptions of our very purposes, and new value propositions.

Dare I say it? Sector-wide transformation may require innovation.

But we know this, right?

We know that the world has changed and that we need to adapt or otherwise respond to it.

We know this.

So why haven’t we seen massive transformation in the arts and culture sector in response to this changing world?

A couple decades ago two researchers, Pralahad and Bettis, asked just this question. They wondered why it is so difficult for organizations to change and why, even when organizations see change in their environment, they are unable to act.

Pralahad and Bettis conceptualize organizations as having, in essence, a dominant logic – an information filter that focuses the attention of managers on some issues but not others.  The dominant logic also underpins the beliefs about causality that are inherent to an organization’s business model. For instance, we do X, which is of value to society and, in return, Y revenues are paid to us by the government, citizens, sponsors.

We are living in an era in which the logic underpinning our institutions appears to be unsound. It is no longer clear that what we’re doing is of great value to sufficient numbers of people. It is no longer clear that enough people are going to step up and pay for us to continue pursue our missions. How many people stormed the ministry to demand subsidies for the arts in the Netherlands a few years back?

Not enough.

We need a new logic … a new relationship to society … a new way of seeing our place in the world.

Pralahad and Bettis would argue that we cannot find this new logic without first unlearning the old one.

That’s what this model is showing.

pralahad and bennis 2

This graph suggests that instability assists in unlearning an old logic: If your organization becomes sufficiently destabilized, you may abandon your old filter, thus enabling you to see the world in a different way. To see partners where previously you saw competitors. To see venues where previously you saw useless space. To see co-creators where previously you saw ticket buyers. To see clients where previously you saw “non-arts people”. To see 50 ways to deploy existing assets where previously you saw one. To see multiple businesses within your organization where previously you saw one. To see numerous markets for your services where previously you saw a single, rather niche market, of upper middle class, educated people.

Of course, unlearning is not inevitable. Finding a new dominant logic is not an automatic outcome of instability. Some organizations will simply fail. Others will hunker down, wait out the storm, and return to the status quo (the old equilibrium and dominant logic). I wrote about the latter possibility in a post last year when I picked up on a provocation by a field colleague who wondered whether the arts sector in the US had squandered the recession–whether it had, in essence, wasted its opportunity for transformation.

So if we have failed to see transformation (at the organizational or field level) perhaps one reason is that we have not yet been (or allowed ourselves to be) sufficiently destabilized, in a sense, to abandon old models and the long-held beliefs underpinning them.

But I suspect that’s not the only, or even primary, reason.

I suspect the primary reason is that we do not yet have a vision (or buy-in) for what sector-wide transformation would look like or what purpose/whose interests it would serve. And I would say the same is often true of our pursuit of innovation at the individual organization level.

My friend Todd London gave a talk at an innovation summit recently. In it he said, “I come to bury innovation, not to praise it.” I thought very much of doing the same thing today because I, too, am so weary of this discourse. I once ran an organization that had a solid reputation for being innovative; however we never attended an innovation lab or even thought about needing to innovate, per se.

Instead, I would say we had three goals: to do work that no one else in our city would dare to do; to increase the fan base for the art and artists on our stages; and to do everything possible to make sure that the experience was always social, intimate, and meaningful for both the artists and the audiences. Very simple goals and we were willing to question just about everything about the development, production and distribution of our work in order to reach them. And we were willing and able to experiment continually (1) because it was inherent to the mission of the organization and (2) because we were in a state of crisis at the time and it was clear that some things had to be blown up in order for us to move forward.

From my experience innovation is a side product of:

  • actively throwing away existing maps and having one’s organizational eyes wide open to a changing environment (i.e., having vision);
  • having strong values but flexible forms and practices;
  • encouraging creativity throughout the organization;
  • having the courage to see the truth about organizational performance and act upon it;
  • rejecting the status quo as a goal; and instead
  • continually seeking to create greater value in the world.

But how to innovate seems to me the less interesting and powerful question. Beyond “staying alive”or “replacing lost government funds” how will innovating allow you to advance your mission: increase your capacity to bring people together on equal terms, create and share knowledge, provide greater support for artists, develop and produce higher quality work, take risks, or make relevant and meaningful that which has become tired, is unfamiliar or misunderstood, or has been forgotten?

Or to do something else?

More importantly, could innovation serve the goal of sector-wide transformation? If so, how?

What would sector-wide transformation look like?

Until we can answer this question I don’t think we will successfully undertake the overhaul that is needed.

Innovation is a process, not a destination.

It’s a means to an end … The bigger question is, to what end does your organization, or the arts and culture sector as a whole, need or desire to innovate?

What is the changed state you/we want to see in the world? And why?

 

On the distinction between giving people what they want versus what they need.

want needRecently, Nina Simon has written a smart post taking aim at the “Need versus Want” distinction often used to describe the role of (nonprofit) arts organizations—as in, “Our job is not to give people what they want but what they need.” As someone that has, at times, used this distinction to make points in various talks I was eager to read Simon’s post, Let’s Stop Talking About What People Want and Need As If They are Different (and We Can Tell How).

Simon makes three arguments: (1) it’s presumptuous for arts organizations to think they know what people need; (2) sometimes those running arts organizations (rather disingenuously) wrap up what they want to do in something called “serving people’s needs”; and (3) it’s depressing to think that art is not something that people might want. Reading Simon’s post inspired me to think a bit more about why the distinction between Need versus Want is one that has appealed to me in the past and whether I agree that it may be a false and unhelpful comparison for the arts to continue to make.

Taylor Mac on Need and Want:

At the 2013 Under the Radar Festial artist Taylor Mac performed a Manifesto in which he elaborated on “a good number” of his beliefs about the theater. When I read the talk I was immediately taken with a section in which he distinguishes Need from Want in the relationship between artist and audience.

I believe theater is a service industry.  It’s like being a plumber and theater artists are blue-collar workers who wear better clothes, for the most part.

I believe theater artists should be students of humanity

I believe, to learn what your audience needs, is the job

But caution that sometimes we confuse need with want.

Giving our audiences what they want is not the job

Sometimes giving them what they want is a fringe benefit or happy accident but it is not the job

I believe you may be saying to yourself, “That’s very presumptuous of him to think he knows what the audience needs”.  But I believe if I were a plumber you wouldn’t think it was presumptuous of me to say my job is to learn what your plumbing needs. You would say I was a good plumber.

I believe sometimes we confuse what the audience needs with what the artist wants.  That makes crappy art.  But I believe there is room for it all.  Including crappy art.

I am drawn to Mac’s conceptualization for many reasons—not least of which he suggests that the job of the artist is not to presume the needs of the audience as much as learn or discern them. Mac seems to submit that the artist’s ability to comprehend and respond to the world is a skill. Whereas the plumber has the ability to diagnose the needs of a plumbing system, the artist has both the ability and responsibility to do the same with other (social) systems.

Alain de Botton makes a similar argument in his TED talk Atheism 2.0. De Botton rejects the idea of Art for Art’s Sake and asserts, instead, that Art must “do something for this troubled world.” By assigning to Art the responsibility to do more than exist and by characterizing the world as in need de Botton proposes that the ‘job’ (to use Mac’s characterization) of artists and arts organizations is to bring something of value to bear in a ‘system’ (so to speak) in need of repair, maintenance, or perhaps complete overhaul. When I have held up the importance of responding to Need versus Want it has quite often been in this vein.

Moreover, I have often taken the line that effective arts organizations essentially broker an opportunity for people to engage with (and with each other through) the arts experience; and in curating a season arts organizations (ideally) pay attention to their communities and program work that they believe has social or intellectual relevance–that will matter–which can be different from saying that they program work that they believe will sell well.

This alludes to what I would argue is a reason to hold onto the distinction: Need versus Want is quite often shorthand for what it means to choose to work in the part of the sector that is endeavoring to operate outside a market logic. Giving people what they want is often shorthand for being market-oriented and giving them what they need is often shorthand for being artist- and/or community-oriented. This is a potentially critical distinction. Everywhere we look arts organizations (like the rest of society) are encouraged (or permitted, perhaps) to measure their worth (the value of their contributions to society) almost exclusively in short-term, market-driven metrics (positive press garnered, strong box office generated, jobs created, budgets balanced, hotel beds filled).

There can be a tension between serving markets and serving communities and serving the artform and artistic processes—particularly for disciplines like theater which exist in a mixed-market (meaning the markets for theater are occupied by commercial, nonprofit professional, and amateur organizations). I perceive that the Need versus Want language is, at times, useful in helping to parse our relationship to these peculiar masters.

A Caution: Philanthropic Paternalism

Both Simon and Mac rightly allude to the possibility of conflating audience needs with artistic wants. At the organizational level I would characterize this as a caution against what is sometimes referred to as philanthropic paternalism. Philanthropic paternalism is a term I’ve encountered in academic literature primarily drawn from nonprofit studies; it refers to a tendency of those in the private nonprofit sector to identify and address problems as they see them rather than as those they serve see them. Philanthropic paternalism stems from developing programs and services with very little input from those they are intended to benefit. This is a construct that is, arguably, more easily grasped in relation to the health and human services arm of the nonprofit sector, but it still holds in the arts (for both arts organizations and those that fund them).

How might we ‘gather input’ in the arts? Well, what are the processes for identifying where the community’s needs (read: hopes, fears, controversies, voices, stories, history, important events, values, etc.) and the organization’s purpose and goals intersect? We may do market research but are we diligent about thoughtfully accounting for, or engaging the community in, the process of developing missions, vision statements, and strategies? Perhaps tendencies toward philanthropic paternalism are mitigated by inviting a more representative group of individuals from the community to participate in those processes. Even better, why wait for the annual retreat or future-planning summit? Why not change governance and staffing structures and administrative and artistic processes to ensure that the organization (or perhaps a community of organizations working together) will regularly encounter, absorb, and reflect upon knowledge about who lives in the community, what they value, how they live and how they are impacted (or not) by existing cultural institutions in the community?

Need versus Want: Where the distinction makes little sense

While it may be useful for artists and arts nonprofits to distinguish between Need and Want in conceiving of their “jobs” it’s not a distinction we should expect the audience itself to make. Do I need to see Fun Home and Good Person of Szechwan at the Public Theater in New York City when I’m in town next week, or do I want to? It seems a strange question. On the receiving end the distinction begins to evaporate.  Is art necessary and life-saving? Do we sometimes go out of duty or obligation only to find that the experience is (or becomes with time) an enjoyable one? Do we delight in it like a kid in Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory? Sure. Maybe yes to all of the above, or some, or none.

What matters to me is not whether I need or want to see a couple shows at the Public. I value the chance to see these two particular shows sufficiently to pay just over $180 (which is steep on my PhD salary) to see them. What would seem meaningful to me is if I were to browse the offerings of the Public theater, shrug, and come to the conclusion that there’s nothing there I need or want to see.

And that, really, should be our larger concern: Are we losing people? If so, why? Due to what action or inaction on our part in response to ever changing communities, markets, and artworlds? We are perhaps on thin ice if framing our job as giving people what they need (rather than what they want) has become a form of cognitive dissonance reduction–a way of rationalizing declining relevance as a problem outside of our control. Cultural organizations arguably exist to influence the values of the culture as much as reflect or manifest them.

My Grantmakers In the Arts 2013 Conference. I’m Sensing an Evolution.

Grantmakers-2013-2-300x255A few weeks back I was invited to attend the 2013 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference in Philadelphia as a Conference Blogger. I joined Barry Hessenius (Barry’s Blog) and a whole team of bloggers, led by Ian David Moss (Createquity), from Fractured Atlas. I wrote three posts summarizing the activities I attended and reflecting on key themes, which you can find here. I vowed (to myself) that I would let the conference sink in a bit and then write a post for Jumper–a brief summary of the sticky points, if you will. This is that post.

ARTISTS FRONT AND CENTER

In a relatively short period of time (since I was last at GIA in 2009) it seems that the conversation has shifted from being largely organization-centric to being oriented to the needs of both organizations and individual artists (with increased attention being given to the latter at the moment). This was certainly noticeable from the way artists were incorporated into the plenary sessions, but was also evident in the sheer number of sessions dedicated to artists, or artist collectives, or the relationship of artists to institutions (not including the Support for Individual Artists Pre-Conference).

Of course support for individual artists (in practice, or as a topic for conversation at GIA) is not new. What does seem new, however, is the idea that such investments are needed not simply because most artists exist outside of institutional structures but because artists are potentially important agents of change in the arts sector. If we want to see innovation in the arts sector, goes the argument, then perhaps we need to support artist-driven enterprises and encourage the presence and influence of artists within institutions.

