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Thank you for visiting the 6E Updates page. This third update includes added resources for ten of the twelve chapters in the 6th edition of Management and the Arts. I hope students, faculty, and practitioners will find these additional resources of value.
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REMINDER
ERRATUM (AKA - an error in printing or writing)
While every effort is made in the proofing process of a manuscript to make corrections and fix typographical errors, sometimes things are missed. If the reader comes across any errors or typos in the sixth edition, please notify me at mgtandthearts@gmail.com. Thank you.
Acknowledgments – Page xxvi - The name Joshua Stavros was misspelled
Chapter 9 – Page 378 - Under the Balance Sheet header, the abbreviations should be NA for Net Assets and not NE which stands for Net Equity.
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UPDATES – WINTER 2023
Chapter 1 – Arts Management Overview
The Tenth Anniversary of an Arts System Map: How Are We Doing?
Sunil Iyengar, September 2022
Here is a link to an update from the NEA related to the How Art Works System Map shown in Fig. 1.1 on page 5 and discussed in Chapter 1 on pages 4 -6. This 35-page report articulates several research pathways the NEA is engaging in as it revisits the system map.
Link to report: https://www.arts.gov/stories/blog/2022/tenth-anniversary-arts-system-map-how-are-we-doing
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National Endowment for the Arts Research Agenda - FY 2022-2026
This document charts topical priorities that will shape the NEA’s research awards portfolio over
the next five years. Before discussing these priorities, it may help to revisit a landmark event in
the history of research at the National Endowment for the Arts.
Link to 13-page PDF: https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/NEA-research-agenda-12.21.pdf
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Yes, “Art Works” —Now What? Preparing the NEA’s FY 2022-2026 Research Agenda
Purpose of this Report. To support the Office of Research and Analysis (ORA) in developing the next five-year Research Agenda, covering FY 2022-2026, the agency engaged RMC Research to gather and synthesize patterns in a wide range of information about research priorities and to identify gaps in existing knowledge. ORA is using the report findings along with other information, e.g., emerging plans for new initiatives, to draft a new Research Agenda.
Link to the report: https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/Yes-Art-Works-Now-What.pdf
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NEW BOOKS ON TOPICS IN ARTS MANAGEMENT
Managing the Arts and Culture: Cultivating a Practice
Edited by Constance DeVeraux, Routledge, 2023
Book description: Managing cultural organizations requires insight into a range of areas including marketing, fundraising, programming, finances, and leadership. This book integrates practical and theoretical insights, blending academic and practitioner voices to help readers "speak the language" in the creative industries. Some features include:
* Scenarios to help orient readers to common arts management problems
* Ethical dilemmas discussed in every chapter
* Study questions to enable students to review the skills learned
* Experiential exercises to gain experience and apply skills
* Emphasis on cross-cultural and transferrable skills
* Integration of international perspectives
* Suggested additional readings and website links for each topic area
With contributions from a team of international experts, this book provides a one-stop-shop for students of arts and cultural management and will also provide a valuable resource for those currently in the field.
Link to order the book: https://www.routledge.com/Managing-the-Arts-and-Culture-Cultivating-a-Practice/DeVereaux/p/book/9780367622619
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Business Issues in the Arts
Edited by Anthony Rhine, Jay Pension, Routledge, 2022.
From the back cover: Business Issues in the Arts is a text designed to address some of the most prescient business issues that nonprofit arts organizations face today. This text is not a how-to but an in-depth dive into fourteen topics and their associated theories to augment learning in arts administration programs.
With contributions from leading academics in arts administration, the book guides readers through an exploration of those topics which have been found by practitioners to be most vital and least explored. Chapters include numerous case examples to illustrate business theory in the artistic and creative environment. The academic contributors themselves each come with both professional backgrounds and research experience, and they are each introduced at the start of their chapters, allowing for a collection of voices to navigate through some oftentimes challenging topics.
Link to order the book: https://www.routledge.com/Business-Issues-in-the-Arts/Rhine-Pension/p/book/9781032070841
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Digital Transformation in the Cultural and Creative Industries- Production, Consumption and Entrepreneurship in the Digital and Sharing Economy
Edited by Marta Massi, Marilena Vecco, and Yi Lin, Routledge, 2022.
