Stuck on repeat

On a day when many arts organizations' fiscal years are ending, this seemed like a good time to discuss this issue...

This past Saturday, I went with friends to Taste of Chicago, one of Chicago's many outdoor festivals and probably one of its most popular. Food, music, and summer make a potent combination.

While perusing the various booths, one naturally walks by several who are there purely for promotional reasons. Pausing in front of one of the Chicago Tribune tents, we were accosted by a hawker whose sole pitch seemed to be "Do you want to buy the paper?" Three times we were asked with little other interaction before our friends caught up to us and we were able to move beyond this odd display of salesmanship.

This highly transactional behavior, badgering someone in the hopes that they'll finally say yes just to get you to go away, is certainly not limited to newspapers. I'm frankly an inch away from sending anything and everything from my alma mater to the spam bin as I can rely on 95% of the messages to be about giving Carnegie Mellon money, either in the form of donations or, lately, to buy some form of memorabilia. And I like Carnegie Mellon.

It's really hard to build loyalty to your organization which is why many organizations remain so transactional. It's even easier to lose loyalty. This makes the investment in building loyalty through good experience management well worth it. You hear it all the time, but not everyone is paying attention to the laments that solid content, good stories, valuable information are things that enhance the experience of someone that you are moving up the loyalty tree and that pay off in the end with regular patronage, sustainable donations, and fierce advocacy on your behalf.

Be sure to make these things a significant part of your communications, not just "Do you want to donate?" stuck on repeat.

Sideshow: Many cellos, one artist

"I want to create endless possibilities with this cello."



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More on participation

There is one and only one answer to the participation gauntlet that I threw down the other day: Try things.

I don't actually pretend to have all the answers here. There are some excellent organizations that are paving the way and excellent ideas to share, but there is no one miracle answer. In fact, opening your organization's doors up to participation is, by nature, an individual experience based entirely on what works with your specific audience group.

This is why the solutions I tend to recommend are process-oriented in nature. They anticipate that some things will fail, and that that is ok. Failing is not a sin, not trying is. Failure is just something that happens on the way to success.

Our artists already know this. That's what the rehearsal period is all about. Trying, failing, succeeding, finding what works and what doesn't, and taking it from the small, safe audience of the other artists invested in the work that are in that rehearsal room to the big stage when it's been through that process and (hopefully) ready for mass consumption.

What does this all suggest then? Here's a basic process I might set up:

1. Engagement groups: I've argued before in favor of forming non-board-of-trustee groups and young professional councils and so forth. This is one of the areas where they really come in handy. This is your opportunity to listen to what they want and develop programs out of their feedback, and your opportunity to take your own ideas to them and test them out on that intimate, invested group that will give you honest feedback. Set something like this up in your organization and start engaging with them on innovative projects.

2. Testing: Work the kinks out of your idea by inviting small test audiences for whatever your idea is. Integrate the people from your engagement groups above with other targeted groups that you think would respond to whatever the project is. Ask those in the engagement groups to invite friends to an exclusive test. Evaluate their experiences and adjust as necessary.

3. Metrics: Based on what you're hearing, now is the time to set definitive metrics by which to measure the impact of your project. They might not be the same as what you originally thought they'd be. An education project can sometimes become a new audience feature or vice versa. Figure out what you are going to track to measure success, and capture that data, both before and after implementing the new project.

4. Rollout: Now is when you can bring this idea to the masses if it survives the first two stages. Announce it to the press and see what they have to say. Tell your patrons. Continue to talk to audiences. Take surveys. Watch your metrics. Look for unexpected results.

5. Evaluate: Did it do what you wanted? Did it do something else that's worthwhile? Has it somehow improved the experiences of your customers, patrons, donors, and/or advocates? Figure out if you want to keep the project going, change it, or scrap it.

6. Share: Take it back to your engagement group, and let them know what the results were and what you think should be done. The entire group learns along with you, and it might generate new ideas. You'll get confirmation of your decision or maybe arguments you haven't considered yet. New projects might spring from the old. The process starts anew.

This process is ongoing, allows you to learn, and has a number of checkpoints where you can get feedback. Hopefully, it can be a start to your own process, tailored to your organization. (And if you need help with that, call me ;) )

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Sideshow: Cellos rock

I featured these guys on a previous Sideshow, but they just keep bringing the rock. How can I resist?



Dear 2CELLOS, if you need some help putting together a Chicago gig, give me a call.

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Entrenched against amateurs

I'm disappointed to see Deb Clapp, the superlative Executive Director of the League of Chicago Theatres, come out with a statement on the League blog against amateur participation in the theatre. I was at the same symposium Deb mentions in her piece, Future of the City: Arts Symposium, hosted by the University of Chicago, and frankly, I found that panel that spoke of participation with generous examples of such participation from L.A. to Grand Rapids was the most interesting and educational by far.