To be clear, I didn’t hear the latter argument articulated, per se. The closest sentiment (I heard) came from Ben Cameron when he explained the motivations behind a new program at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, which puts artists in residence at arts organizations with the aim of  Building Demand for the Arts. In his opening remarks, Cameron mentioned that the program was “a reaction to the book Outrageous Fortune,” which he characterized as having “reinforced a divide between artists and institutions.” (For what it’s worth, I would characterize the book as having drawn attention to the divergent perspectives of arts organization leaders and artists that many in the theater field were previously unaware existed or were unwilling to acknowledge.) In any event, I sense that this particular program of the Duke Foundation is representative of a more general idea in the air. As I wrote in this GIA post,

For the first time, in a long time, I was at an arts conference in which artists (rather than organizations) seemed to have primacy. Where are the new ideas going to come from? Artists. Where does the energy to create community organically originate? Artists. Who are the entrepreneurs in the arts and culture sector? Artists.

If this is a growing sentiment, perhaps it would be worthwhile to structure a discussion next year around this idea and its implications for arts organizations?

OPENING UP THE GRANTMAKING PROCESS

A second (rather minor) theme was one that I experienced in large part due to the sessions I chose to attend. It’s the idea that funders now have the motive, opportunity, and means to give communities-at-large, or expert citizens, greater influence in the grantmaking process. Whether they want to take advantage of these tools is another matter; however, it appears that some long established grantmaking processes and structures may be shifting.

When the Knight Foundation first launched the Knight Arts Challenge in 2008 my sense was that it was perceived as a quite radical leap for a private foundation. I didn’t see (m)any other established foundations following Knight into the land of crowdsourced grantmaking. Even a couple years ago when Ian David Moss gave a TEDx talk and wrote an essay advancing his idea for  Citizen Curators to be engaged in the panel process, the funding community seemed rather perplexed by the idea, and it didn’t really seem to take off. At this year’s conference,however, it felt as though the tide may be shifting. Many arts funders acknowledged that they are rethinking their panel processes and some expressed receptivity to the idea of opening up their decision-making processes for direct engagement, or at least influence, by the end users that they are trying to reach through the arts. You can read more about this theme in my third blog post, which includes a discussion on the shift in Irvine’s program goals and strategy.

If I’m right about this then, again, it could be worthwhile to engage a discussion or debate around the implications of such shifts.

CONCLUSION: THE MEANS AND ENDS OF INNOVATION AND CAPITALIZATION

After writing this blog I decided to read the wrap ups of my fellow bloggers and I was struck by two things: (1) None of us attended the same conference–in the sense that we each walked away with a different perspective depending on the sessions we decided to attend. (2) If you attend GIA every year (as I did for years) it is hard to sense the change that may be happening.

In advance of going to GIA I was told by those organizing the conference that GIA had changed quite a bit since I was last in attendance. I was skeptical. And wrong to be so. Being away from the conference the past four years has, I believe, enabled me to detect the degree to which some things have, indeed, shifted with the times. When I was last at GIA the conversation seemed to be largely focused on the mis- or under-capitalization of arts organizations and ways to enable and encourage flailing organizations to either innovate or die gracefully. No doubt this was in large part due to the influence of the recession.

Don’t get me wrong—Systegic Survibrustainadaptinnovaccountabeffectipreneurism (my mash up of current funder jargon) continues to waft through every discussion and capitalization, in particular, is still cooking on the front burner. However, the conversation seems more evolved now. I sense (and hope I am right on this) that funders have begun to see innovation as a process rather than a destination (and one that should not be institutionalized by funders) and to ask themselves a question that the chair of my department at Erasmus, Arjo Klamer, might ask. Namely, “What’s capitalization good for?” In other words, what are the “goods” (the values, ideas, benefits to the world) that foundations are striving to realize in supporting the capitalization of organizations?

As I understand it, GIA has been actively recruiting new members to the fold the past few years (e.g., family foundations, local and regional arts councils, and community foundations). Additionally, it feels as though the median age of participants at GIA has dropped. It makes me wonder if the evolution in the conversation (if I’m right about that) is a result of having a wider lens on the world … and the role of the arts, artists, and arts organizations within it.

I sincerely hope others in attendance will consider weighing in. Did I attend the same conference you did? If not, what themes emerged for you?

On tipping the dominoes then walking away …

shutterstock_77378713A couple months back I was one of a number of people interviewed for a research project of Grantmakers in the Arts. The interview was aimed at understanding my influences as a funder (when I worked at the Mellon Foundation) and drawng out some lessons learned. At one point in the discussion I found myself saying that I had probably left grantmaking just in time because I was not sure I understood how to be an effective arts grantmaker over the long haul.

While at Mellon I found myself continually questioning whether it was better to provide stable support to a few over a very long period of time (forsaking all others) or to “cycle out” grantees after a reasonable period of time in order to make room for new entrants.

No matter the choice, the questions that ensued were maddening: If “fewer but larger” which few given that so many worthy organizations needed support? If “spreading the wealth” then what was a “reasonable” timeline for ending support given that organizations and their projects were chronically underfunded?

Without a doubt, a common funder’s dilemma.

And there were other aspects that troubled me.

For one, since no single funder is generally a “majority stakeholder” in most arts organization, the fate of any organization is a factor of actions by quite a number of private and public donors, who can have competing values, rationales, measures of success, and goals.

And perhaps most disconcerting, as time went on it felt increasingly difficult to see the sector with clear eyes. As in any organization, attention in a foundation is focused on some problems but not others. The lens is narrowed and the field is seen through the logic of the current “regime” and through the eyes of current grantees. Problems are problems only insofar as they can be addressed by and classified within existing program areas and can be grasped and articulated using the house rhetoric. Whole swaths of the sector and their issues, by necessity, become invisible in order for the funder to maintain any sense of purpose and potency; to think about everything one can’t fund is to invite a nervous breakdown on an organizational level.

***

About a month ago, I was reading an oft-cited essay from 1970 by Zelda Fichandler, co-founder of Arena Stage in Washington DC and pioneer of the resident theater movement. The essay is called Theatres or Institutions?* Perhaps because this GIA interview had been on my mind I found myself circling back to a couple of paragraphs in which Fichandler questions and reflects upon the impact of first receiving funding (when the Ford Foundation, NEA, and others first began to support theaters) and then losing it a little over a decade later. (Emphases added by me.)

She writes:

What happens when the money comes in a little? When you get enough from the Ford Foundation or the National Endowment to move ten squares and buy the Atlantic City Boardwalk? Is it migraine headache time? What time is it when you are suddenly endowed with all the blessings of institutionalization? (Mind you, the blessings aren’t something that are forced on you. They’re something you asked for without quite knowing what you’re getting.) Time for the Table of Organization? Time for the specialization of labor? Time to begin to consider the internal distribution of wealth now that you’ve got some? The promoting, marketing and distribution of the product? Ways to increase efficiency, ways to rationalize use of time and manpower, ways to diversify so as to appeal to a broader base, ways to close the gap between income and spending? It’s headache time and Surprise! Surprise! Time. One has become a private enterprise in a capitalistic society. The “not for profit” in your papers really says No Parking. Shades of Adam Smith and the Ford Motor Company of American and Pan, where hast thou fled? (p. 109)

[…]

We’ll need more money than we are getting and we must get it in a different way. Arena Stage has just received a terminal grant from the Ford Foundation which, partially matched by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts will just about cover our deficit for the last season and for this one and the next. We have also received other grants from these and from other foundations, among them a three-year grant for a workshop program for our acting company, a three-year grant for the training at minimal salaries of young craftsmen under a production intern scheme, a three-year grant to increase the salaries of a ten-person nucleus of an acting company. This was very early on, around 1958 or 59—to entice actors from the magnetic field of New York. …

I mention these in particular to make the point that while it may be better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, these grants had such a seminal meaning for our organization that when they were withdrawn, or, more accurately not renewed, the trauma was so intense that one wondered whether it would have been better not to have had them than to have had them and lost them.

Not knowing from one year to the next whether there will be a spring, or only summer, winter and fall, one simply does not know how to organize one’s closet. I suggest an end to this tithing tease. I suggest a recognition that subsidy is here to stay or we cannot possibly. (p. 110)

Reading this last line, in particular, brings to mind some of Scott Walters’ recent posts on the need for artists to create new business models that are not dependent on contributions in order to maintain their independence (summarized here by Laura Axelrod).

I am compelled by the dead-in-your-tracks ending of the last sentence of Fichandler … or we cannot possibly. Cannot what? Cannot conceive of any way, perhaps, to continue the revolution that the resident theater movement was intended to be if our comrades in the large private foundations and federal arts agency abandon the cause.

Less than a decade after she spoke these words major funding from Ford would be evaporating and funds from the NEA would begin to flatten before beginning their descent. And by 1978 there would be a palpable sense that the resident theater movement had taken a wrong turn at some point along the way.

I keep returning to these paragraphs from Fichandler’s essay because they illustrate poetically and potently what happens in the psyche of a grantee when a little bit of money comes in and when it, inevitably, goes away. In response to the question, Would it have been better not to have received these grants than to have received them and lost them? I finding myself wanting to shout back at the page, “Yes! You would have been better off never having received the money!”

No matter how good the intentions of most foundations over the past several decades it seems the “tithing tease” has debilitated rather than strengthened the sector. And by debilitated I mean weakened the ability of organizations to enact their missions.

So what is the problem? I find myself wanting to push past questions like whether or not the field would benefit from more GOS and less project-based support, or from longer-term rather than shorter-term grants and ask a more  philosophical question … Something like …

Is it ethical for funders to start what they cannot finish?

Cannot because they do not have the resources … Or cannot because they are unwilling to commit to full funding or long-term support because it is believed that these create an unhealthy resource dependency …  Or because there is a desire to keep options open in order to be able to pursue new initiatives or respond to new grantees at will.

The assumption embedded in the term “start” is that I’m not talking here about the kind of helping hand that simply wants to support ongoing programs or operations. I’m talking about the kind of hand that seems to want to push, pull,  prod, coax, launch, build, expand, change, or otherwise disrupt the status quo.

Some follow-on questions …

  • Is it ethical to de-fund organizations that are achieving agreed upon goals, if you know that removing support will destabilize the organization or the funded program?
  • Is it ethical to provide “seed funding” if the organization is unlikely to be able to raise the remaining funds needed to finance the initiative (in the start up phase and over time).
  • Is it ethical to start relationships with new organizations (i.e., cut the pie into smaller pieces) when those that are currently funded are already receiving inadequate support?

Fichandler says it all in those paragraphs: (1) Even small amounts of money can have undue influence. She isn’t just talking about new programs being started, she’s talking about a shift in the logic, the goals, and the processes of her theater. (2) When money goes away it can be traumatic–not simply because it’s hard to replace the cash but because it feels like, and signals to others, a withdrawal of support for the cause.

As far as I can tell not much has changed with funders since 1970. We continue (at times) to give organizations just enough money to encourage them toward one path rather than another (a choice that we know will consequently enable certain future paths and disable others) and then we walk away when they are just far enough down the path that they can’t really turn back.

We still call it philanthropy but perhaps we need another name for an action that essentially amounts to tipping the dominoes and then walking away.

***

PS – I am delighted (!) to have been asked to attend and blog about the 2013 Grantmakers in the Arts conference in Philadelphia in early October. I will be posting on the GIA website and also on Jumper.

*Essay published by the International Theatre Institute (US) in a journal called Theatre 3 (one of five such journals).

Trying to find the money-motivation sweet spot

for love and moneyLast week, over on New Beans, Clay Lord wrote a post in which he mentioned the release of a new report on the salaries at arts agencies and used some of the findings, as well as some personal experiences, to discuss (among other things) the relationship between passion and salaries. He opined:

 We, as a field, need to get out of the cycle of allowing passion or lack of knowledge to displace financial worth—especially when this (and other) data show that such passion likely in part allows for disparities that should not exist.  We, as a field, need to better understand that we have inherent disparities, that we have created systems where moving up is challenging in part because our leaders are being paid in passion as much as they’re being paid in salary, and that passion isn’t something that you can retire on—systems where talented would-be leaders reluctantly fall away, frustrated at or unable to afford the reality of working in it—systems where some of our brightest cannot devote their whole energies to what they’re doing and also afford balance, family, time, space.

The link that Clay makes between intrinsic motivation (e.g. passion) and extrinsic motivation (e.g. salary) is one that has been studied quite a bit, particularly in the creative industries. People have theorized, and studies have confirmed, that people accept lower salaries than they might otherwise make (or than what they might actually need to live) in exchange for the various intrinsic benefits that they derive from a life in the arts.

