May 31, 2009

A SMALL SILVER LINING IN THE ECONOMIC CLOUD

Hello everyone.

"And the beat goes on......................."

HELP JUST FOR THE ASKING?

With budget downsizing, layoffs and less money coming in from all sources, what can the average arts organization do to get staff help in fundraising, event planning, marketing, media relations, volunteer coordination and all the other things that simply have to get done?

The bad economic situation may actually be providing at least a temporary answer -- qualified interns. More and more recent college graduates are actively seeking nonprofit internships because in the current job market there are no jobs to be had. Internships give them practical experience and something to put on their resumes that will help them distinguish their experience (and commitment to a chosen field (e.g. marketing, finance, etc.). Any number of experts are advising college graduates (and even displaced workers)to consider an intership as a smart (temporary) move.

An increasing number of nonprofits are finding that they are getting huge responses to ads on craigslist and other places for interns - including non-paid positions -- even ones demanding six month minimum commitments. The key to attracting superior talent to these positions is to offer real training and oversight as well as meaningful decision making authority. If all you are looking for is someone to file papers and stuff envelopes, you aren't likely to get anyone who can really help you. But if you can allocate senior management time to oversee such a program and offer mentorship and skills training so that the experience is seen as serious professional development, there has never been a better opportunity to attract truly talented and often time surprisingly well qualified people in fields as diverse as website design and management, to marketing and public relations, to finance and accounting.

Need help in your understaffed (or nonexistent) marketing department? Is your finance department (or finance person) overwhelmed? Do you just not have the time right now to begin to create next year's budget? Want to boost the percentage of twenty somethings in your audience? Want to get some media coverage with that same segment? Want to increase awareness of your organization and raise money from the young professionals crowd?

Why not recruit two or three recent communications department (or other departments - e.g. business / finance etc.) new college grads as unpaid (or minimally paid) interns, for a defined time period (say, four to six months), and then after a quick orientation and tutorial in your organization and the nonprofit arts sector, turn that mini team loose to work on a series of predetermined objectives you and the team mutually arrive at (e.g., raise $20,000 from the under 35 crowd. Or get ten articles in local papers, magazines or on local television about the organization. Or draft a detailed budget for next year including cost cutting options. There are doubtless a score of things you would like to have done, but can't do yourself)? No budget? No problem, that is part of their challenge. You meet with them regularly to review what they are doing, offer suggestions and direction and monitor their progress. You stand to get unbridled energy and enthusism, out-of-the-box thinking and entrepreneurialship, and just maybe achieve some results that have been eluding you. You also get one or more people who will care about your organization and go out into the community and spread goodwill. You might even get a future permanent employee. They get the opportunity for some practical, real world experience, real decision making authority, and, depending on the degree of their success, an excellent addition to their resume and a terrific recommendation from you to prospective employers. They also get the chance to do some meaningful work and help with a good cause. Win / Win. No?

But this opportunity may not last forever. The economy will improve, more jobs will become available, and more workers will then be in demand, and less of them will be interested in working as an intern.

Something you might want to think about anyway.

Links you may want to check out:

Doug McLennan's blog on TEN WAYS TO THINK ABOUT SOCIAL NETWORKING AND THE ARTS: www.artsjournal.com/diacritical/2009/05/power-in-numbers-there-ought.html

SEATTLE AFTA CONFERENCE LINK: www.americansforthearts.org/Events/2009/convention/default.asp

Have a good week.

Don't Quit.
Barry

May 24, 2009

BARRY'S BLOG - SOME COOL RANDOM LINKS

Hello everybody.

"And the beat goes on.................."


NINE COOL RANDOM LINKS FROM AROUND THE WEB:
Here's some links I thought you might find interesting:

John Kilacky (Arts Program Officer - San Francisco Foundation) emailed me with this link to his Ten suggestions of things you can do to cope with the hard economic times. Check them out here – www.blueavocado.org/content/survival-strategies-arts

Here's an idea (from the Dalouge Smith blog - Dog Days - May 14, 2009)I have long thought should become reality. An Artist-in-residence in every corporation – click here: www.artsjournal.com/dogdays/

Some people thought Michelle Obama's remarks at the Metropolitan Museum in New York last week came up short, but to me what is important is the fact that the First Lady made the remarks in the first place. (I don't remember Laura Bush or Hillary Clinton out on the stump for the arts - though perhaps they did - though not often that's for sure.) One can only hope, however, that the arts are not just on the First Lady's radar screen, but will be a policy priority of the West Wing and the President too. Here is the text of Michelle Obama's speech – www.artsjournal.com/culturegrrl/2009/05/text_of_michelle_obamas_speech.html