Nor is Clapp alone in her sentiments. One of my favorite artistic directors anywhere in the world, Martha Lavey of Steppenwolf Theatre Company, also recently came out against a particular form of participation, using Twitter in the theatre, saying that the job of the audience is to sit back and soak in the art.

These are both professionals in the arts world that I respect tremendously and that have done critical work in building the theatre community of Chicago (and I could admittedly sit and listen to Lavey speak for hours at a time, completely enraptured), but I come down well on the other side of this debate. I would even argue that both of these amazing thought leaders undermine their own arguments.

Clapp recognizes in her post:

I love public and community art projects that draw people in to something that is larger than them, that results in a creation that asserts our humanity. And I think places where creativity is encouraged are magical – places like Lill Street where I make my pots and Old Town School of Folk Music.

We are not those places, we are the places where we hear the voice of another, where we set aside our own need to be heard and listen and are uplifted and fortified because we have seen something that truly had something to say – something that spoke to us like nothing else before.

I find it difficult to reconcile that difference. After all, Old Town doesn't just do classes. I've seen a number of amazing shows there as a member of the audience (though I've gotten up to dance at times). It seems almost like Clapp is afraid that if the theatres in town start to hold classes or showcase amateur work that it will compete with, rather than enhance the intense wonder of the professional work that happens on stage. The opposite has been true for Old Town, and I have every confidence that it would be similar at a League theatre as well.

As for Lavey, she was integral in transforming Steppenwolf into the theatre of the "public square". The talkbacks at Steppenwolf are some of the absolute best I've ever been to. Should those talkbacks start and end only at times that Lavey decides? Is that how a public square works?

Twitter in the theatre is one minor way to participate in the art, live as it happens, but, if well-executed with rules to maximize everyone's ability to enjoy the show, tweeting or not, it can be one of the few that are unobtrusive and respectful of the artists and audience. It's the non-stop talkback of sorts that has your audience engaging with you, transforming from Customers that observe into Patrons that engage, with little effort on your part.

I believe very strongly in ensuring that we do a better job of raising up the work of professional artists so that they can be paid for the creativity, inspiration, and entertainment that they bring us at the same time that we define the amateur and professional spaces as separate with separate resources without denigrating the amateur artist. But participation is key in building loyalty to our art forms and to our organizations, and to actively discourage it in any form is, in my view, a big mistake.

I don't know specifically where this entrenchment comes from, but it is clear that the arts as a whole have resisted letting amateurs into our spaces, that we view them as receptacles for our greatness instead of active partners in the artistic process. That has to change. At the very least, social media is giving voice to those amateurs and if we cannot find a way to welcome them, embrace them, and convert them into great lovers of professional work through a personal connection to the art they yearn to capture a piece of for themselves, we will have lost our opportunity to capture tomorrow's audiences.

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Sideshow: Who's Broadway for?

Just in case you were doing something more entertaining than watching the Tony Awards last night like I was, here's Neil Patrick Harris doing what NPH does best.



Being able to browse the internet for the 5 minutes actually worth watching and the list of awards from an award show makes living in the future so fabul... awesome.

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Gala events: Music of the Baroque

I decided to take a small break from controversies to talk about fun stuff...

I had the distinct pleasure of volunteering for the sold-out Music of the Baroque 40th Anniversary Gala event about a week or so ago. Their gala was a $350 a seat event at the Fairmont Hotel Chicago, and well worth every dollar.

Connection to the art: For the donors, they started with a short concert, featuring the music that these supporters believed in enough to be a part of the event. I wasn't able to attend the performance itself, and it was a short part of the event, but I still applaud them for making this a part of the wining and dining. I don't know everything that went on in the concert, but I hope they found a way to connect the artwork to the emotional effect it has on the various constituents of the organization. Testimony from children introduced to baroque music, from fellow patrons and donors. I didn't see a screen in the room, but my first thought would be to show pictures and quotes on a screen behind the musicians as they played.

Blinky lights: As part of the volunteer staff helping with the raffle, this is where I got most of my observations. One of the smallest but most significant choices that Music of the Baroque did was to designate those that had purchased a package of raffle tickets with a magnetized blinking light that could be placed on your dress or lapel. As I walked past one group, one person observed "Look! We all have lights!" They had turned into a status item of sorts, a clear blinking sign to a room of philanthropists that you're part of the even-more-generous crowd. They also ensured that no one got asked too many times, turning a great event booster into an annoyance for the crowd.