Interestingly, some researchers have also looked at this question from the other direction. That is, what happens when you pay people to do something that they might normally do just for the love of it? Bruno Frey is a leading discussant on this topic and, in particular, on Crowding Theory as it relates to motivation, money and the arts. He writes in his 2000 book, Arts & Economics: Analysis & Cultural Policy:

Crowding Theory analyses the effect of external interventions on intrinsic motivation. It is thus applicable to the creativity of individuals, which relies strongly on motivation to act for its own sake, rather than because of external compensation. The external intervention may consist of monetary and non-monetary rewards, as well as certain stipulations. It is based on a well-developed psychological effect known as ‘Hidden Cost of Rewards’ and ‘Cognitive Evaluation Theory’, stating that rewarding highly motivated persons to undertake a task tends to reduce their intrinsic motivation. Due to the external incentive introduced intrinsic motivation is no longer needed nor appreciated. This psychological relationship has been generalized to the Crowding-Out Effect.

In other words, money tends to crowd out intrinsic motivation.

Crowding theory may help explain such things as:

  •  Why volunteers may get a warm glow from a job well done, a hearty thanks, and a token gesture, like a T-shirt or a free meal, but may feel less enthused (and appreciated) if they are instead offered a low hourly wage for their efforts.
  • Why, once you have been paid very well to do something you love, over time it feels more like a job and you both expect to be paid and (perhaps) enjoy it less than you did when you weren’t making much money doing it.
  • Why people often romanticize the early days of nonprofit startups when no one was being paid but everyone was there for the love of it—and why they often feel something is lost as the organization grows and begins to hire others, often paying them a living wage.

Therese Amabile is also a leading scholar on the relationship between the external environment and internal motivation for people working in the creative industries. Amabile has found that money, severe deadlines, competition, and fear of retribution all (contrary to some myths) tend to hinder creative work.

And some months ago (in a post called Not In It For The Money) I shared a link to a terrific RSA video (called Drive) in which Daniel Pink reflects on the findings from a couple studies that look at the relationship between monetary rewards and work performance and found that–with the exception of jobs that are mechanical (e.g., working on an assembly line)–larger financial rewards do not necessarily lead to higher performance and may even be inversely correlated with performance. He describes non-mechanical tasks as those that are complicated or require a high degree of conceptual or creative thinking.

However, Pink also makes the critical caveat that this finding only holds once you are paid enough that money can be taken off the table as an “issue” (meaning, you can stop thinking about money and think about the task). I recommend that you watch the entire video to get the nuance underpinning these statements. It’s a great animated talk and is only ten minutes or so.

Reflecting on Clay’s post and these ideas, I began puzzling on this relationship between passion for the mission/arts and money and wondering  (particularly with regard to larger arts nonprofits):

  • Which jobs within a typical art group would be categorized as “mechanical” and which as “creative/conceptual/complex”? Do we (or should we) reward accordingly (i.e., using financial rewards to get higher performance out of the former, but not the latter)?
  • Does money crowd out passion for the mission the way it crowds out intrinsic motivation for the job itself? And how might equity in pay relate to this? In other words, does paying exceedingly high salaries to a few at the top crowd out intrinsic motivation/passion of the rest?
  • Is there a money-motivation sweet spot, where a staffer or artist is paid enough that money can be “taken off the table” but not so much that the job attracts even those with no intrinsic motivation for the task? In other words, is there any benefit to leaving a modest “compensation hole” to be filled by passion for the work or mission of the nonprofit?

 

Taming our inner speculators …

speculators

A few days ago, while doing research, an article caught my attention. It was written in 1936 and it was about the birth of Theatre Arts magazine twenty years earlier (in 1916). Here’s how the founding of the magazine is described in the article:***

For it began in revolt against musty tradition, its first issue proclaiming a credo that still rings in the ear: ‘To help conserve and develop creative impulse in the American theatre; to provide a permanent record of American dramatic art in its formative period; to hasten the day when the speculators will step out of the established playhouse and let the artists in.

(Emphasis added.)

That day seemed to have arrived with the formation of the resident theater movement–the “alternative-to-commercial” theater–30 years later. As I noted last week, Zelda Fichandler recently described the movement’s inspiration and purpose saying:

We looked at what we had – the hit-or-miss; put-it-up, tear-it-down; make-a-buck, lose-a-buck; discontinuous; artist-indifferent; New York-centered ways of Broadway, and they weren’t tolerable anymore, and it made us angry. The fabric of thought that propelled us was that  theatre should stop serving the function of making money, for which it has never been and never will be suited, and start serving the revelation and shaping of the process of living, for which it is uniquely suited, for which it, indeed, exists. The new thought was that theatre should be restored to itself as a form of art.

If only achieving the ideals of the resident theater movement (the revolution, as it was called) had been as simple as kicking the speculators out and giving the artists the keys to the buildings, the business cards, and nonprofit status.

It turns out that as nonprofit theaters became successful, some of them started to look a lot like commercial producers. A 1984 New York Times article– Will Success Spoil Nonprofit Theater?–described the whys and hows and so whats of the process:

With achievement comes heightened expectations, expectations not necessarily consistent with a theater’s role of developing new plays and new writers. … Rare is the artistic director who does not hunger at some level for acclaim in New York; it is the theater capital of the nation, and Broadway, however maligned, is a part of the mythology on which theater people have raised. There are practical advantages, too. The income from a commercial transfer can virtually support a nonprofit theater … And the publicity attendant to a transfer makes it easier for a nonprofit theater to both raise money and to attract leading artists.

The problem is that the gravitational tug of Broadway is strong. There can come a point when a nonprofit theater begins producing plays solely, or subliminally, to export them to New York.

There it is again.

That “long tug of war,” referenced last week, “between art and commerce, spiritual ideals and materialistic forces …”

The resident theater was founded (and propelled forward by the Ford Foundation) at a time when philanthropists believed that the best way to organize the cultural sector was to create clear boundaries between the “commercial entertainment” and “artistic” spheres and to avoid contamination between the two. (Whether this still is, or ever was, a good policy or approach is a topic for another post, perhaps.)

If you go back and read about the formation of the first symphony orchestras (decades earlier), you can observe this same “weed out the entertainment” then “fertilize the art” strategy.

Of course there’s a difference between theater and symphony orchestras (which perhaps foundations and government agencies did not fully account for): one doesn’t see many (any?) examples of “commercial orchestras” in the US.

Not only did a robust commercial theater industry precede the resident theater movement, it continued to exist (and compete with the nonprofit theater) once resident theaters were formed. Theater exists in a mixed market, and one in which the commercial theater has held heavy sway for the past century.

So, even if we had subsidies on par with Sweden or Germany, we probably could not have kept the art and commerce theater worlds separate for many, obvious reasons–not least of which, successful playwrights, actors, directors, designers, and producers rarely work exclusively within one industry (either Hollywood, or Broadway, or Off-Broadway, or regional theater) and successful properties (plays, books, films, etc.) frequently traffic across these boundaries as well.

And while subsidies helped to fortify the lines between the sectors for 20 years or so, as many nonprofit leaders have remarked over the years, after funding fell off from Ford and the NEA, what choice remained but to do more commercial fare (whether shows aimed at Broadway or hits that had already played there)? How could theaters be expected to pursue the ideals of the movement when the beliefs underpinning the economic model were no longer valid?

So, given that nonprofit theaters exist in a mixed market, given that artists and properties cross sector boundaries, given that  funding went away but the big buildings built with the funding had to be supported anyway, co-productions between the two sectors … collaborative R&D … exchange of rights … transfers … alliances … dalliances … deals between the two sectors… were perhaps inevitable.

As Bob Brustein (founder of ART & Yale Rep) remarked in a meeting in 2011 of commercial producers and nonprofit theater leaders to discuss partnerships between the two sectors:

I want to say something about commercial production [ at resident theaters]. I’ve obviously been a big enemy of that. But I’m an enemy of the frequency of it.

I think it’s inevitable from time to time. The question is keeping some sort of a constraint on it […]

Whether you want to or not, one of those shows is gonna go [to Broadway].

But why constrain it? Why tame our inner speculators? Particularly in this era of social and cultural entrepreneurship when, everywhere you look, people are making money while doing good and doing good while making money. By comparison, the legal and cultural/cognitive boundaries between the “art theater” and the “money theater” (to use Todd London’s great tags in this terrific essay) start to feel oppressive–as though they may be holding us back from reaching our full potential, from being the “entrepreneurial” organizations that governments, foundations, boards, and donors now want nonprofits to be.

I think the 1984 article illustrates why. If you start to go back in time (before even the creation of nonprofit resident theaters) over and over again you will observe that commercial success seems to breed external and internal pressure for more commercial success, which seems to be at odds with some of the core values or purposes (e.g., access, diversity, artist development, artistic risk taking, education, community-building, preservation and innovation) that “art theaters” or resident theaters exist to uphold or advance.

The question is, how to keep some sort of constraint … given that intermingling is perhaps inevitable … given the ‘gravitational pull” of Broadway … AND given that it’s great to reach more people with great theater and difficult for a new work to enter the cultural canon and discourse without going to Broadway.

At the same 2011 meeting (mentioned above), Polly Carl, editor at HowlRound, suggested that what was needed is a code of ethics. Ethics in the American theater is a running theme throughout Polly’s writing and talks. In one essay on the subject, she urges nonprofit theater leaders to prioritize the creation of an ethics statement that “answers the hard questions.”

What types of questions?

In her book, Economic Lives, economic sociologist Viviana Zelizer refers to the OED for a definition of ethics: “The science of morals: the department of study concerned with the principles of human duty.” She then expounds on the definition, writing:

In economic activity, then, ethics concerns the proper way of conducting production, consumption, distribution, and transfer of assets. For instance, ethical questions assume such varied forms as, Is it right to pay women for their eggs? Is it wrong for a supervisor to make sexual advances to an employee? May a CEO legitimately issue public reports exaggerating a firm’s economic performance? Is it appropriate for company executives to use company jets for personal trips? More generally, is it feasible to set rules that eliminate conflicts of interest between a person’s corporate responsibility and private interests? …

I could certainly imagine an equivalent list of questions for nonprofit arts organizations. And in this era in which there is increased scrutiny over the ethical practices of corporations, I could certainly see why the time is ripe (if not overripe) for this effort in the nonprofit arts.

And not because of commercial deals, per se. The ethical issues for a nonprofit theater would seem to be much broader than how to do deals or how many deals to do.

But I’m curious what others think.

Do nonprofit theaters (or other arts nonprofits) need ethics statements?

If so, what hard questions should be put on the list?

 

  Speculators is a John Leech sketch from 1846.

***Theatre Arts at the Age of Twenty. New York Times, Feb. 2, 1936.

A new talk: Our long tug of war in the arts

coconut groveA couple weeks back I gave a talk in Australia at the annual conference of APACA (the Australian Performing Arts Center Association). It’s called Living in the struggle: Our long tug of war in the arts. I would characterize this as a rather existential talk, concerning our necessary missions and the free market society in which we now exist, and the different directions they so often seem to pull us. The first section of the talk is called Mission, Markets, Morals, and Mice. In it, I recount the highlights of a newly published experimental study (from Germany) that recently garnered the headline in one journal, “Markets make us less moral.”

Here’s how this experiment worked:

The researchers put participants into three groups. The first group was simply presented with two options: accept the death of a lab mouse and receive ten euros; or forego the money and the mouse lives. They were shown a picture of the mouse and a video of the process that would be used to euthanize the mouse. In this scenario 46% of people said they would allow the mouse to be killed in exchange for ten euros.

In a second scenario—a bilateral market, with one buyer and one seller—the seller was given the mouse and told, “the life of the mouse is entrusted to your care” but you can sell the mouse to the buyer (for a negotiated amount up to a predetermined maximum) and the mouse will be killed. In this scenario a much higher percentage of sellers–72%–said they would allow their mouse to be killed in exchange for money.

The third scenario was a multilateral market, with multiple buyers and sellers, and the percentage selling their mouse was slightly higher still: 76%.

The researchers then ran the experiment with coupons instead of mice. In this study, in contrast to the study with the mice, the percentages were the same across all three groups. What the researchers make of this finding is that the marketplace effects, in particular, our “moral decisions” rather than our more “neutral decisions.”

So why did I raise this experiment as a topic of discussion?

Because I would assert the following: (1) for a nonprofit arts organization, what to program, where, for whom, and at what price are not just business decisions, they are moral decisions; (2) the lines between the market and voluntary (i.e., nonprofit) sectors matter and we, thus, need to question our motives for choosing some works or strategies, over others; and (3) if, for arguments sake, we think of our mice as the artists we exist to support and the local communities we exist to serve, some of us may be sacrificing our mice, so to speak, in an effort to thrive in this “market society” (to use a term I first encountered in Michael Sandel’s book What Money Can’t Buy.

