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Arts Entrepreneurship — The Idea Formation Conundrum
At Eastman, when we were building the Institute for Music Leadership’s capacity in music entrepreneurship, we created a prize to encourage idea formation, the New Venture Challenge (http://www.esm.rochester.edu/iml/entrepreneurship/newventurechallenge.php). In the first round we received only one idea that could be described as innovative and addressing a need or potential market. Although since then the New…
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Arts and Culture Entrepreneurism
I found out rather quickly that cultural entrepreneurism has a fairly specific definition and that I had misrepresented it. Please check out a link that one of my readers provided (www.culturalentrepreneur.org). What this organization does is provide incredible value to its communities both close in and in a wider definition. And, there are other organizations…
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Cultural Entrepreneurship
A number of students whom I taught at the Eastman School of Music in the Institute for Music Leadership, and now an impressive number of students whom I teach at Drexel are not interested in entering the established not-for-profit arts and culture sector. They have dynamic and important ideas they want to move forward. They…
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Boards Reconceptualized, Part III
So I have proposed a 3-member fiduciary board that in order to serve must receive certification from a controlling authority. A state’s attorney general would be an appropriate authority, since h/she is ultimately responsible for oversight of a not-for-profit corporation. I believe this idea has merit and deserves public vetting. As I see it, board authority…
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Boards Reconceptualized, Part II
Recapping quickly and moving on — My last blog posed a governing board of 3, who would be certified through a formal vetting process, and then become responsible for insuring that the public interest is being served by the incorporated arts organization. These duties would include fiduciary responsibility, management oversight and assessing the extent to which the…
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Boards Reconceptualized, Part I
If you have been a reader of my blog, you know that I believe that the traditional NFP organizational model (501(c)3) suffers from systemic malfunction, and that the board role is central to this condition. For me it’s time to look beyond, to some possible solutions, and hear others’ opinions. Boards of directors have 3 essential…
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NFP Boards, Good Idea Run Amok?
In contemplating altogether new organizational models for the arts and culture sector, I find myself focusing on the roll of boards. Increasingly, professional staff members are spending escalating percentages of their time managing their boards of directors, taking time away from managing activities related to their missions. Once a good and necessary idea, perhaps the traditional…
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Principles of Leadership Design
My orginal quest to identify or create new organizational models as alternatives to the traditional 501(c)3 not-for- profit (NFP) led me inevitably to leadership design. The most perfect organizational design is worthless without a strong accompanying leadership schema. My recent posts have identified core problems related to leadership design. In this week’s post, I want to…
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A Sad Leadership Story
Now that I teach administration I have the luxury of observing and commenting on repeating occurences in organizational leadership. In both my direct leadership background, as well as in my board volunteer service I have experienced what I will comment on today, that of board members taking on leadership roles, moving from volunteer to professional…
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Tri-Part Leadership – – a Failure
In my most recent post I spoke to the problems created by managing directors (CEO’s, presidents, executive directors) of performing arts organizations being increasingly asked to make artistic, mission-related decisions as they increasingly move away from their own artistic expertise and acuity. This is a distinct problem that must be addressed. For one, simply recognizing…