Training: This is one of the areas that Music of the Baroque could have improved upon just a little bit. I, shamefully, admit that I got waylaid at the bookstore and arrived a few minutes late to the 30 minute training session, however, in speaking with the other volunteers after the session and over the course of the night, it became evident that they had been trained more on technical details than on how to best approach the gala attendees. Volunteers are often not salespeople. They don't have those developed instincts. As there were returning volunteers as well as new ones, it would have been well-advised to get a group discussion going on ways to approach attendees that really worked well in the past. Perhaps even run a few roleplay sessions for practice. Giving your volunteers confidence and proper tools to act as your agent makes a huge difference in how they represent your organization.

Overall, the event was a smashing success though. The organization reports that they raised a fantastic $233,000 that night, including $50,000 by raffle. I took my beautiful girlfriend out for a swing on the dance floor with the live band later in the evening to enjoy the fruits of our labor in supporting the organization, and the entire experience was appreciated by myself and, more importantly, the attendees. There were lots of shining eyes in the crowd as they supported an organization that clearly had their act together.

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Violagate

Oy, I hate that name. It's so trite to just label any scandal, high or low, X-gate. But there it is.

For those of you not following along at home, a long-time member of the arts community, Bernard Zaslav, succeeded at stopping a performance by heckling the artist, resulting in the artist getting so upset that he threw his viola down, breaking it. Zaslav states that he did so because the sounds were hurting his ears via his high-tech hearing aids.

There is no real reason to dispute this claim that he was in pain (though many have in an attempt to discredit him). There is also no reason to dispute his claim that he loves new music (though his statements shouted from the front row do, indeed, paint a pretty bad picture of him in this regard, his previous, long track record of work supporting new music throws the crotchety old man that only loves Dead White Guys into serious doubt). Being someone that has been at 10 on the pain scale (as high as it goes), I even believe fully that he wasn't thinking rationally at the time. Pain does that.

What is at the heart of the dispute in my eyes is how he handled himself since the concert. That aforementioned membership in the arts community makes him a leader of sorts, fair or not. He serves as a model for how we want others to act, both within the community and for our audiences. While I am no proponent of the sit-quietly-in-the-dark way that we currently impose on most of our audiences and think that there are ways to appropriately express yourself as an audience member, this is not it. Yet Zaslav never apologizes.

The only time "apologize" gets typed by him in the forum linked above where much of the conversation seems to be occurring is for when he makes a mistake on which ensemble a musician he mentions earlier is a part of. He later acknowledges that his actions were rude, but he still fails to apologize directly. He is reported to make a phone call to the presenter and the artist, but later continues to make statements that justify his actions. He even does some self-promotion throughout the exchange to add some insult to injury.

If he, like I, believes that these are not actions that we want our audiences to emulate, then he should have come out and said "I'm sorry for my actions. I was wrong to do what I did. This is not how an audience member should deal with this situation, and I regret my actions." From there, Zaslav could have been a catalyst for a number of excellent discussions and proved his leadership within the community having made such a simple and profound statement. Whether he can't manage to say it publicly for pride's sake or for some other reason, he has missed this opportunity.

We are all human. We have individual experiences. Some of those experiences lead us to do things that aren't well-thought-out at the time. The response to those things is not to be stubborn and defensive. It's to acknowledge our humanity and take ownership of our mistakes so that we can all move past them.

Think how much better it would have been for Rep. Anthony Weiner too had he come right out and said that he sent those texts and pictures, that he was sorry for his actions, and that he and his wife have a great deal to work out privately right from the beginning. He's not a Congressperson that runs on family values voting, so there's no hypocrisy there. Lying to the public and trying to use misdirection though does, indeed, make it a more serious scandal as it now becomes a matter of trust that his constituents will now have to consider as he runs for office in the future. To me, dishonesty in Weiner's case or justifying in Zaslav's case are far worse than taking the original action in dispute.

If this situation infuriates you as much as I, then let this be a lesson to us all. If you make a mistake, one that effects a large number of people, one that might even make it out into the news or blogosphere and become public, it becomes incumbent upon you to make a public statement acknowledging your bad behavior, or the people out there with their social media and blogs will have to act to marginalize you.

You missed an opportunity for a teaching moment and a sincere moment, Mr. Zaslav, so don't be surprised as the rest of us make an example of you instead.

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Internal loyalty

Anne Parsons is the kind of arts manager that gives the rest of us a bad name. The president of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra has been in the news quite a bit over the past year. The latest news to feature her is perhaps one of the most telling, however.

In March, while the fight was still raging between Parsons and the musicians over a 23% pay cut for the musicians as well as some other issues surrounding outreach and community involvement, Parsons got her contract extension with the DSO board wrapped up and then kept under wraps, waiting until after breaking the strike and the spring concert series to announce her contract extension. And who could blame her considering that announcing the fact that she was being brought back for exactly the same pay would have given the musicians even more resolve to wait out Parsons and the board?

