Thank you for visiting the 6e Updates page. Update #8 is designed to be used in conjunction with the learning resources for Management and the Arts, 6e. I hope students, faculty, and practitioners will find these added resources timely and valuable this fall semester.
In other news, I have begun working on the seventh edition of Management and the Arts, which will be published in the late spring of 2027. If you have suggestions for topics to include in the seventh edition, please email mgtandthearts@gmail.com.
I am also working with three co-editors on the second edition of The Routledge Companion of Arts Management. The Companion book will have new chapters from scholars and arts managers from around the world. The new edition will be published in the spring of 2026.
Thanks, as always, for your support and interest in all things arts management.
William Byrnes
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SIXTH EDITION ERRATUM
- In the Acknowledgements - Page xxvi, the name Joshua Stavros was misspelled
- Chapter 4, page 106, Six Core Questions – The numbering sequence should start with #1 and not #5.
- Chapter 9, page 378, Balance Sheet, the abbreviation should be NA (Net Assets), not NE.
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NEW BOOKS
Here is a quick preview of six new books that you should find of interest. The range of topics covered is highly relevant for arts managers and leaders.
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Artificial Intelligence in the Cultural and Creative Sectors - Opportunities, Challenges, and Transformations
Edited By Marta Massi, Marek Prokupek, Alessandra Ricci, Maria Carmela Ostillio
This book explores how AI is redefining the creative and cultural sectors, reshaping how content is produced, distributed, experienced, and managed. Spanning areas such as publishing, heritage, music, performance, and design, the book offers the first comprehensive, interdisciplinary examination of AI’s impact across these diverse sectors as technologies become increasingly embedded in both creative and operational processes.
(Note: Scheduled for release in October 2025.)
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Achieving Creative Justice in the U.S. Creative Sector
By Antonio C. Cuyler
Providing a practical guide on how to activate ADEI to achieve creative justice and a research agenda, this book is an essential reading for practitioners and scholars who feel compelled to address creative injustices that constrain the creative flourishing of historically and continuously low-casted peoples throughout the entire cultural ecosystem that defines the U.S. creative sector.
The free Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons.
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Human Resources in the Arts
By Brea M. Heidelberg
Arts and cultural institutions are a unique organizational context. Managing creative people within that context requires considerations that are not standard in traditional human resource practice. This book is designed to provide arts and cultural administrators with an overview of the most pressing elements of human resource management for arts and cultural institutions.
Written by an arts management professor with an equity-focused human resources consulting firm, this book provides readers with knowledge they can immediately use to solve human resource management issues they will encounter.
Infused with practical considerations and real-world examples that are grounded in human resources and industrial psychology research, Human Resources in the Arts will benefit arts management students and practitioners alike.
LINK: https://www.routledge.com/Human-Resources-in-the-Arts/Heidelberg/p/book/9781032298771
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The Routledge Companion to Governance in the Arts World
Edited By Ruth Rentschler, Wendy Reid, Chiara Carolina Donelli
This research compendium of arts governance brings expert insights from management through the humanities and social sciences to provide a comprehensive global overview of how the field is evolving as the world is in turmoil.
Moving beyond the traditional governance focus on boards, the book is structured across a framework that provides five levels of analysis: individual board directors, boards, arts organisations, community collaborations and public policy instances around the world. Contributors examine urgent contemporary issues in arts governance such as toxic leadership, bad behaviour, discrimination and post-colonialism. They present governance definitional challenges, governance struggles for organisations of different sizes and types, in different regimes, with different accountabilities, complexities, collaborations and policy environments.
Experts from around the world are brought together in this book to explore and illuminate the creative sector’s distinct dynamics in arts governance. The book is an essential scholarly resource for academics, students and reflective practitioners of arts and cultural management.
NOTE: This book is available as an e-book at a price that is a great deal more affordable than the hardbound version.
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Evolution of Cultural Management and Policy in Europe - Shaping Culture
Edited By GiannaLia Cogliandro Beyens
Since the 1990s, cultural management and policy in Europe have undergone transformative changes. This insightful book offers a comprehensive journey through that evolution, blending historical insights with an analysis of current trends to illuminate the future of the field.