From the publisher: This research-based book investigates the effects of digital transformation on the cultural and creative sectors. Through cases and examples, the book examines how artists and art institutions are facing the challenges posed by digital transformation, highlighting both the positive and negative effects of the phenomenon.
With contributions from an international range of scholars, the book examines how digital transformation is changing the way the arts are produced and consumed. As relative late adopters of digital technologies, the arts organizations are shown to be struggling to adapt, as issues of authenticity, legitimacy, control, trust, and co-creation arise.
Link to order the book: https://www.routledge.com/Digital-Transformation-in-the-Cultural-and-Creative-In-dustries/Massi-Vecco-Lin/p/book/9780367351168
Chapter 2 – Arts Managers and the Practice of Management
Dance Data Project (DDP)- New Report
In Update #2, I shared a report by the Dance Data Project about gender distributions of leadership positions in ballet companies in the U.S. This latest update can be used in conjunction with Chapter 2, pages 44 - 49 (Part 2: Profile of the Arts Manager). The report takes an “initial dive into the fiscal interactions between company budget and company leadership compensation from the fiscal year 2016 to the fiscal year 2020.”
Some key data points include:
Artistic Director Salary Change
* The median artistic director salary increased by 3.4% in FY 2017, 2.8% in FY 2018, 3.0% in FY 2019, and 3.2% in FY 2020 when comparing changes from the fiscal year against the previous year.
* Largest increase for an Artistic Director: Miami City Ballet- 78% increase from FY18 ($325,000) to FY19 ($581,250)
Executive Director Salary Change
* The median executive director salary increased by 3.3% in FY 2017, 2.6%, in FY 2018, 3.3% in FY 2019, and 1.5% in FY 2020 when comparing changes from the fiscal year against the previous year.
* Largest increase for an Executive Director: Aspen Santa Fe Ballet: 65.1% increase from FY16 ($149,617) to FY17 ($246,999)
The report also includes a section covering FY 2020, which shows compensation increases despite ballet company budget reductions. For example, Joffrey Ballet’s AD saw their compensation increase by 14.5% and the ED’s compensation increased by 9.7%, despite an overall budget decrease of 16.8%. When considering these salaries, keep in mind the information in the Chapter 12 Appendix, starting on page 527, about the cost of living in various cities and regions of the United States.
Link to the DDP report:
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NEW BOOK ON INTERNATIONAL ARTS MANAGEMENT
Here’s an additional resource to supplement Box 2.3 International Arts Management Resources in Chapter 2, starting on page 47.
Arts Management, Cultural Policy, & the African Diaspora
Edited by Antonio C. Cuyler, Palgrave Macmillan, 2022
About This Book: This book centers people of African descent as cultural leaders to challenge the myth that they do not know how or care about managing and preserving their culture. Arts Management, Cultural Policy, & the African Diaspora also presents comparative case studies of the challenges, differences, similarities, and successes in approaches to cultural leadership across multiple cultural contexts throughout the diaspora. This volume disrupts the enduring and systemic global marginalization, oppression, and subjugation that threatens and undermines people of African descent’s cultural contributions to humanity. The most important distinguishing feature of the volume is its geographical use of the African diaspora to explore the subjects of arts management and cultural policy, which, to date, no volume has done before. Furthermore, the volume’s comparative examination of ten critical, historical, practical, and theoretical questions makes it a significant contribution to the literature in Arts Management, Cultural Policy, Cultural, Africana, African American, and Ethnic studies.
Link to order book: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-85810-0
Chapter 3 – Adaptive Arts Organizations
Here are some additional resources to supplement the topic of external environments covered in Chapter 3.
Social & Cultural Environment – Chapter 3, page 82
Classical Music’s Racial Awakening – Was It All a Mirage?
I Care if You Listen, Jennifer Grim, November 16, 2022
Until very recently, the long-established tradition of classical music organizations has been to base their programming on music of the Western European canon. From small chamber music series to large performing arts venues, most programming has centered around works and artists that are “bankable” with audience members. Perhaps we would see a piece or two by an underrepresented composer, or a separate series that presented artists of color. But still, those moments felt rare within the general landscape of the performing arts.
The racial awakening after the killing of George Floyd in 2020 sparked a knee-jerk reaction among white arts organizations to program underrepresented composers and performers. And with venues closed due to Covid, and no concert seats to fill, why not take a “risk” and present a virtual concert of works by Jessie Montgomery, Carlos Simon, or William Grant Still? What’s the harm?