In the end this new talk is an attempt to suggest that while the arts sector has grown and proved to have tremendous staying power that we may have done so at the expense of the goals, values, and ideals that we set out to achieve in the first place.

As an example, in doing my research on the evolution of the resident theater movement over the past several decades, I recently came across an article from 1992 about Arnold Mittelman’s tenure at the now defunct Coconut Grove Playhouse in Miami.* The article opens with the following quote, which seems to perfectly encapsulate the heart of my talk:

Like the village that surrounds it, the Coconut Grove Playhouse has lived to middle age in more-or-less constant tension, its stage the locus of a long tug of war between art and commerce, spiritual ideals, and materialistic forces.

For those that don’t know, the Coconut Grove Playhouse began as a movie theater but was purchased, renovated, and reopened on January 3, 1956 as a playhouse. Its first production was the US premiere of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. In 1982, actor-director José Ferrer was named Artistic Director and under his supervision the Playhouse gained a reputation as one of the nation’s leading resident theatres. In 1985, Arnold Mittelman was selected after a national search to succeed Ferrer. Mittleman was at first hailed as a savior for pulling the organization out of financial crisis. Before too long, however, some of Mittelman’s methods of salvation began to raise eyebrows. He was criticized for failure to take artistic risks; failure to provide local artists with a place to hone their talents; for having overtly commercial producing ambitions; and for receiving excessive compensation and perks. There were comments in the article like this one …

It galls us that a state-supported institution, a regional institution, does not in fact hire Florida actors. … Mittelman is clearly acting like any other commercial entrepreneur, but under the guise of a state-supported institution.

Or this …

 I’m fed up not just with the fact that Mittelman won’t employ local talent, I’m fed up with the fare he keeps bringing here … A regional theater should be doing cutting-edge stuff.

Or finally …

What we need is someone who is developing more than tried-and-true box office successes. If you’ve got a state theater that’s also supported by contributions, you ought to be less worried about selling tickets and take some more risks. As it is, we’re looked upon as a sort of cruise ship on terra firma.

Towards the end of the article, Mittelman defends his actions on the basis that the world of regional theater had changed significantly from what it was even a few years before. He asserts that achieving those original ideals—(e.g. supporting a local company of actors and producing “serious” fare rather than musicals)—was no longer the goal of his theater or a majority of resident theaters. In essence, he describes an evolution in resident theaters and suggests that he is being judged against a standard set at a different time, when the environment could support the ideals of the pioneers of the movement–pioneers like Zelda Fichandler who (in a 2011 talk) remarked on the formation of the resident theater movement, saying:

What drew us to the way we went? What was the vision, the inciting incident? Actually, there was no incident, no high drama, there was simply a change of thought, a new way of looking at things, a tilt of the head, a revolution in our perception. We looked at what we had – the hit-or-miss; put-it-up, tear-it-down; make-a-buck, lose-a-buck; discontinuous; artist-indifferent; New York-centered ways of Broadway, and they weren’t tolerable anymore, and it made us angry. …

The fabric of the thought that propelled us was that theatre should stop serving the function of making money, for which it has never been and never will be suited, and start serving the revelation and shaping of the process of living, for which it is uniquely suited, for which it, indeed, exists. The new thought was that theatre should be restored to itself as a form of art.

Nobody was looking for us, peering through the window, watching for us to come to relieve the boredom and unawareness of their lives. It was we who had to teach and persuade them to want what we wanted to give them. And we had to insist on it for their own good, but, really, for our own, if we were honest enough to admit that. … Nobody called us, but we came.

The evolution Mittleman described in 1992 has continued apace.

In the “long tug of war” it seems that art has ceded quite a bit of ground to commerce and that many of the ideals of the resident theater movement have eroded in the face of larger economic, social, and cultural forces in the world.

We have witnessed a long creep towards commercialism in the nonprofit sector in the US generally (not only in the arts), in part, because this is what the American system seems to encourage. What happened to resident theaters? Perhaps it was the same thing that happened to nonprofit hospitals and other social service organizations? In his 2003 book The Resilient Sector, Lester Salamon addresses the evolution of the nonprofit sector in the US in the face of a host of pressures. What he asserts, provocatively, is that US nonprofits have proven to be extremely resilient in the face of such pressures, but that the strategies they have employed to survive have, over time, moved them in the direction of the market and farther away from their missions, what he calls their “distinctive purpose.” Salamon ultimately argues that a better balance needs to be struck between the things that make nonprofits special and the things nonprofits need to do in order to survive. (See pages 75-87.)

Reading Salamon, it seems that the much heralded resilience that many of us have achieved in recent years has perhaps required us to un-tether ourselves from our missions. It’s taken for granted these days that large resident theaters regularly hire NY actors rather than local actors, have done away with both repertory and acting companies with rare exception, send musicals to Broadway, and pay their leaders quite decent salaries.

But it wasn’t always thus; and, as the article on Mittelman suggests, at one point such organizational behaviors gave us pause.

After my talk I had several really interesting conversations with the delegates. In particular, one participant came up to me at a tea break and said, “Your talk made me realize I gave up my mice a couple years ago and I need to get them back.”

I would suggest the same is true of more than a few nonprofit arts organizations out there.

Yes, Mittelman is right, the world has changed. We are in the middle of a decades-long tug of war. If the winds were on our side at the beginning of this tug of war, it seems they have shifted. It is harder and harder for us to defend the existence of our organizations on any level except, perhaps, economic impact (and, as I’ve written about before, we need to be very cautious about going down that path).

I don’t believe we win this tug of war by dropping the rope—by denying our missions or denying this market society. Though, when we are tired after decades in the trenches, it sure can be tempting to throw down the rope. As we drift into middle age many of us let go of our ideals … We need to watch out for this when we are laboring in pursuit of something greater than ourselves. And I’m talking to myself as much as anyone else reading this post.

We win by figuring out how to stay in the struggle. The struggle is our mission.

I ended my talk writing:

There’s a saying that my husband frequently uses (in reference to himself): “Weed never dies.” I gather it is a phrase that has come to have many interpretations, the most obvious that pesky or wild people are often hard to deter or suppress.

I like this saying.

Here’s the thing about weeds: they are rarely cultivated, much less fertilized, but they show up anyway. And they are unapologetic about it. They are often quite hearty. And their strategy is to overwhelm.

I sometimes think what we need is to overwhelm this market society with bold, ambitious art. And we must not be apologetic about it. We must not wait to be asked.

Remember Zelda Fichandler’s words:

Nobody was looking for us, peering through the window, watching for us to come to relieve the boredom and unawareness of their lives. It was we who had to teach and persuade them to want what we wanted to give them. And we had to insist on it for their own good, but, really, for our own, if we were honest enough to admit that. … Nobody called us, but we came.

Which is another way of saying, “We are here to give people what they need, not what they want.”**

We weren’t meant to blend in … we in the arts. We are the antidote … the resistance … the challengers of the status quo. Though we may be in it, we are not meant to be of this market-driven world.

* Rowe, Sean & Almond, Steven (1992). Coconut Grove Playhouse Feature Story. Miami Herald, 11 March 1992.

** This is a reference to a phenomenal talk by Taylor Mac at last year’s Under the Radar Festival Symposium, called I Believe: A Theater Manifesto.

 

On organizations evolving: when short-term coping mechanisms become the new way of doing business

icebergsA couple weeks ago, one of my favorite arts bloggers, Andrew Taylor (a/k/a The Artful Manager) wrote a post whose title conveys a pretty strong thesis: Organizations don’t evolve; they cope.  While I share Andrew’s skepticism of the field’s use of natural world metaphors (ecosystem, ecology, evolve, adapt, sustainability, etc.) it’s not because I think the metaphors don’t apply (within limits); it’s because I think we sometimes misapply them.

Andrew begins his analysis with a comparison between individual organizations and individual organisms, writing:

We’re calling on existing organizations to evolve to the new environment, as living organisms evolve to theirs. Only, individual organisms don’t evolve. They only cope. So, we can tell a nonprofit corporate organization to evolve just as effectively as we can tell a fish to grow opposable thumbs. Its traits and tendencies were inherited at birth. It can adjust its tendencies, it can retrain its reflexes, but it’s still a nonprofit corporate organization, even if it can do new tricks.

He then rightly points out a couple paragraphs later that there are differences between an organization and a fish:

An organization is a bundle of people, things, processes, and traditions, bound by contracts and covenants, and restricted in its operation by laws, codes, and norms. A fish is, well, a fish.

The distinctions that Andrew makes between an organization and a fish are critical; indeed, it is these very distinctions that would seem to make it possible for an organization to evolve and impossible for a fish to do so.

Moreover, I would argue that (legally constraining, in principle, as the form may be) the nonprofit corporation has demonstrated that it can be rather easily manipulated to ends (goals) other than the (educational or charitable) ones which any given 501c3 organization is presumably formed to pursue. In other words, where there’s a will to evolve, there seems to be a way.

***

Organizations are socially-constructed systems with goals, presumed to be shaped by the contexts in which they are established. Typically, variations in organizations have been perceived to come about primarily through the deaths of old forms and the births of new ones. With the birth of new organizations, variations may be introduced, some of which will be retained in the population.

The introduction of the nonprofit form in theater is a nice example. In the first half of the twentieth century it was relatively rare to find a professional, nonprofit theater company in the US. With the emergence of funding from the Ford Foundation, and later the NEA, the nonprofit form became (in the words of Arena Stage founder, Zelda Fichandler) the apava for resident theaters across the US. In a 2011 talk, she remarked:

There’s an expressive word, I believe it’s Sanskrit – and the word is apava – that translates as “the effective means to make a vision concrete” or workable or real. Our apava, strangely enough, turned out to be the nonprofit corporation. Some of us might take that fact for granted, but we shouldn’t. It’s the basic reality of our existence. Before nineteen hundred and fifty something, theatre was excluded from the benefits given to science, universities, charities, the church, opera, and maybe dance – but not theatre, because it made a profit. We knew that without the nonprofit blanket we could not exist, for it allows us to receive gifts and grants and to be free of taxes on tickets.

Beginning in the 1960s there was an exponential growth in the number of nonprofit theaters. Organizational ecologists would suggest this was a reflection of the legitimacy of the form over other forms and that this growth would continue until the population had reached its carrying capacity, and then it would begin to decline. The carrying capacity is the maximum population size that an environment can sustain indefinitely given available resources.

As an example of the growth and decline in a population, as part of HowlRound’s recent weekly series on Black Theater in the US, Sade Lythcott noted in her essay that “in the roughly ten-year span of the Black Arts Movement in New York alone (1965-1975), over two hundred black theaters emerged; today there are less than ten.” The decline in that population (not only in NYC but across the US) has been considered by some in the theater field to represent the struggle of black theaters to attain legitimacy, resources, support, meaning, etc: they were birthed in a certain context and as the environment around them shifted they were unable to compete and survive.

Likewise, it is rare these days to see a young contemporary choreographer form a permanent company in NYC with a large number of dancers on the payroll, or a resident theater company (in any city) formed with a permanent acting company.

And it’s not just certain forms of arts organization that are now harder to sustain; reading the “bracing” conclusion of the executive summary of the 2010 National Arts Index (as reported by Ben Davis), one wonders if we have reached the carrying capacity for the nonprofit form in the arts generally:

Given the profusion of underfunded organizations, the nonprofit model may have to be abandoned in favor of more experimental or market-oriented business models for the arts.

This is frequently how evolution in an organizational population is seen to occur: through the death, birth, and (importantly) growth of some organizations (and not others) in response to a shifting environment.

But as we have seen now and then, and as more recent research has theorized, it’s not only populations that can evolve. Individual organizations themselves can transform (sometimes dramatically, sometimes incrementally) and do. While a fish may not be able to grow a new central nervous system, an organization, in essence, can.

An organization can “unlearn” practices and beliefs and norms and strategies, and learn new ones. It can shift its “dominant logic.” One paper on this topic (Bettis & Prahalad, 1995 – The Dominant Logic: Retrospective and Perspective) asserts that this “unlearning” and “shift in logics” may be more likely to occur out of a period in which an organization experiences a high degree of instability. (Of course, this is not always the case: other possibilities arising from instability are that the organization will survive and revert back to the status quo, or simply fail entirely).

It’s not hard to identify arts organizations that have been transformed out of periods of duress. The Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestras is a musician-owned and –led orchestra that formed after the demise of the New Orleans Symphony. The fact that the name has changed is less important than the fact that many of the same people re-organized and re-formed with new goals and a different structure and relationship between management and musicians.

