Onward Through the Fog

Finding Our Way in Unfamiliar Twenty-First Century Terrain

Funding Our Way in Unfamiliar Twenty-First Century Terrain?

21st Century Challenges and Opportunities

New York/New England in 1556

Digital technologies are creating new cultural frontiers

• Cultural authority has moved to the Web

• The era of the digital native began in 1985

• 64% of online teenagers ages 12 to 17 engage in at least one type of content creation

10 million subscribers

2008 Study on Gaming

• Conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, the first to investigate the prevalence of gaming among young people aged 12 to 17.

• www.pewinternet.org

Demographic shifts are driving changes in cultural expectations

• The U.S. Census Bureau now projects that by 2042 we will be a “minority-majority” population.

Aging Population, Aging Audience

• Today, seniors aged 65 and older number 36.3 million, 12 percent of the population

• By 2050, they are projected to grow to 86.7 million, approximately 20 percent of the population

Generational leadership transitions are reshaping

organizations

• Young leaders will reinvent organizations for the 21st century

• It’s up to the “elders” to cultivate and encourage them

Cultural organizations are profoundly undercapitalized

• Is the cultural system overbuilt?

• What are the alternatives to our current Darwinian approach?

• Mergers/alliances work when there is congruence of mission, compatibility of collections and political will of the governing body

• The very idea of mergers raises hackles in the culture community: most though not all are driven by crisis

Agreement about the value of cultural nonprofits has eroded

• The market definition of cultural value is now dominant

• It’s time to listen to what our constituencies value in cultural experience

• John Holden, “Cultural Value and the Crisis of Legitimacy. www.demos.co.uk

Schenectady 1896

Navigating by Compass

True North

Philadelphia Cultural Leadership Program

• Vision, mission, goals, programs and identified constituencies are all aligned

• Strong and informed leadership guides the organization

• There is a culture of planning throughout the organization

Tools and Assistance

• Index of Organizational Health• www.pewtrusts.org

• Philadelphia Cultural Management Initiative• www.artshelp.org

• Cultural Data Project

Annual Report (Financial Activity Section)Annual Report (Financial Activity Section)

21st Century Assumptions

• Organizations need to know their environment as well as they know themselves

• Achieving programmatic relevance in a crowded marketplace will be more challenging

• Operating “in the black” is no longer sufficient for long-term sustainability

A new role for cultural organizations?

• In the future, cultural organizations could be a force for securing all individuals’ right to their own creativity.

• For now, planning toward this or other transformative visions is all that may be possible.