Link:
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The Education Environment – Chapter 3, page 88
The Arts Education Data Project (AEDP) provides the first-ever look at the status and condition of arts education in the U.S. using actual student participation data reported by school districts to their state education departments. The AEDP created the National Arts Education Status Report 2019 as a comprehensive look at access to and participation in arts education in the United States.
Link to information on the study and to interactive dashboards:
Also, download the seven-page Summary Report PDF:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-603l5cTNDT2nAtffBXfVtysFFO2UVTb/view
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JOURNAL ARTICLE
Arts majors and the Great Recession: a cross-sectional analysis of educational choices and employment outcomes
By Richard J. Paulsen, Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer, September 2021
Abstract
This study uses American Community Survey data to examine the impact of the Great Recession on college graduates majoring in the arts. Arts graduates play important roles in an economy, through both artistic creation and in careers outside of the arts. While the Great Recession took a significant toll on the US economy generally, arts majors faced additional vulnerabilities as industries that rely on discretionary spending, like the arts and entertainment, are especially hard hit in times of economic downturn. This paper assesses the impact of graduating during or shortly after the recession relative to graduating shortly before this period on educational choices, including choice of major, double majoring, and completing an advanced degree, and career outcomes, including employment status, type of employment, hours worked, and earnings, for college graduates majoring in the arts. Graduating before or after the recession is found to have a negative impact on the share of graduates majoring in traditional arts fields, but a positive impact on the share majoring in related creative fields. Using a difference-in-difference estimation strategy, relative to non-art college graduates, traditional arts majors graduating during or after the Great Recession are more likely to complete a double major, be self-employed, be unemployed, work longer hours, and earn less income than those graduating prior to the recession. These impacts are likely to have a negative effect on the pipeline of college-educated artists working in the arts into the future.
Link to article: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10824-021-09430-7
Chapter 4 – Planning and the Arts
Strategic Plans
Box 4.3, pages 118 -120 provided excerpts from strategic plans for arts organizations. Here are two additional plans you can use to expand your perspective on how these documents may be written and formatted.
First up is the NEA’s 2022-2026 plan, which has four strategic goals and twelve objectives. Page nine of the plan includes a strategic framework that summarizes the mission, vision, goals, and objectives. Underpinning all four goals is what the NEA calls its “Cross-Cutting Objective,” which is to “model diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in the arts through all of its activities and operations.” More details about what could be thought of as tactics are shown starting on page 16 of the plan.
The second document, the Salt Lake City Arts Council Strategic Plan 2021-2026, has four priorities: Foster Cultural Equity and Social Impact, Cultivate and Build Partnerships, Strengthen Organizational Health and Development and Elevate the Arts Sector
The plan uses a Focal Point Template (see p. 38) to state the priority, list a focal point, pose a key question and then outlines the tools, metrics, and resources needed to fulfill the focal point. Pages 13 to 34 detail how the arts council will then execute the plan. For example, the focal point of the first priority (p. 14), Foster Cultural Equity and Social Impact, is “Expand Diversity and Representation.” The question posed is, “How can we expand the diversity and representation within our organization and with those we serve?” The “Tools” include statements that are part objectives and part tactics. However, since this is a summary document, a detailed timeline is not provided. Regardless, this document is a good example of a plan for an entity like an arts council or service organization.
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National Endowment for the Arts Strategic Plan FY 2022-2026
OVERVIEW
This National Endowment for the Arts’ (NEA) strategic plan covers fiscal years 2022 through 2026. The plan took shape while the agency was implementing provisions of the American Rescue Act of 2021, designed to bring direct relief to Americans enduring the health and economic crises of COVID-19. By including the NEA in this comprehensive relief strategy, Congress reaffirmed the NEA’s capacity to support a vital and growing segment of the U.S. economy: the arts and cultural sector—including artists and other creative workers—on whose stability rests economic and job opportunities for people and places nationwide.
Amid this historic backdrop, the NEA is positioning itself as the lead agency within the federal government for social and economic change through the arts. The NEA will broaden and deepen its engagement with organizations that seek to extend the arts and the arts’ benefits to underserved populations, even as the agency will support arts projects that aim to help improve individual health outcomes, or that use systems-level approaches to help strengthen or heal communities. The NEA also will invest in arts projects that support the training, research, technical assistance, and technologies needed for the sector to serve Americans wherever they live, and to benefit future generations. Ultimately, through effective operational practices—and with a dedicated focus on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility—the NEA will achieve the goals and objectives of its strategic plan.