Or consider the new strategies introduced in the opera world when Peter Gelb traveled from Sony to the Metropolitan Opera (which was, at the time, struggling with declining audiences and financial challenges). Consider the way the HD broadcast adaptation, specifically, has begun to influence the creation, production, and distribution processes not only at the Met but in other organizations, as well, and has begun to change the relationship of audiences to the art form of opera.

Or look at how Diane Paulus has radically re-interpreted the mission of the American Repertory Theatre. She has changed the goals, relationships, identity, structure, and strategies of the organization in response to not only a changed “world” (i.e. larger societal context) but also changed expectations from ART’s “host,” Harvard University.

Of course, organizational evolution is rarely this dramatic. More often, it happens so slowly we don’t recognize it. Paulus did in one season what other theaters took two decades to enact.

We tend to talk about the arts and culture sector these days as though it is “stuck” – unable or unwilling to change – but it might also be useful to consider how the present state is a function of small adaptations (in structure, people, processes, culture) in response to a shifting environment and the persistence of some of those changes over time (i.e., those that were perceived to increase the chances of survival).

Evolution occurs both through adaptation and through the perpetuation of whatever is working well. In The Resilient Sector, Lester Salamon has suggested that we have been witnessing a long creep towards commercialism in the nonprofit sector in the US generally (not only in the arts), because this is, essentially, what the slings and arrows of the US system encourages.

With the lack of subsidies and increased competition for funding, what options exist for staying alive? Do an enhancement deal and produce a new musical; reduce production expenses and beef up the development and marketing staff; find a corporate sponsor and produce a sensational exhibition of some kind; hire a celebrity and charge $300 for tickets; avoid producing works that require a large number of actors or musicians or dancers and more than the standard amount of rehearsal time; replace an unknown work by an emerging playwright with last year’s Tony Award-winning work; or better yet, a revival of a well-known title by a household name.

These strike me as coping mechanisms. Tactics to enable short-term survival.

In this sense, I agree with Andrew. Organizations often adopt coping mechanisms in response to changes in the environment and uncertainty. However, sometimes a coping mechanism, perhaps because it’s working in the short-term, becomes a longer-term strategy. It gets re-framed as a process innovation and becomes a new way of doing business — a model for existing organizations, or new ones being formed, to replicate. Eventually, one adaptation can begin to have repercussions on the audience, the art, and the identity of not just one organization, but on an entire organizational field.

Some of these changes may strengthen nonprofits and their ability to realize their missions and goals. Some may not.

Therefore, from my perspective, the question is not whether or not organizations can (and thus should be expected to) evolve; they do evolve. The question is how, and in response to what?

***

BTW, closely related to this blog, I’ve endeavored to tackle the concept of sustainability in the arts in a recent talk that I’ve given in Minneapolis, Lyon, Salzburg, and Belfast. It’s called, “Holding Up the Arts. Can We Sustain What We’ve Created? Should We?” There is a permanent link in the sidebar “Stuff I’ve written”.

Are we overdue to amend our default cultural policy?

Philadelphia_Orchestra_at_American_premiere_of_Mahler's_8th_Symphony_(1916)

A few weeks back, in a guest-post on Engaging Matters, Roberto Bedoya extended an invitation for others to join him in blogging about “how the White Racial Frame intersects with cultural policies and cultural practices.” The proposition grew out of a series of posts (largely written by a bunch of white people, like me) focused specifically on the Irvine Foundation’s new participatory arts focus and, more generally, on (funding) diversity in the arts. I don’t feel qualified to address this topic and I’m positive I do not do it justice, but this is my sincere attempt to unpack some small part of this large issue. (You can read my previous posts on the the Irvine strategy here and here.)

Prologue on the white racial frame

A  few days ago, DC theater director Eissa Goetschius posted on her Facebook page:

Because I was curious, I just looked through the archives of the Shakespeare Theatre online to try to see how many directors of color have worked there over the years. Unless I missed some – which might be possible as this was only as scientific as googling the names I didn’t know – there have been two in all of their years of existence. Harold Scott directing OTHELLO and Rene Buch directing FUENTE OVEJUNA both as part of the ’90-’91 season. I REALLY HOPE I’M WRONG ABOUT THIS. SOMEONE TELL ME I’M WRONG. ‘Cause this means they haven’t had a person of color direct a show in over twenty years.

In a similar vein, about a week ago someone mentioned to me that it seemed like all the AJ bloggers were white. I don’t know all the AJ bloggers, so can’t confirm whether they are all white; and Elissa also gives the caveat that her search was possibly flawed. But if these figures are true, or even nearly true, they should strike us as remarkable. The question is, do they? On a day-to-day basis? Or do we take for granted that there is nothing all that strange about an absence of non-white directors and bloggers?

I am embarrassed that, for instance, I never noticed all the other AJ bloggers may be white.

When Roberto Bedoya issued his invitation/challenge, I felt I needed to read a bit about the “White Racial Frame” (a term credited to Joe Feagin). Here’s a paragraph I found to be useful (from Wikipedia):

The dominant white racial frame generally has several levels of abstraction. At the most general level, the racial frame views whites as mostly superior in culture and achievement and views people of color as generally of less social, economic, and political consequence than whites—as inferior to whites in the making and keeping of the nation. At the next level of framing, whites view an array of social institutions as normally white-controlled and as unremarkable in the fact that whites therein are unjustly enriched and disproportionately privileged. (Italics added.)***

There has been an ongoing discussion for decades now about the need and desire to diversify the arts sector; and notable progress has been made at individual organizations. But if statistics like those showing up in Clay Lord’s recent graphs, and Elissa Goetschius’s Facebook post are accurate and indicative of the field generally, it would seem that much of the striving is insincere … or the efforts are sincere but ineffective/inadequate … or that we’re striving in vain because we have misidentified the problem … or the goal … or … ???

Growing diversity and the emergence of the cultural hierarchy

In his widely read 1990  book, Highbrow Lowbrow, Lawrence Levine documents the transition in America from the 18th and early 19th centuries—a time when Shakespeare and opera and classical music were popular forms of entertainment enjoyed, re-purposed, and performed by, for, and at the will of the people alongside jugglers, animal tricks, and Yankee Doodle Dandy—to the late 19th and early 20th centuries when cultural hierarchies emerged as a tool for not only defining the “highbrow” arts and segregating them from the “lowbrow” arts (a/k/a “popular”, which became a derogatory term) but defining the “cultural elite” and segregating them from the rest of society. While this history is understood by many in the arts sector, I feel compelled to revisit it in light of the topic of this blog.

Describing the fragmentation and subsequent loss of a shared public culture in the late 19th century, Levine writes:

Theaters, opera houses, museums, auditoriums that had once housed mixed crowds of people experiencing an eclectic blend of their expressive culture were increasingly filtering their clientele and their programs so that less and less could one find audiences that cut across the social and economic spectrum enjoying an expressive culture which blended together mixed elements of what we would today call, high, low, and folk culture. (P. 208)

What was motivating this shift? Levine tells us:

It was not merely the audiences in the opera houses, theaters, symphonic halls, museums, and parks that they [they champions of culture] strove to transform; it was the entire society. They were convinced that maintaining and disseminating pure art, music, literature, and drama would create a force for moral order and help to halt the chaos threatening to envelop the nation. (P. 200)

The “chaos” to which Levine refers related (in large part) to the arrival of new immigrants that “made an already heterogeneous people look positively homogeneous.” Culture was increasingly portrayed as both a force with which to “transform the American people” and as an “oasis of refuge from and a barrier against them.”

Related to (and perhaps stemming from) these contradictory messages, the more people were told that “the arts” were a certain kind of fare for a certain kind of people, (that is, the more they were told that art was serious and sacred and required education and civilized behavior to be appreciated), the more they felt disqualified (and disinterested) to participate. Hence the emergence of two worlds—a cultural gulf, in the words of Levine—moving in opposite directions, each less accepting and understanding of the other over time.

Sound familiar?

While the mid-20th century brought challenges to the cultural hierarchy in America and renewed (and sometimes even sincere) efforts to integrate, diversify, and democratize the arts, Levine suggests that by the close of the 20th century not much progress had been made. In the epilogue to his book, he offers as evidence the key propositions in Allan Bloom’s 1987 book, The Closing of the American Mind. Describing views of Bloom (and others—Levine notes that Bloom is not a lone voice), he writes:

There is, finally, the same sense [as existed at the close of the 19th century] that culture is something created by the few for the few, threatened by the many, and imperiled by democracy; the conviction that culture cannot come from the young, the inexperienced, the untutored, the marginal; the belief that culture is finite and fixed, defined and measured, complex and difficult to access, recognizable only by those trained to recognized it, comprehensible only to those qualified to comprehend it. (P. 252)

The emergence of a cultural hierarchy in the early 20th century was a tool for social and ethnic exclusion and from its inception this segregation was led by wealthy individuals in society—at the time, white people, often men. The production of high art may have required patrons (productions costs rose while the patron base shrunk); but, more importantly, patrons demanded that the worlds of high and low art be separated.

I wish I could say that this does not still feel like “the natural state” for the arts in the US.

Disrupting the hierarchy

A few years back Clay Lord interviewed me about the work on intrinsic impacts that Theatre Bay Area and Alan Brown were doing (which, as I understand it, found that a production at a small community theater in the upper Midwest had greater intrinsic impact on its audiences than any production by a professional theater in the study). At one point I said that I hoped their work could “help reframe the conversation about social value and about what it means to be a leading organization.” I asked Clay:

Can we somehow use these new metrics to help us see the world [differently]? … Who’s at the top? Who’s at the bottom? Who’s considered leading? These are rankings that were established decades ago and it’s nearly impossible for even an incredibly worthy and high-performing entrant to displace one of the ‘pioneering’ incumbent organizations at the top of the pyramid. We need data that can help us see the field differently.

Well, it would appear the Irvine Foundation has collected it. Moreover, armed with data and having gained a new understanding of the culture sector in its region, Irvine appears to be attempting to invert (or flatten?) the cultural hierarchy. (That’s my read, at any rate.) Its new strategy is to fund organizations/programs that use hands-on participation to engage nontraditional audiences ahead of (or alongside?) organizations/programs designed primarily to provide passive entertainment for those already inclined to participate. (It’s hard to tell from what’s been written whether the new strategy is intended to complement or displace the old one.)

Understandably, this shift has been a bit of a jolt to the cultural sector of the region. As Nina Simon reported on her blog, the move has been characterized as being “ahead of the field” and has not been embraced by as many arts organizations as Irvine hoped or expected. Throughout its process Irvine has welcomed input and has responded graciously to questions and critiques.

The critical response to Irvine’s new program is telling. Irvine’s new strategy is backed by solid research. As I’ve noted elsewhere, it’s not a capricious move. This strategy is more thoughtfully conceived than many funding strategies to hit the arts sector in the past several years.

So, what’s the problem?

Irvine is disrupting the status quo.

The reason it’s difficult for even incredibly worthy newcomers to rise in our sector is because incumbents continue to be privileged by the system. Over and over again we see rewards (fame, status, economic advantage) accruing to a small number of already established leading organizations—what Robert Merton in 1968 coined the Matthew effect, a term taken from a verse in the bible:

For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken even that which he hath.

Even when foundations attempt to support diversity somehow old, large, and largely white, professional institutions seem to benefit. When philanthropists give money to flagship resident theaters to do black plays instead of giving money to small black theaters to simply stay in business they may do so in a sincere attempt to encourage diversity in largely white theaters but what they legitimize is not “diversity” but rather “white theaters.”

And legitimacy cuts both ways. It’s hard to legitimize professionals without making amateurs illegitimate. It’s hard to legitimize large resident theaters without making every other kind of theater (e.g., ensemble theaters, ethnically specific theaters, community-based theaters, grassroots theaters) seem less legitimate.

Let’s stop talking about diversity and talk instead about equality … and policy

Of the many posts contributing to the Irvine/Diversity Funding discussion over the past month, I found myself returning to one by Linda Essig. Inspired by having heard urban theorist and former mayor of Bogotá Enrique Peñalosa speak about his vision for more sustainable and egalitarian cities, Linda wrote a post asking whether it was time for us to stop talking about diversity in the arts and talk instead about equality.

She writes:

One of the basic concepts he [Peñalosa] espouses is that in an egalitarian society, because every bus rider is equal to every car driver, a bus with eighty passengers should be given eighty times the road space of car with a single driver.  Further, bicycles in motion should be given higher priority than cars that are parked. In Bogotá, this meant dedicated bus lanes; it meant bike lanes protected from automobile traffic by a median for parked cars; it meant bike lanes and sidewalks were paved before parking lanes.