The Hewlett Foundation released the SRI follow-up report to their California arts education report - you can find it at their onsite library (scroll down) once you click here: www.hewlett.org/library

The Poodwaddle World Clock is a very cool site that gives you (in real time) the world population as it is growing plus scores of other world stats and info. It breaks down growth by continent, in terms of gender and some other fascinating statistics - there is a moving toolbar at the top - click on any of the icons. This is a dynamic site - play with it. I think you will find it fascinating. Click here: www.poodwaddle.com/clocks3.htm

Got an email this week from a Gen X self-described "emerging leader" who suggested to me that the real reason a lot of people are going to this year's Americans for the Arts Conference in Seattle is to network and look for possible new employment given that there are so many layoffs and closures going on in our sector. And I suppose if you are looking to put your name and face into people's minds so as to increase your chances of finding a new position, this conference is a very good one at which to do that. Click here for a link to their conference site: www.americansforthearts.org/Events/2009/convention/default.asp

Target Women if you want a donation. I have long suspected this is true. My own experience suggests most corporate giving decisions are made by high level exeutives wives. Here the Chronicle of Philanthropy suggests women in each family increasingly make the philanthropic decisions. www.philanthropy.com/news/updates/index.php?id=8307

Create a "social network" of your own. Ning.com is -(according to Ask.com) - "a social network designed around creating social networks. Ning invites users to create their own social network by going through a series of steps that name the social network, select a color scheme, and allow for unique profile questions.

In some ways, Ning is a portal to mini-social networks since you can choose to join any of the thousands of user-created networks, and in other ways, it is a social network development platform."
This has many potential uses for your arts organization. Click here: www.ning.com

Place group calls and send messages to multiple people for free (from your mobile or any other phone). www.foonz.com

If you have a link to a cool site you think people would like to know about, please add it as a comment below, or email me a reply. Thanks.

Hope you are rejuvinated following the Memorial Day holiday.

Have a good week.

Don't Quit.

Barry

May 17, 2009

NEXT YEAR COULD BE A WHOLE LOT WORSE

Hello everybody.

“And the beat goes on............”


THE CALM BEFORE THE REAL STORM?:

In conversations with foundation program officers, local and state arts agency directors, and elected officials, I am hearing the same draconian predictions – that arts organizations (in many, if not all, places) haven’t yet really begun to feel the economic crisis that is looming in the near future. We’ve been hit hard already, but we’re really still living on last year’s budgets and spending patterns – last year’s city and municipal budgets, last year’s foundation budgets, last year’s philanthropic giving, and last year’s audience attendance. And it is going to get a lot worse.

I am hearing that some major foundations may be cutting their funding pool budgets for next year by 20% or more, and that some smaller arts funding foundations are contemplating even deeper cuts. Local cities and counties, hard hit by the economic downturn and desperate for revenue, are likewise contemplating huge reductions for arts funding. And the competition for those scarcer dollars is heating up as many government funded areas seek to appropriate arts money for their needs, and are making the argument that what they do is more critical and necessary than arts funding and that arts funding must, during these hard times, take a back seat to other, more pressing needs. There are many cities and counties where the local arts agency funding pool is threatened with elimination or drastic cuts. Similarly, hotel tax funds – used to fund the arts in many jurisdictions, are down because tourism is down, and thus their pool of arts money is shrinking.

The response by many arts organizations to these possible reduced funding pools is to (perhaps erroneously) assume that if there is a 20% cut in some funding pool (hypothetically a foundation let’s say), that their grant will be cut by 20% next year. But what I am hearing is that (at least some) funders are trying to reassess what they fund and to what extent as they struggle to make hard choices in these desperate times, and that may mean that any number of organizations that have for a long time gotten an annual grant, may this year not get a cut in that grant, but rather may not get any grant at all. If the average arts organization’s funding includes a number of grants from a variety of sources, all of these cuts, in the aggregate, may add up to be a quite substantial portion of their total budget. For any number of organizations that could be an overall cut to their budget much larger than what they are anticipating.