Link to plan: https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/2022-2026-Strategic-Plan-Feb2022.pdf
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Salt Lake City Arts Council: Strategic Plan 2021-2026
Letter from the Director and Board Chair
As we developed this strategic plan, our team made the decision that it would be a guide that included the voices of the staff, board, and mayor and would incorporate a year-long process of community engagement with Salt Lake City residents. The plan addresses the ways we hope to work internally as a team as well as externally, engaging with artists and community members. In our stakeholder roundtables, we asked the community to “describe the arts in Salt Lake City in one word.” The word we heard was “growing.” As we begin our 40th year as an arts council, we are exploring how we continue to support the programs and services that have become hallmarks of the community and how we foster and support an inclusive, vibrant, and broadening arts culture across all our neighborhoods. Simply put, changing communities means a changing Salt Lake City Arts Council.
Download the plan: https://saltlakearts.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/3.-Salt-Lake-City-Arts-Council-Strategic-Plan_Final_compressed.pdf
Chapter 5 – Organizing: Organization Design and Culture
Arts Entrepreneurship
Pages 149 to 152 in Chapter 5 provide a brief overview of arts entrepreneurship and highlight several arts incubators and cultural innovation resources. A recent article in the Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society (Vol 52, Numbers 4-6, 2022) entitled “The Cultural Entrepreneurship Scorecard: An Instrument for Assessing Cultural Organizations” offers an additional perspective on this topic. This open-access article by Edwin van Meerkerk proposes a method for measuring and assessing cultural entrepreneurship. The author demonstrates how a scorecard similar to the Balanced Scorecard in Chapter 4 on page 129 (Fig. 4.5) can be used to assess organizations across five cultural entrepreneurship categories: government, sponsors, consumers, artists, and employees.
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The Cultural Entrepreneurship Scorecard: An Instrument for Assessing Cultural Organizations
By Edwin Meerkerk, 2022,
The Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Society, Volume 52, 2022 - Issue 4
ABSTRACT
Research into cultural entrepreneurship has not yet yielded a single definition of the term, or consensus on assessment criteria. In policy practice, however, cultural entrepreneurship is used as a criterion for subsidies and grants. This article brings together the criteria surfacing in academic literature in a model that allows both researchers and policy makers to assess cultural entrepreneurship. This model is tested in six case studies from the Netherlands. The conclusions show that, by focusing on five categories derived from the stakeholders of each cultural entrepreneur, a balanced view can be obtained. It is hypothesized that strategic choices may underlie the unbalance found between the five categories with each institution.
Link to article: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10632921.2022.2030270
Chapter 6 – Staffing, Boards, and Volunteers
Human Resource Management
The Nonprofit Risk Management Center (NRMC) Launches Website with Free HR and Risk Resources
Many small and midsized nonprofits don’t have dedicated HR or risk staff, so they have an acute need for information and resources on these topics. And like all nonprofit leaders, our focus group participants faced a workforce shortage and staff burnout nearly three years into a pandemic. With that in mind, NRMC has launched a new website. The new site is full of resources to help nonprofit organizations build strong, supportive relationships with employees and manage the risk issues they face.
Link to the resource: https://www.risk-resources.org/resource-center/
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Human Resource Planning, Strategies and Job Design
The article below and the response are relevant to the topic of job design and staffing strategies covered in Chapter 6, pages 189 to 203, and the roles and functions of arts managers covered in Chapter 2, pages 48 to 54.
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“How Many Arts Administrators Does It Take to Change a Lightbulb?”
The Nightingale’s Sonata, Thomas Wolf, October 31, 2022
Have you ever gone to a concert and looked at the printed program or perused an annual report of a museum where the names and positions of administrators are listed? Did you wonder, as I often do, why so many are needed? Putting on performing arts events or running a museum may be complex, but the associated tasks are not exactly rocket science. It may take 90 musicians to play an orchestra concert. Does it really take the same number of administrators to run the organization? And that is a conservative number. In some performing arts organizations, the number of administrators far outnumbers the number of performers.