Linda then extends the metaphor to a discussion of diversity in the arts asking, for instance, whether we are giving equal attention, space, and opportunity to non-Greco-Euro-Anglo art forms. Reframing this diversity discussion in terms of equality resonates for me.

Awhile back I wrote a post on the extraordinarily high quality of the school system in Finland, which differs from the US education system in several ways, one of which is its focus on social equity rather than excellence.  The policy of Finland: “Every child should have exactly the same opportunity to learn, regardless of family background, income, or geographic location.” Education is seen not as way to produce star performers but as a way to achieve social equity.

Likewise the revered Venezuelan social program, El Sistema, which puts instruments in the hands of hundreds of thousands of children. Both programs demonstrate that excellence and equity need not be at odds. Finland has a far superior education system to the US public education system. El Sistema created Dudamel and many other talented musicians.

At the end of the post on Finland’s education system, I asked:

In ten or twenty more years does the nonprofit arts and culture sector want to be the US education system: excellent art for rich people and mediocrity, lack of resources, and lack of opportunity for everyone else? Or do we want to be Finland’s: high quality artistic experiences (or ‘an expressive life’ as Bill Ivey might say) for every man, woman, and child?

We always say that the US has no cultural policy, but is this true? Or is our implicit policy the one that was set by elites at the turn of the last century and served their social goals at the time? Moreover, is it possible that our resistance to creating a national cultural policy has become a method for maintaining those goals?

Late-19th-century policies and practices transformed the US cultural sphere and resulted in the loss of a shared public culture and the disproportional privileging of certain art forms, institutions, and people over others.

Shall this history continue to distort the way we see (and fail to see) our world?

Or shall we make an amendment to our default culture policy?

 

Photo: Philadelphia Orchestra, 1916

 

*** (Leslie Houts Picca and Joe Feagin. 2007. Two-Faced Racism: Whites in the Backstage and Frontstage. New York, NY: Routledge)

When does coaxing become coercing?

carrot-stickLast week I wrote a post on the efforts of foundations to encourage diversity (of various forms) in nonprofit arts organizations, in which I suggested that such efforts could be construed as a form of coercion. In particular, I discussed a new initiative at the Irvine Foundation and suggested that Irvine has been trying to “coax” its grantees into uncharted territory and “coerce” them into behavior that some are not ready or willing to adopt. In response to my post, Ted Russell at the Irvine Foundation tweeted the excellent question, “We’re coaxing. But when is that coercive?”

Yesterday, Barry Hessenius at Barry’s Blog wrote a post astutely synthesizing a few of the recent posts on this topic of “funding diversity” (including my own, for which I’m grateful) and offering his own thoughtful perspectives on several issues, including philanthropic coercion:

Individual organizations are less interested in systemic sector wide change, no matter how lofty the purpose or how much they may embrace the concept and agree with the goal.  It’s really not their job to do so.

But, it is the legitimate job of funders; and foundations that have determined that sector wide systemic change (of whatever sort) is one of their objectives, not only have the right, but arguably the obligation to implement strategies – even ones that make demands of their grantees – that they believe may help reach those objectives.  One can argue such strategies are ill conceived, that they don’t work, that being too ambitious without allowing ample time and resource allocation to give the strategies a chance to succeed is a formula for failure – but I don’t think their underlying attempt to make systemic change is necessarily coercive.  Or, if it is, I think they have the right to be coercive (and a lot of change comes about only becomes it is coerced.)  How else can systemic change come about, if no one is permitted to make even the attempt?

I’ve been thinking a lot about Ted Russell’s question the past few days. While I agree with Barry that foundations (to the limits of their tax codes) should be able to set priorities as they see fit, I would suggest that with the power that one wields as a major funder (in a particular field or region) comes the burden to take responsibility for not only where one’s investments are made, but where they are withdrawn.

I once heard a lecture at Stanford University by Jim Phills, Jr. (author of Integrating Mission and Strategy for Nonprofit Organizations) in which he said that the more desperate an organization is for resources the less control it has over its destiny (i.e., the more likely it is to do things that are not in line with its own mission and strategy in order to obtain resources).

To coax is to persuade gently and gradually.

To coerce has many definitions but as I’m using it I would suggest that it entails pressuring another party (through action or inaction) to act in a manner that goes against their will.

For an organization that has a history of funding from Irvine, then the current shift could result in two perceived threats: (1) loss of financial support that is critical and (2) loss of the imprimatur of the Foundation. Given the possible impacts of such losses, such an organization could quite reasonably begin to feel strong pressure to adopt strategies that are not currently in line with its mission, vision or values.

I understand that foundations change their strategies with good reason. As I mentioned in my last post, it seemed that Irvine was quite thoughtful in developing its new strategy. And Irvine may be “coaxing” (from its point of view).

But if its longstanding grantees perceive that they will be out in the cold if they are not on board with the new strategy?

Well, to my mind, this is where coaxing begins to feel like coercion.

On coercive philanthropy and change: Breakups may be good and necessary

its_not_you_its_me_heart_candyClay Lord has been on fire over this past week with a couple truly substantive and provocative posts—both aimed at issues around ethnic diversity in the arts. The first asserts that (1) valuing diversity and managing it are different (the former relatively easy, the latter not so much) and (2) funders interested in funding organizations to reach more diverse audiences are not as patient as they need to be if they want to see this change realized. The second post examines data from the Bay Area that attests to the (relative) lack of ethnic diversity in audiences among a sample of arts organizations and pleads for greater attention to this particular issue.

In conjunction with the second post, Clay tweeted a question to his followers that drew quite a lot of responses. The question: “Should an arts organization that finds itself located in a more diverse community be expected to serve a more diverse audience?”

Clay asked me a very similar question when he interviewed me a few years back and, as I recall, I responded that I thought that for the major “flagship” theaters in the US it was not at all unreasonable to expect plays to be selected with an eye to reflecting the different values and stories and communities that exist within a the theater’s geographic area over the course of a season or two.

It’s, of course, quite different for organizations that were created with narrower missions. If your mission is to support Hispanic writers and serve Hispanic audiences (because they are under-served by large flagship organizations, even if they may be presenting a Hispanic work every year or two) then why add the burden of being required to also draw non-Hispanic audiences? These organizations exist to compensate for the preponderance of organizations serving white people. On the Boards, where I worked at one time, has distinctive programming that draws younger-than-average audiences who make far less than the medium income in Seattle. This is also diversity.

In other words, the value of such boutique organizations is that they deeply serve particular communities; they are diverse in aggregate. The value of a broad-based organization is that it can more broadly represent the community over the course of a season or two.

We need both.

And, of course, we recognize what keeps the flagship organizations from abandoning their current programming strategies (which are perceived to serve a rather narrow demographic of white, upper middle class, old people) and it is something like Clayton Christensen’s innovator’s dilemma. The major theaters often have loyal, donating subscribers upon whom they depend for annual operating support. As Clay points out in his post, they (rightly) perceive that changing the programming might drive some of them away.

As I’ve written and talked about for years, Centerstage theater in Baltimore went through this. When Irene Lewis arrived the theater was doing white plays with white actors for white audiences. Baltimore is 67%  African American. She felt that the theater was not serving its community and so she began changing the programming and (importantly) the marketing. I interviewed Irene about this once and she said that early on they lost subscribers, some patrons were not at all happy with the shift, and she was challenged on the new direction. Centerstage persevered, however, in large part because Irene (and I suspect others) were deeply committed to the change. Centerstage eventually replaced the lost subscribers with others that embraced the new direction of the theater. Irene told me it took ten years for the change to be fully realized. When I spoke to her about five years ago, the “African  American plays” in their season were drawing the largest audiences of the season.

There are three lessons I get from this story: (1) Change will come in the arts sector when leaders are committed to change. (Throwing money at “reluctant dragons” is a waste of time and precious resource.); (2) If you want more diverse audiences change the programming; and (3) Once you change the programming, be patient. It takes a long time (ten years!) and you need to be willing to lose some current patrons in order to gain new ones.*

When’s the last time you heard of a ten-year (not initiative) grant? As Clay points out, most foundations are not patient. They want results within a “grant period” often designed to accommodate the needs and cycles of foundations rather than the needs and cycles of institutions and projects.

But impatience isn’t the only issue. I was at a meeting awhile back where someone that used to work at a private foundation (as did I) said, “Private foundations can be recklessly fickle.” Indeed. Or at the very least they can appear to be so when they decide to abandon initiatives because they often fail to provide satisfactory reasons for their actions.

Or even when they are transparent and articulate their new “strategies” and substantiate them with research, they overestimate the value and impact of a $300,000 grant on an organization with a multi-million dollar operating budget that has several large stakeholders, each of whom is giving a bit of money and hoping for value alignment in return.

The laundry list of philanthropic offenses is long and well chronicled by others but these are a few that relate directly to this issue of funding strategies around diversity and their impact on arts organizations.

So let’s talk about funding strategies. As many have noted, foundations are rarely content these days to simply be helpful; they feel compelled to be strategic. We hear quite a bit about strategic philanthropy—which strikes me as an oxymoronic concept. Coercion might be a better word for it (Bob Brustein wrote an essay awhile back called Coercive Philanthropy that has influenced my thinking on this; but I would propose that once it’s coercion it’s no longer philanthropy).

I also remember listening to the brilliant Adrian Ellis of AEA Consulting at an Americans for the Arts Conference in 2010 say something like (and I’m paraphrasing from memory so hope I have this right), “The more strategic a foundation is the less able it is to support the strategies of individual organizations.” I couldn’t agree more.

Hence the dilemma of Irvine (which Nina Simon points out in her post about Irvine’s new strategy): Irvine sets a new strategy around audience participation but is experiencing a mixed response from the field and has not received as many strong applications as it hoped (or this is what I perceive to be the issue from Nina’s post).  Irvine appears to be interested in bringing about a kind of diversity (i.e., change) in the arts sector we don’t often talk about: aesthetic diversity. Irvine’s strategy is not fickle. It has done the research. The research has suggested that if Irvine really wants to have impact it will support organizations that engage community members in the co-creation of work rather than organizations that present professional work produced for what are now often referred to as “passive” audiences. I have to believe the research is robust (as it’s a major foundation with sufficient funds to hire smart researchers).

However well-researched and justified, Irvine must recognize (and I think it does) that its strategy is out of line with the missions of a majority of professional arts organizations, which were formed to present work by professionals for audiences that come to appreciate that work, not make it. (Clay also makes this point in his comments to Nina Simon’s post.) It should expect resistance and attempts by organizations to make token adjustments but still appear worthy of a grant. If I ran an arts organization and needed to change the aesthetic orientation of my organization to get a grant I think I would be a very poor leader, indeed, if I applied for that grant in earnest without serious discussion involving the entire staff and board.

There are organizations, like the one lead by the visionary Nina Simon, for whom Irvine’s new guidelines are water in a desert (as she discusses in her post). They share Irvine’s values, and the work they are doing has been undervalued for too long. The Irvine grant is a source of legitimacy for such organizations.

And the rest?

Well, I’m guessing it feels more like a bucket of cold water in the face.

Irvine needs to recognize that it is endeavoring to coax organizations into uncharted territory. It wants to coerce a change that many cannot, or do not want, to make. Again, I’m guessing they know this.  Any organization can do a project here or there in which they let the audience participate in the process. But to reorient an organization away from a structure set up to support professionals presenting the work requires more than money. I reckon it requires a shift in leadership (on the board and staff). It is that fundamental.

So what’s the lesson?

One might jump to the conclusion that foundations should perhaps not attempt to fund change in a system unless they are committed to providing funding for as long as it takes for that change to be realized.

Another conclusion might be that foundations shouldn’t try to change fields and sectors at all, and should content themselves with providing support to nonprofits already doing excellent work that aligns with their priorities.

I seriously question whether funding organizations to make them change works. Has any organization that was reluctant to change made substantive long-term change because of a grant? I suspect any change that happens probably has more to do with leadership, other sources of income, and an intent to change that was already solid before the grant arrived.

And when change fails to be manifested? Well, I would wager that a majority of foundations perceive that organizations are at fault in that case (not the grantmaking strategy). And why wouldn’t they? Organizations write proposals in which they promise to change themselves in dramatic ways for ridiculously small amounts of money and over unreasonable periods of time. They lie about what they can do. They choose to do this to get the money. Foundations choose to believe these lies because it’s convenient to believe that it’s possible to change the world in 3-5 year cycles.