Parsons reportedly makes close to $300,000 per year along with a long list of fringe benefits, not the least of which is the house she lives in. I haven't looked deeply into top-tier orchestra management salaries of late, but that doesn't sound out of the ordinary, for better or worse. So by pure market value of experienced top-level management, I'm sure that it's reasonable for the level of management talent we're discussing. Of course, the argument that Detroit would lose its status as a first class orchestra if it made such drastic cuts was summarily dismissed by management, so why would the market for management talent be different? But this isn't purely a factor of economics.

Parsons already has an image as a union-breaker given her role in the strike and her intransigence in negotiating, even when top politicians and mediators came in to try to help put an end to the long dispute. The loss of Emmanuelle Boisvert, the long-time concertmaster of the DSO, to Dallas where she will be willingly taking a demotion to associate concertmaster, as well as the loss of other musicians towards the end of the strike, showed the lack of trust and confidence already prevalent among the musicians.

So now, how can these musicians that finally bowed to time and accepted that huge 23% cut in pay possibly feel to this latest slap in the face that Parsons will force them to take hugely painful cuts without bothering to take any of her own?

Would $69,000 make everything at the DSO better? Of course not. But one of the constant refrains before and throughout the strike from Parsons was the need for more outreach and community programming, a fact I strongly supported. $69,000 would certainly make an impact on expanding such programs. I could still think of many interesting things to do with $69,000 that would help reach out to new audiences.

More important though is the sense of shared sacrifice that was asked of the musicians that Parsons abandons completely here. After all, if the average musician was making just over $100,000 (about a third of what Parsons makes), each individual musician's share of about $23,000 that they sacrificed won't make or break the orchestra either. It's the shared sacrifice together that makes it possible for the orchestra to realign itself, but it's not one that Parsons contributes to in any real sense.

This is why artists rail against arts management so often. This is where the accusations that we're exploiting their work to make money for ourselves comes from. Parsons shows with such a simple misstep that she doesn't believe in supporting artists, just institutions. This makes it just a little bit harder on the rest of us that are working to ensure that starving artists are a thing of the past to earn the trust of the artists we work so hard to support.

This comes down to my favorite topic on this blog, loyalty. This move shows a complete lack of leadership on Parsons' part, and in the aftermath of the strike, she needs to be rebuilding loyalty if the rest of her programming has a real chance to help rebuild the audience base and expand into new audiences. She needs willing and enthusiastic collaboration with the musicians that decide to stick it out.

Let's assume for a moment that her salary is deserved for those "deep connections within the national funding community" among other things. Fundraising is going to be a critical part of rebuilding the orchestra's position in Detroit and the world stage. There's still a chance for her to lead here, to make a very substantial commmitment to the orchestra and its musicians.

So I call on Parsons to donate 23% of her salary back to the orchestra as long as the musicians also must sacrifice for the health of the organization. Parsons is already a donor, as I'd hope all arts managers would be to the organizations they love and support, but at a more modest 3-7% level according to the article.

This is a chance for her to make a powerful statement to the musicians, to donors spooked by the strike, to those national funders to which she has deep connections that she believes in the orchestra, in the city, and in the long-term strength of the organization and its mission. This would allow her to match action to her words. And as it would be a voluntary effort, it may even mean more, in the end, than had the DSO board done its fiduciary and moral responsibility and reduced her salary through negotiations.

If you also believe that Parsons should donate an amount equal to the sacrifice she asks of her musicians, say so in the comments below. Show your support to have Parsons donate her shared sacrifice, and maybe it can convince her that she needs to take action to earn back the loyalty of the musicians.

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Arts Trek: The Next Generation

We have a responsibility to the next generation of artists and audiences to have strong arts managers coming up the ranks. Internships are such a key part of learning that it pains me when I hear stories of internships that consist exclusively of stuffing envelopes, making coffee, and filing papers. Having been given an opportunity to have a leadership role at an arts organization as part of my graduate program at Carnegie Mellon showed me what a difference it makes to have a good experiential program where you contribute to the success of an organization.

Dana Goldstein, doing a guest stint on Ezra Klein's blog, seems frustrated as well, and gives some great examples of ways to change the educational system to better accommodate strong internship programs. In the meantime, while we wait for schools to adapt to this sort of programming, identify the areas where you need help in your organization and commit to putting a young high school or college student into that role, be it for school credit or for minimum wage. Perhaps even seek out people that hadn't sought a career in the arts before and open that student's eyes to the incredibly rewarding (if incredibly hard) work we do.

Every organization seeking to grow has things that can be done to kick it up to the next level. Research on new grants to pursue, starting a social media program, connecting with new classrooms for your outreach efforts, starting a youth arts booster club, etc. Find out what your potential intern is interested in and match them with mentors in your organization and with work that they can do to make an impact. Your organization will build a relationship with that student, that student's friends that hear about the cool stuff they're doing, the school that student comes from, and will be setting up potential employees or enthusiastic collaborators down the road when that student is ready to enter the job market.

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