Link to the blog post: https://www.nightingalessonata.com/blog/2022/9/21/how-many-arts-administrators-does-it-take-to-change-a-lightbulb-by-thomas-wolf-1
And a rebuttal to Wolf’s article . . .
“A recent article from academic and musician Thomas Wolf makes a strident argument that arts organisations employ too many administrators. Ash Mann disagrees.”
Arts Professional, UK, Ash Mann, November 9, 2022
In Wolf’s analysis, bloated bureaucracy forces arts organisations into an unhealthy cycle of needing revenue just to pay for administrative staff. Much of the money has to come from government funding or private donations, which in turn requires more administrators to manage these revenue streams. The cycle perpetuates.
According to Wolf, these administrators are inefficient, overpaid and easily replaced. While he makes some interesting points about how this ‘problem’ might be addressed, his arguments are fundamentally flawed and - to an almost comical extent - fail to understand how cultural institutions operate in the 21st century.
Link to post: https://www.artsprofessional.co.uk/magazine/article/how-many-arts-administrators-does-it-take-change-lightbulb
Chapter 7 – Leading in the Arts
Here’s a resource you can use to supplement the “Leading Ethically” section of Chapter 7 starting on page 271.
Ethical Leadership Guide: Definition, Qualities, Pros & Cons, Examples
by Martin Luenendonk, Last updated on September 3, 2020
“Ethics must begin at the top of an organisation. It is a leadership issue and the chief executive must set the example.” – Edward Hennessy
The world of business is full of ethical dilemmas, from where to direct scarce resources to serving the local community. Every leader will make ethical decisions, whether or not they acknowledge them at the time. But the decisions they do make can determine whether their leadership is based on an ethical framework or not.
In this guide, we’ll examine the ideas and concepts of ethical leadership. We’ll study the basic principles of ethical leadership and the characteristics ethical leaders showcase. Before detailing a few examples of ethical leaders, we turn our attention to the advantages and disadvantages of being an ethical leader.
Link to article: https://www.cleverism.com/ethical-leadership-guide-definition-qualities-pros-cons-examples/
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NEW BOOKS ON ARTS LEADERSHIP
Grassroots Leadership and The Arts For Social Change – For Educators, Organizers, Activists & Rabble-Rousers
Edited by Susan J Enrich and Debra DeRuyver, Dila, International Leadership Organization, 2022
Description: Throughout history artists have led grassroots movements of protest, resistance, and liberation. They created dangerously, sometimes becoming martyrs for the cause. Their efforts kindled a fire, aroused the imagination and rallied the troops culminating in real transformational change. Their art served as a form of dissent during times of war, social upheaval, and political unrest. Less dramatically perhaps, artists have also participated in demonstrations, benefit concerts, and have become philanthropists in support of their favorite causes. These artists have been overlooked or given too little attention in the literature on leadership, even though the consequences of their courageous crusades, quite often, resulted in censorship, “blacklisting,” imprisonment, and worse. This volume explores the intersection of grassroots leadership and the arts for social change by accentuating the many victories artists have won for humanity. History has shown that these imaginative movers and shakers are a force with which to be reckoned with. Through this volume, we hope readers will vicariously experience the work of these brave figures, reflect on their commitments and achievements, and continue to dream a better world full of possibility.
Link to order book: https://ilaglobalnetwork.org/books_/grassroots-leadership-and-the-arts-for-social-change/
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Arts and Cultural Leadership – Creating Sustainable Arts Organizations, 2nd ed.
By Kenneth Foster, Routledge 2022
From the back cover: Drawing on the work of practitioners and theorists in the fields of philosophy, biology, and ecology as well as the arts, Foster proposes a rethinking of organizational design, strategy, and structure that is based on ecological concepts and the creative process that is intrinsic to the arts rather than the conventional business model that currently prevails, particularly in western arts and culture organizations. He contests conventional thinking about arts administration and management and urges arts leaders to foreground innovation as they reimagine their organizations for a world unlike any other. New sections include an enhanced theoretical discussion as well as new material on business models, strategy, and organizational design and practice. Applicable to any arts organization, the entrepreneurial focus is especially relevant in the aftermath of the global pandemic, the ongoing climate crisis, and the quest for democracy and social justice.
Link to order the book: https://www.routledge.com/Arts-and-Cultural-Leadership-Creating-Sustainable-Arts-Organizations/Foster/p/book/9781032204598
Chapter 8 – Economics and the Arts
Cultural Economy Reports
As you will see from the report at the link below, the quest to gather meaningful information about the impact of arts continues. See pages 305 to 308 in Chapter 8 for coverage on the topic of the economic impact of the arts.