Perhaps rather than trying to change the behaviors of foundations (who have proven to be rather immune to such attempts) organizations need to change their responses to such initiatives. For instance, when that next RFP for a new funding initiative is announced:

(1) Don’t apply for the money, no matter how desperate you are for resources, if the proposal guidelines make you roll your eyes. If this is a foundation that has funded you in the past and this change means you are no longer eligible for funding, write a letter to the Foundation articulating the strategy you are following and why you believe it to have merit. Let them know that you will not be applying for a grant because it would destabilize your organization as it would pull you off what you consider to be a sound strategy. Let them know that if they are ever interested in supporting your organization to continue the good work you are already doing, and the positive impact you are already having in the community, you would be most grateful for the opportunity to apply for a grant.

(2) If you read the application and the funder appears to be interested to support a change you do want to make in your organization (cultivating more diverse audiences, for instance), don’t apply for that grant until you have calculated the total cost of that change on your organization over the next decade and can present that number in your application to the funder, letting the funder know (a) how long you reasonably expect it to take for the change to be implemented; (b) how much you expect it to cost; and (c) the amount you would need from the funder to commit to making the change. If the funder wants you to lower the number and shorten the timeline, or for the program to be self-sustaining after three years, don’t apply unless you have in writing a commitment from board members or donors to fund the program (on top of their current contributions) once the initial funding runs out. If those elements are not in place, write a letter to the foundation explaining the work you want to do that aligns with their values and why you will not apply, and walk way.

I know organizations that are desperate for resources feel as though they cannot afford to say no to the possibility of money. However, I can almost guarantee that you will be better off financially five years from now from having stayed the course with your strategy than from having grown an extra appendage or two in order to get a few grants in the door. We know that such grants have an inflationary effect on the operating budget and the money always goes away too soon.

And on the other side of the table, funders need to be prepared to read such letters, take the heat, and keep walking if they believe they are on the right path. Former grantees may feel betrayed; it’s hard to fall out of favor with a foundation. There will be grumbling by people all over the field, I suspect. (I’m assuming, of course, that foundations are making exit grants to longstanding grantees, or giving them ample notice that funding will not be renewed, and not simply pulling the rug out from underneath them.)

Sure, an honest conversation could lead to a necessary and healthy break up (which is hard), but even this would leave both parties free to pursue their preferred and diverging strategies. But perhaps through a candid discussion common ground could be found; such a conversation might also lead to a stronger relationship, if not now, at some point in the future.

*”Reluctant dragons” is a term that was frequently used by a former funding colleague to refer to organizations hesitant to adopt a particular (foundation funded) practice.

Are the arts trading in happiness? If so, what kind?

happiest place on earthA couple weeks ago I wrote a post on changing definitions of success in which I, essentially, asked, Can we change them? And do we really want to? In a thoughtful comment to the post (well worth reading in full) a veteran policy advocate, Margy Waller at Topos Partnership (who worked with ArtsWave in Cincinnati on The Arts Ripple Effect) floated the possibility of happiness among citizens as a measure of our success. She wrote:

Enrique Peñalosa, former mayor of Bogota, … redefined the measure of success for his city:

“If we in the Third World measure our success or failure as a society in terms of income, we would have to classify ourselves as losers until the end of time. With our limited resources, we have to invent other ways to measure success.”

Instead of GDP or rates of poverty, he focused on a kind of equality of quality of life ~ seeking to create a city of joyfulness for everyone, saying:

“Economics, urban planning, ecology are only the means. Happiness is the goal.”

Suppose we did the same in the arts? Instead of the dollars and cents of economic impact, or the old butt in seats case — what if we focus on happiness?

Margy quite rightly notes that happiness is an area of “serious” economic and sociological research and she provides links to several interesting studies and projects, including the Mappiness Project out of the London School of Economics (previously discussed in a post by Clay Lord), which found that 4 of the top 6 happiness-producing activities for participants were arts activities: theatre/dance/concert, singing/performing, exhibition/museum/library, and hobbies/arts/crafts.

Coincidentally, the day I wrote my post on success I was sent a link to an article in the Atlantic, There’s More to Life than Being Happy, which distinguishes between a “happy” life and a “meaningful” one. I was drawn into the piece because it opens with a discussion of a book I have read many times, Man’s Search for Meaning, by holocaust survivor and psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl. For those who are not familiar with the book, it is Frankl’s analysis and reflection on why some were able to endure the camps psychologically and others were not. His conclusion: meaning matters and those that were able to withstand the horrors had some purpose for which to live.

The Atlantic article cites the following passage from Frankl’s classic text:

This uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence has a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. When the impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility which a man has for his existence and its continuance to appear in all its magnitude. A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the “why” for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any “how.”

Having a purpose is powerful. I suspect it is one reason why nonprofits are often so resilient in the face of life-threatening problems.

The author of the Atlantic article makes the point that the book’s “ethos — its emphasis on meaning, the value of suffering, and responsibility to something greater than the self — seems to be at odds with our culture, which is more interested in the pursuit of individual happiness than in the search for meaning.” The article goes on to site recent research that examines the differences between leading a “happy” life and a “meaningful” one, which found:

Happiness without meaning characterizes a relatively shallow, self-absorbed or even selfish life, in which things go well, needs and desire are easily satisfied, and difficult or taxing entanglements are avoided.

Meaning, by comparison, is associated with using your talents to “serve something greater than yourself.” It’s about transcending both the “self” and “the present moment.”

Which leads me to my question: If, as Margy Waller and others have suggested, our goal were happiness—if our aim were to increase the overall level of happiness of a community, or to contribute to the “happiness economy”—what kind of happiness are we talking about in the nonprofit arts?

When I was in primary school there was a certain kind of happiness that would arise if the nuns announced a Congé* and classes were canceled and replaced by a play day. There was another kind of happiness that ensued when I understood the various proofs of the Pythagorean theorem and the gas laws.

What’s the happiness exchange that we’re striving for? We deliver experiences (a play, an exhibit, a concert, an opera) that make people happy (because they are out and about and liberated from mundane chores and cares), and they deliver money to us in the form of ticket sales or contributions and make us happy in return (because we get to stay in business another day)?

Happiness without (much) meaningful exchange?

That’s good – but is it enough?

Disneyland, so it claims, is the “happiest place on earth”. Like Disneyland, one could argue that we are trading  in what are called experience goods (indeed, we’ve spent the better part of the past 20 years improving our  methods in the arts for creating total experiences for patrons). But I would argue that, unlike Disneyland, the arts don’t exist merely to give people a relatively shallow and fleeting high—network television can do that, Broadway revivals can do that, happy hour can do that. (It would seem to be a primary purpose of happy hour.)

And I do not mean to diminish the joy of such experiences—all of which I partake in with some regularity.

But perhaps if we are trying to deliver “mere happiness” we are selling the arts short. I notice that in early mission statements of resident theaters in the US (the subject of my research) the phrase “entertain and enlighten” is sometimes used. It’s good to do both; and I sometimes wonder if, over the years, we have let ourselves off the hook for the second “e”. Many mission statements seem to talk about “delivering artistic experiences” with little specificity as to the purpose of those experiences beyond entertainment.

Perhaps the rewards to society that come with striving to help people find something more meaningful should be our goal (even if many people may be coming to us looking merely for a play day). If so, we need to think about how we measure (account for) not only a happiness that derives from a stimulating evening out on the town, but a deeper happiness that derives from … meaning making … or better understanding oneself, others, and the world we share … or feeling life has great worth or value, etc.

And yes, one might reasonably expect that doing so should deliver something back to us beyond merely another day in business: relevance–what I like to think of as meaningful existence.

* Congé is a day celebrated in Sacred Heart schools that comes as a surprise to students and faculty. It signals a day that academics are put aside and the fun begins.

Can we change our definition & measures of success? Do we really want to?

preacher-pulpit2Happy New Year a week late. I picked up a book at the university library a few days ago called Morals and Markets and have read a few chapters, which have been tumbling around in my mind with an excellent New Year’s essay by Polly Carl on the measures of an individual playwright’s success, a New York Times op-ed on trying to measure the impact of social media using “yardsticks” of traditional marketing, and a much cited New Year’s prediction for the arts by Rick Lester at Target Resource Group that appeared on Thomas Cott’s Year End Predictions issue. These provocative texts have me thinking about the process of changing measures of success.

Part I: A short story about life insurance:

Morals and Markets is an academic text written in 1979 by sociologist Viviana Zelizer about “the development of life insurance in the US.”  Zelizer recounts that while the first life insurance company was established in the US in 1759 it was not until the 1840s that sales of life insurance began to take off. Then, within a relatively short period of time, life insurance policy sales grew at an astonishing rate. Why had life insurance failed to get off the ground in the late 18th and early 19th centuries? And why, in the mid-19th century did it eventually become adopted with such fervor? While most historical accounts, written by economists, laid the sudden success at more aggressive advertising and sales techniques (most notably the introduction of the charismatic life insurance missionary/salesman), Zelizer felt something else was going on. She ultimately argues that it was cultural factors at play, among them religious beliefs. She writes on pages 150-151:

In the first place, the development of the insurance industry reflected the struggle between fundamentalist and modernist religious outlooks that worked itself out in the nineteenth century. … The cultural incompatibility of life insurance with literalist and fundamentalist beliefs hindered its development during the first part of the century. In opposition, the emerging liberal theology tended to make the enterprise legitimate. … The history of life insurance helps us understand the problem of establishing monetary equivalents for relations or processes which are defined as being beyond material concerns … With life insurance, money and man, the sacred and the profane, were thrown together; the value of man became measurable by money. …  Life insurance threatened the sanctity of life by pricing it. … By the latter part of the nineteenth century, the economic  definition of the value of death finally became more acceptable, legitimating the life insurance enterprise. However, the monetary evaluation of death did not de-sacralize it; far from ‘profaning’ life and death, money became sacralized by its association with them. Life insurance took on symbolic values quite distinct from its utilitarian function, emerging as a new form of ritual with which to face death and a process of the dead by those kin left behind.

Another cultural factor explored in the book is initial resistance that stemmed from perceptions of life insurance as a form of “betting on lives.” That resistance waned after the 1870s, however, when certain financial practices which had theretofore been perceived by a “traditional economic morality” to be “deviant speculative ventures” became legitimized by a new entrepreneurial ethos. Changing views on life insurance reflected this general shift in attitudes about economic risk taking.

In the last paragraph of the book Zelizer writes (p. 153):

America was, and remains, a land of economic magic. In the case of life insurance the trick was to sell futures—pessimistic futures. The task of selling a commodity to a materialist civilization is relatively simple. The task of converting human life and death into commodities, however, was highly complex. The universe of believers and theologians became involved with another universe of hard-headed businessmen. Out of this interaction emerged a compromise credo which was a far cry from the vulgar marketplace linkages and at the same time a giant step beyond simplified heavenly rewards. Theology yielded to the capitalist ethos–but not without compelling the latter to disguise its materialist mission in spiritual garb.

Part II: Redefining Success

In a post on the measures of success in her own life and the lives of artists, Polly Carl describes what has become the “tired trajectory of success for playwrights”:

Theater artist gets trained >Theater artist emerges >Theater artist gets small gigs in small theaters >Theater artist gets big gigs in small theaters >Theater artist gets small gigs in big theaters >Theater artist gets big gigs in big theaters.

She then observes that this journey is problematic because it suggests that success is linear, that we can and should define what success looks like ahead of time, and that success can be measured in terms of economic growth (bigger house, bigger paycheck, etc.). Within hours of reading her post I was sent a link to the NY Times op-ed mentioned above, Can Social Media Sell Soap? on the problem of attempting to calculate the ROI of social media using traditional marketing media measures. The two pieces got me thinking about the yardsticks of success that we now use in the nonprofit arts.

Notwithstanding the past four years where the definition of success seemed to have been temporarily replaced by the more essential goal of simply finishing the year without a life-threatening deficit, it seems that, by-and-large, the sector is and has been for some time now measuring its success primarily in economic terms: butts in seats, increased revenues, budgetary growth, inches of press, and (how could we ever forget) economic impact.

I would extend Polly’s observation of a success-definition-rut among artists, to arts organizations. Lately I keep hearing admonitions to arts groups to shift their focus from “surviving” to “thriving” but how, as a sector, are we defining this thriving?

Has the recession helped us to interpret “thriving” to mean something deeper or outside of the realm of economic measures? Or (despite all the buzz about intrinsic impacts) are we really only comfortable in our skin if we can flash our numbers (and not just any numbers … butts in seats, budgetary growth, inches of press, economic impact).

I get it.