Add to our problems that the number of those donating to the arts may not be falling, but the amount of their individual gifts apparently is. Corporate giving is way down across the entire nonprofit sector. And we have all seen the impact of audiences staying home resulting in cancelled or shortened performance schedules and the like. The NEA economic stimulus money (though not very much) nonetheless has helped some organizations cope with the (so far) relatively modest downturn (compared to what might lie ahead this coming year), and that has, itself, created somewhat of a false sense of security. That extra money won’t be available next year.

The long and short of all this is that a lot of inside people are talking about the next year as one that will really hit the arts hard. Some organizations are in denial over what may be coming, others may just not see it coming and are going to be in for a shock. Still others see the writing on the wall and are trying to plan for survival, but aren’t sure to what extent all of this will hit them. It will be prudent for arts organizations of all types and sizes to do some very serious worst case scenario planning this year in anticipation for next year.

One can only hope the above scenario doesn't happen.

NEA CHAIR NOMINEE:

The New York Times broke the story last week that Rocco Landesman, a broadway producer, is President Obama’s choice to head the NEA (www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/theater/13nea.html?_r=&scp=1&sq=endowment%20for%20the%20arts&st=cse ) For many in the arts this was a very surprising nomination, and some will be disappointed that Obama didn’t pick someone of color, a woman and / or someone with nonprofit arts experience. I don’t know Mr. Landesman, but like him I was an outsider and came from the "for profit" entertainment sector when I first started in the non profit arts 13 years ago, so I would hope everyone would give him a chance. I think it incumbent on the whole of the arts field to open an immediate dialogue as to what the NEA should be, what its’ priorities ought to be, how it’s money should be allocated and what role it should play in supporting arts & culture in America. I think every national arts service provider group – from every discipline, along with the foundations and funders, and & every state and city agency, should all begin to ask their colleagues to chime in on what kind of NEA we all want to see and then begin to organize those thoughts and reflections and share them with Mr. Landesman. Along that line, I intend to gather a half dozen or so leaders for discussion on this blog of exactly those questions -- with the hope that such an exercise might motivate others to do the same. The NEA ostensibly belongs to all of us. We need to discuss what the agency should be.


AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS IN SEATTLE:

With budget cuts, shrinking funding pools, and looming challenges, it is hard to argue that people should spend money and time travelling to attend a conference, but I would argue that this is precisely the time when arts leaders should get together --- to talk about those challenges, share ideas as to how to survive and cope and to network with their peers. For me, the Americans for the Arts conference has always been one of my personal preferred meetings. I can think of three really good reasons why arts leaders here in California in particular should attend the meeting in Seattle June 18-20th.

1. The networking possibilities. The conference provides one the better opportunities to intersect and interact with some very well positioned and powerful leaders in the field -- including those from three key groups: a) a large segment of the foundation / funding community -- (and I like to intersect with the people who have the money because sharing information with them tells you a lot about the health of our sector and let’s you know what kinds of projects may and may not fly in the future), b) a very large segment of the national service provider organizations(half of which it seems are now part of Americans for the Arts under the expansion umbrella of the past few years), and interaction with those people gives me a good idea as to what the various sectors of our field are facing and what they are doing to cope, and let's me get a handle on how others are successfully dealing with major challenges (it also let's me brainstorm with people from different corners of our field about possible collaboration, and (c) an excellent cross section of the sector's best and brightest independent consultants - and as a consultant now I like to touch base with others to see where there might be some possibilities for collaboration or for work.

I have found that I invariably come home from these gatherings with a new project in the development stage, and a very high percentage of those embryonic projects conceived at this conference end up being realized. Something seems to happen here and there are always surprising outcomes.

2. AFTA always allows attendees the opportunity to really see and experience the arts & culture of a city up close and in detail. I have been to probably a dozen AFTA conferences, and but for those conferences I would never have had the chance to really experience those cities and their arts communties in anywhere near the depth I do because of AFTA's sponsorship. Seattle is a fantastic and cool city, and it's so close to California that it's possible to come to this meeting Thursday and go home Friday night if you want to. Airline flights have never been more reasonable and there are multiple hotel options. As the conference rotates to different locations around the country, (and was in Vegas two years ago), it isn't likely to be back on the west coast for some time.

3. The chance for renewal. I have come away from each of these conferences both renewed and re-energized, and it is important for arts leaders during these times to get reconnected again to the pool of positive energy that will allow them to survive and weather these tough times.
Click here for AFTA convention information & registration www.americansforthearts.org/Events/2009/convention/default.asp

Have a great week.

Don't Quit.
Barry