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Making data work: A scoping survey to develop a mixed-methods evaluation framework for culture
This 44-page PDF report was published in 2021 by the Centre for Cultural Value, University of Leeds in the United Kingdom. Excerpts from the report are below.
Research Context
Although there is an abundance of data emanating from the UK’s world-leading cultural sector, protocols and practices of collection, collation, storage, analysis, and impact evaluation are sporadic and chaotic. Therefore, cultural data is incoherent and poorly aligned to national policy questions and decision-making processes, which means that policy decisions are often made in a vacuum of robust evidence.
Moreover, there remain seemingly intractable philosophical and disciplinary tensions and incompatibilities between how cultural data is captured and evaluated at the micro-level and how public spending is reviewed and allocated at the macro level. In short, there is a crisis in cultural data.
The core aim of this project was to co-develop a mixed-methods cultural evaluation framework that would combine insights from large datasets with soft, qualitative data that capture the lived experiences of people who produce and consume culture, such as artists, producers, curators and audiences.
Link to report - https://www.culturalvalue.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Making-Data-Work.pdf
Chapter 10 – Marketing and the Arts
Dynamic Pricing
The topic of dynamic pricing is discussed in Chapter 8, pages 327 to 330 and pricing is covered on pages 401 to 403 in Chapter 10. The video below offers you a more in-depth treatment of the subject.
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VIDEO: Deeper Dive - Dynamic Pricing is Not Enough - Oct 20, 2022 – 36:43
TRG – Tont Followell and Stephen Skrypec
How an organization prices what they offer is only one factor of the maximizing revenue equation. An effective pricing tactic must also include an approach to demand management for an overall effective strategy.
A pricing and demand strategy includes a scale of the house plan, intentional inventory management of tickets, and dynamic pricing tactics.
In this Deeper Dive, we’ll explore why dynamic pricing and demand management is a key to building lasting customer relationships, accessing new audiences, and maximizing revenue.
Link to video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pa0o-VUAAoI&t=71s
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NEW BOOK ON ARTS MARKETING
How to Market the Arts - A Practical Approach for the 21st Century
Anthony S. Rhine and Jay Pension, Oxford University Press, 2022
From the publisher
How to Market the Arts provides a history of both nonprofit arts and critical marketing concepts to show how standard methods of marketing are ill-suited for the nonprofit arts industry. Through visual models and case studies of several arts organizations, the book offers instead a practical look at how this industry might adopt more holistic marketing strategies that better reflect their true function which is often to serve communities over persuading consumers. Rhine and Pension offer a theoretical framework for reconsidering the nature of nonprofit arts marking, as well as useful steps an organization might take to increase its value to a community and develop a broader audience base.
Link to order the book: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/how-to-market-the-arts-9780197556085?cc=us&lang=en&
Chapter 11 – Fundraising and Development
Giving Trends and Research on Crowdfunding, and Donor Appeal Letters
Giving: The topic of giving trends is covered in Chapter 11 on pages 452 to 454. The link below provides more recent data about arts giving in the USA as of June 30, 2022. As you contemplate this report, it is worth considering how the recent upheaval in economies worldwide because of inflation and geopolitical uncertainty may impact giving in 2023. If, for example, there is a recession in 2023 that extends into 2024, how might fundraising by cultural organizations be impacted?
Crowdfunding: Crowdfunding was not discussed in Chapter 11 primarily because it is not widely used by arts organizations to raise funds. However, various crowdfunding platforms and social media is used by artists and small organizations to varying degrees of success to solicit donations. The research in the journal article below should be used to supplement the content on pages 472 to 477 in Chapter 11- Fundraising Practices and Tools.
Donor Appeals: The second journal article provides insights about crafting email and direct mail appeal content covered in Chapter 11 on page 475. The authors explore the impact of targeted motivating language effects donors.
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Update on Giving and Donor Numbers - Q2, 2022
Although overall giving increased by 6.2 percent in the second quarter of 2022, it still failed to keep up with inflation, according to a new report from the Fundraising Effectiveness Project (FEP). The new data also show that the number of donors dropped by 7 percent compared to the second quarter of 2021. New and newly retained donors have now dropped for the fourth quarter in a row. FEP described this sharp decrease (dropping 17 percent for those giving less than $100, and falling 8 percent among those giving $101-$500) as a “collapse” in the number of donors giving less than $500 and one-time donors, the largest segments of donors, accounting for almost 98 percent of donors.