Believe me, after walking away from a great job that I loved (actually two decades of jobs in the arts that I loved and that defined my success pretty handily) I have spent many sleepless nights these past 2 1/2 years wondering how the heck to define success or, put another way, assess my value. Candidly, most days I feel like an under-performing and illegitimate scholar (as all practitioner-turned-academics will understand); a frustratingly sporadic blogger (sorry!);  a hapless stepparent and homemaker; a too-distant and out-of-touch friend, daughter and sister; and a headstrong and difficult spouse.  What I would give for a job that I “was born to do” and through which my value in this life would be immediately recognizable.

But wouldn’t it be even better if I could redefine success so that my life has value even if I don’t have a great job?

Of course it would.

But still. Would anyone in the world buy into my definition, I wonder? I mean, my mom would probably be proud of me no matter what. But it takes a lot of courage to do what Polly is proposing. To live by your own definition of success—a definition that may be illegitimate in the world we live in.

Part III: Big Data

So we are in this pickle. The value of the arts and culture sector in the US has been declining in recent decades (at least by our cornerstone measure of success: butts in seats). It would seem that we either need to get more people to show up or we need some new measures that can tell people that we’re valuable even if the old metrics don’t look so great. I suspect that Rick Lester at TRG would probably comfort us with the knowledge that we are now in the era of “big data”— which shall enable us to embrace a customer orientation and, “armed with facts,” make better decisions about what to program, who to target, with what product, at what price, on what day, etc.  And others (Alan Brown and Clay Lord, most notably) might suggest that big data could also help us make the case for our value beyond butts in seats—that is, for our intrinsic impacts.

It strikes me that these two uses pull us in different directions. (More on that a bit further on.)

I love data more with every passing day, but I can’t help but think that if we make an analogy with Zelizer’s story of life insurance (and the role of cultural factors in legitimizing it as a key determinant of its adoption), that big data (while an important factor) is probably not going to solve our success/valuation problems. Increasing arts participation and redefining success are less dependent on data than on the values and ideologies that underpin our sector and society-at-large.

We may be able to use data to do better marketing but if kids heading off to college in 2030 still have little-to-no exposure to the arts by their parents or at schools is there anything we could target them with in 2040 that would get them to walk in the door of an opera house producing Don Giovanni or a traditional regional theater doing a production of the Death of a Salesman? And if the data tell us we probably could get them in the door if we radically changed programming, would it matter if those leading and funding arts organizations the next twenty years are unwilling to consider such shifts because they consider them to be immoral?

We may be able to use Twitter to, for instance, understand the social impact of a professional theater piece on a given neighborhood; but will it matter if most boards, government agencies, and funders do not consider the impact of a conversation on Twitter to be as or more important than how many people bought tickets and whether income targets were achieved? We may be able to collect data on the social and cultural impact of amateur groups but does it matter if the training programs and the professional arts sector continues to dismiss such contributions as illegitimate?

We may have the possibility of new data, but we seem to be stuck with the same old values and yardsticks.

Part IV: Time to look in the mirror:

Like Polly, I think it’s time to dig deeper. We can start trying to solve our problems with data, but like a prescription of Paxil, it’s not going to be nearly as effective if we’re not willing to acknowledge the disconnect between some of our fundamental values and ideologies and those of society. Moreover, once acknowledged, we are unlikely to make progress by simply bemoaning our circumstances and calling ourselves victims of a philistine society or simply abandoning the social purposes we were formed to uphold and taking the for-profit route because it’s just too damned hard to fight the good fight anymore.

We are, without a doubt, a sector with conflicting values: excellence versus equity (among others). And as the lines have blurred with the commercial and amateur worlds our identity and the values we stand for (conflicting though they may be) seem to be eroding to the point where it feels like we stand for everything (which is arguably the same as standing for nothing).

No doubt society has changed. The alternative ideals that supported the massive growth of the nonprofit arts sector in the mid-twentieth century were out of favor by the 80s and with it, so were we. But we’ve changed too. Perhaps we have been unsuccessful with getting American society to value what we do not simply because their values changed but because ours have. Is it clear what we stand for? It might be clear to the 70-year-old who takes-for-granted that we stand for something important and good because we once did; but is it clear to the 20-year-old? And if we shout, ‘We stand for something important and good!” does that 20-year-old believe us? Based on what evidence?

I’m not advocating a monolithic conception of the sector, but I am (like Polly, I think, if I interpret her essay correctly) advocating for some honesty and transparency about the core, enduring, distinctive identity and values that we do stand for and, with them, our definition of success.

But as we see in Zelizer’s accout, from there begins the hard work of advancing these ideals and values and measures of success.  What changed the religious fundamentalists that initially rejected life insurance? Among other factors, other more entrepreneurial clergymen, who saw the value of life insurance and began to preach about it from the pulpit.

What caused nonprofit arts organizations to adopt marketing practices? Among other influences, corporate boards and trade associations that encouraged and expected them. Marketing, like life insurance, was an idea that was initially downright distasteful to people working in the arts.

Part V: Can we change the measures of success? Do we really want to?

The arts (like life insurance) long ago became a commodity (having previously operated in the realm of the gift economy), though (also like life insurance) one with values (social, cultural, and symbolic) beyond utility. We came up with our own “compromise credo.” As I observe the heated debates on cultural blogs (including, for instance, the dueling that happened in the comments section of my recent post on the arts cliff), I wonder if this compromise position is becoming untenable and, moreover, as a sector we are deeply divided on how to resolve the tension.

It feels to me like we’ve got big data in our corner and we don’t know whether to stand at the bully pulpit and (A) use the data to get really good at selling our commodity and to make the case that we count in this extended era of economic rationalization (a glance at AFTA’s National Arts Index is but one indication that we’ve actually gotten pretty darned good at that); or (B) use the data to make the case that the measure of success in this world should not be limited to growth in the economy and to identify and measure the something else that matters as much or more.

As I wrote in the executive summary of In the Intersection (a report on partnerships between commercial producers and nonprofit theaters), “Recognizing that the metrics of success and the values of nonprofits have changed is one thing. Changing them back is quite another.”

It wouldn’t be easy to pursue path B. We would have to organize and work together and invest resources in creating and living by such alternative definitions and measures of success. We would have to argue against many of the moves we’ve made the past 30 years.

We would have to use our pulpits.

We would have to believe these other things matter.

As I look across the nonprofit arts and culture sector landscape I see some who believe but I perceive that way too many of us have lost faith.

My wish for us in 2013 … that we can find, keep, and spread the faith.

PS I resolved at the end of the year that I would start posting on Jumper more frequently (weekly at least) and failed in the first week. It’s still a goal. Although after reading this, my longest post-to-date, you may be grateful that I’m not posting with much regularity. Congratulations and thanks to any who manage to stick with it to the end. 🙂

I see an arts cliff, too, Mr. Kaiser; but it’s not fiscal in nature.

Cliff-Warning BTHuffPo blogger and Kennedy Center chief Michael Kaiser recently wrote a post reflecting on the financial corner that many arts organizations have painted themselves into (which he compares to the Fed’s fiscal cliff). His post got me thinking about our tendency to see the problems facing the arts and culture sector as inherently financial in nature. Kaiser ends his post with the following recommendations:

I have spent the better part of my life arguing that revenue increases are not only advisable, but necessary. It is inarguable that over time, those organizations that reduce salaries of artists and cut artistic initiatives are going to have a harder time raising funds and selling tickets — they will simply not be able to compete for the best talent and for funders and audience members. For not every arts organization is going to be making big cuts–for every troubled organization I can point to one that is doing well at the moment.

Like many who are commenting on our national problem, I believe growth must be the long-term answer.

And a combination of judicious cost cutting matched with aggressive marketing and fundraising aimed at creating more revenue must be the short-term answer.

I agree with Mr. Kaiser’s general point that investments in artistic planning and programming, as well as improved stakeholder relations, are critically important to the long term health and vitality of arts organizations. However, I see some flaws in his analysis of both the nature of the arts cliff and how to avoid tumbling over it.

Michael Kaiser suggests that the arts cliff is a result of “plummeting contributions” and the failure of earned income to keep pace with growth–and that the solution is to be found in driving revenues. However, I’m skeptical of his suggestion that more aggressive fundraising and marketing is the answer. For one, this seems to have been our strategy the past few decades (could we be any more aggressive with our marketing and fundraising efforts?) and it doesn’t seem to have done the trick. But more importantly, I’m not persuaded that the arts cliff is actually a fiscal cliff.

I, too, see a cliff (or, actually, multiple cliffs)– but I would suggest that they stem not from a failure to cut costs judiciously and maximize revenues but from some other failures. Here are four for your consideration:

  • The arts education cliff. By-and-large, arts organizations have failed to plunge with vigor and seriousness into the K-12 arts-ed breach and systematically provide comprehensive, high quality, hands-on arts education experiences. We seem to have forgotten that the “taste” that is a critical component of deriving satisfaction and meaning from the arts is not formed at birth or (for the most part these days) at home, or school. Most organizations (still) don’t see arts education as being their responsibility. Years from now I predict we will look back and see a missed opportunity to strengthen our organizations from both a mission and financial standpoint and will be amazed that for-profit providers have successfully moved into this space ahead of us.
  • The diversity cliff. Many arts organizations have failed to change the demographics of their boards and staff to reflect the diversity (physical, aesthetic, etc.) of the artists and audiences that they are seeking to serve. Other social sectors, and even corporations, made such adjustments y-e-a-r-s ago. We watched on November 7th as Republican pundits and politicians shook their heads and stammered on about shifts in the demographics of the US and struggled to make sense of their losses. I predict the arts will be doing the same in 10-15 years. The social structures that have long under-girded our sector are crumbling.
  • The professionalism cliff. The disparagement of the community arts (aka/ grassroots, populist, popular) sector alongside the promotion of “professionalism” has led to the systematic devaluation of this incredibly important part of the “arts ecosystem”. We are a sector of professional snobs, who have turned our noses up at the community arts for the past thirty years. And I’m not persuaded that this sentiment is changing because individual organizations have begun to collaborate here and there with community-based artists and companies (often in response to carrots dangled by foundations). I predict that before the decade is out we will recognize the folly and vanity of distancing ourselves from our community-based cousins, who will be perceived as being able to do everything many “professional” organizations do but with more heart, less expense, and greater social impact.
  • The leadership cliff. When I think of the organizations that are knocking it out of the park these days (and there are plenty of them) it all comes down to leadership. We need leaders who have vision and courage to throw away the staffing, structure, and programming templates and the willingness to fail in the short term in the interest of being better in the long term. We need leaders who identify more with the artists on their stages and the poorly paid administrators in their offices than with the donors they are courting 250 days a year. We need leaders who are not using their organizations to advance their careers but who are laboring in service of something greater than themselves. Talented, forward thinking leaders exist, but we are not doing a great job of promoting them, making use of their talents, and moving them into positions of power and influence in the sector. Some of them are slaving away as #2s. Some of them are running smaller organizations. I wager that all of them are ready and able to run much larger enterprises. Our sector seems to be quite poor at succession planning and I predict that our dysfunction in this area is going to catch up with us–before current leaders are finally ready to ease into retirement (10-20 years from now), but after they have already begun to erode the value of their organizations.

So, yes, the arts are facing a cliff. And we’ve been walking towards it for 30 years. But with all due respect to Mr. Kaiser, this cliff is not averted by simply doing, raising, and selling more.

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  • Andrew Taylor on On a Strategy of Indeterminacy: Or, the Value of Creating Pathways to the Unforeseen: “Love this line of thinking, Diane! Although I also wonder about the many small, safe-to-fail ways you could explore randomness…” Feb 21, 22:54
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A Few Things I’ve Written

"Surviving the Culture Change", "The Excellence Barrier", "Holding Up the Arts: Can We Sustain What We've Creatived? Should We?" and "Living in the Struggle: Our Long Tug of War in the Arts" are a few keynote addresses I've given in the US and abroad on the larger changes in the cultural environment and ways arts organizations may need to adapt in order to survive and thrive in the coming years.

If you want a quicker read, then you may want to skip the speeches and opt for the article, "Recreating Fine Arts Institutions," which was published in the November 2009 Stanford Social Innovation Review.

Here is a recent essay commissioned by the Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts for the 2011 State of the Arts Conference in London, "Rethinking Cultural Philanthropy".

In 2012 I documented a meeting among commercial theater producers and nonprofit theater directors to discuss partnerships between the two sectors in the development of new theatrical work, which is published by HowlRound. You can get a copy of this report, "In the Intersection," on the HowlRound Website. Finally, last year I also had essays published in Doug Borwick's book, Building Communities Not Audiences and Theatre Bay Area's book (edited by Clay Lord), Counting New Beans.

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