Source: Nonprofit Advocacy Updates, November 14, 2022
Link to Fundraising Effectiveness Project (FEP) 2022 Quarterly Report:
https://data.givingtuesday.org/fep-report/
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NEW BOOK ON FUNDRAISING
Fundraising in the Creative and Cultural Industries - Leading Effective Fundraising Strategies
By Michelle Wright, Ben Walmsley, and Emilee Simmons, Routledge, 2022
From the back cover: Part One explores theories of leadership and change, as well as managing fundraising in a crisis, most notably the impact of COVID-19 on cultural organisations globally. It introduces readers to specific academic frameworks and concepts from arts management, business and entrepreneurship studies – which readers can use to analyze their own situations – and provides insight via real-world case studies. Part Two explores the practical application of fundraising. Readers can begin their journey to becoming a fundraising expert, starting from the basics of fundraising to a broad understanding of the different means and channels through which income can be raised for arts and cultural organisations.
Link to order the book: https://www.routledge.com/Fundraising-in-the-Creative-and-Cultural-Industries-Leading-Effective-Fundraising/Wright-Walmsley-Simmons/p/book/9780367175597
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JOURNAL ARTICLES ON FUNDRAISING
Researching the crowd: Implications on philanthropic crowdfunding and donor characteristics during a pandemic
By Claire van Teunenbroek and Sandra Hasanefendic
Journal of Philanthropy and Marketing, October 11, 2022, Wiley Online Library
ABSTRACT
New online forms of giving have appeared next to more traditional ways like door-to-door collections. One of these new forms is philanthropic crowdfunding: donation- and reward-based crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is a promising method for mobilizing and recruiting donors who may be unreachable via traditional methods. We analyzed online giving via crowdfunding, focusing on donor characteristics and giving behavior before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis comprises survey research (n = 2125) observing giving behavior on an individual level for both donors and non-donors. Our contributions are twofold.
First, we report on the characteristics of donors who give to crowdfunding sources and in relation to donors who give via a door-to-door (i.e., ‘traditional’) collection focusing on micro- rather than macro-level data. Second, we compare the giving behavior via crowdfunding with references to door-to-door collections before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. We show that the percentage of individuals supporting crowdfunding did not increase between 2018 (11%) and 2020 (12%). Regarding the amount, donors donated 13% higher amounts in 2020, but the difference was not significant. Regarding the characteristics of donors, we find that social media has a substantive role in giving via crowdfunding irrespective of other personal markers such as age, education, income, and gender, while this is not relevant in the case of door-to-door collection. Moreover, most people give to crowdfunding projects that are connected to an acquaintance, which signals that familiarity with the person initiating the crowdfunding projects plays a role.
We conclude that crowdfunding, relative to more traditional giving, focuses more on informal giving than formal giving. Such an understanding requires different strategies and stimuli to increase giving via crowdfunding.
Link to article: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/nvsm.1773
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What do you value? Examining gendered responses to appeal letters
By Ruth K. Hansen and Lauren A. Dula
Journal of Philanthropy and Marketing, October 11, 2022, Wiley Online Library
ABSTRACT
This study builds on previous inductive analysis of fundraising professionals' choices in writing acquisition letters. Fundraisers often write in a way that aligns with one of two personal values, either foregrounding aspects of self-transcendent Universalism values (an appreciation for community and the welfare of all people) or of conservation Security values (those of personal safety and stability for close others). Previous research also indicates that while women and men have different donation styles, targeted motivating language has yet to be explored. Using a national sample, this research tests public response to letters written for a fictional children's charity using content aligned with each option separately and combined, compared to a control version. Using an experimental dictator game, Universalism values are found to be negatively related to giving across the board as compared to the valueless treatment. We find no statistically significant improvement in donor responses to acquisition appeals that choose to highlight either Universalism or Security values between men and women, although men were marginally less responsive to Universal, self-transcendent values language. The discussion attempts to make sense of these results and the possible complications of running a donor acquisition campaign in the time of COVID-19.
Link to article: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/nvsm.1776