The book also highlights the pivotal role of cultural networks in shaping and advancing culture, creativity, and heritage, bridging academic inquiry with real-world practice. Through a focused case study on the European Network on Cultural Management and Policy, ENCATC, it provides a unique perspective on how networks shape policy and management strategies across Europe.
A must-read for scholars, practitioners, policymakers, and students, this book delivers key insights into the ever-changing landscape of arts and cultural management.
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Communication for Effective Stage Management - A Collaborative Production Tool
Communication for Effective Stage Management: A Collaborative Production Tool provides a comprehensive examination of communication theory through the lens of effective stage management and offers ideas and methods for stage managers to enhance their communicative presence throughout a theatrical process.
This book offers new, extensive in-depth discussion of communication techniques and how these methods apply to the role of the theatrical stage manager as the facilitator of information. Part I dives into the methods and principles of business communication employed by stage managers and discusses how these techniques are best implemented throughout a theatrical process, all supported with real-life examples. It also offers discussion questions and resources to enhance the content and encourages the reader to self-analyze their own communication techniques during the production process. Part II contains excerpts from other industry professionals who offer their own unique perspective as to the collaborative and communicative work of stage managers and how their own artistic careers are impacted by the communication systems of a stage management team.
This book is best suited for advanced stage management students, professional theatre practitioners, and theatrical educators.
Chapter 1 – Arts Management Overview
“Disruption,” “unprecedented,” and “uncertainty” have become terms more frequently used by U.S. arts managers since January 20, 2025. The list of arts and cultural organizations and institutions negatively impacted by funding cuts and executive orders issued by the Trump administration in the first few months of 2025 is “unprecedented.” There is ongoing litigation connected to many of these executive orders, but regardless of future court decisions, the arts and humanities organizations and arts ecosystems in communities across America are having to adapt to policies that often conflict with their missions.
I thought Joanna Woronkowicz's July posting on the Arts Analytics website made an interesting point that “Trump’s proposed cuts are not the problem—they’re the symptom” of a larger issue of arts policy in the U.S.
The other article is a kind of “before times” overview on public funding for the arts in the US. It will be interesting to see how the 2024 public funding ecosystem holds together over the rest of 2025. The two additional articles I featured provide further perspective about what is going on elsewhere in the world of arts and culture. One report is from Australia, and the other was released in conjunction with the 10th World Summit on Arts & Culture, which was recently held in Seoul, Korea.
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We Don’t Need Another Arts Rescue Plan. We Need a Policy Strategy.
July 25, 2025, by Joanna Woronkowicz
President Trump’s latest budget proposal calls—once again—for eliminating the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), and the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The reaction has been predictably urgent: statements of disapproval, calls to action, and campaigns to protect what remains.
But after decades of reactive advocacy, maybe it’s time to ask a different question. Not how we defend these institutions from attack, but why they remain so vulnerable in the first place. The uncomfortable answer is that the U.S. never built a robust, coherent public policy system to support the arts. What we have instead is a patchwork of stopgap measures, fragile institutions, and borrowed infrastructure—enough to create the appearance of public support, but not enough to withstand political or economic shocks.
Link to full article is at: https://artsanalytics.org/we-dont-need-another-arts-rescue-plan-we-need-a-policy-strategy/
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Public Funding for the Arts 2024
Research by Mohja Rhoads & Nakyung Rhee, National Assembly of State Arts Agencies (NASAA)
Introduction
The public funding ecosystem for the arts in the United States is supported by federal, state, and local governments. The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is funded through congressional appropriations. State Arts Agencies (SAAs) rely on legislative appropriations from state governments and federal funding. Local Arts Agencies (LAAs) receive funding from a mix of local, state, and federal sources. Together, these entities form a complementary system that provides grants and services to artists and cultural organizations across the nation.
LINK: https://reader.giarts.org/read/public-funding-for-the-arts-2024
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Arts & Culture Benchmark Report 2024–25 – Australia
Culture Counts was founded in 2012 with a mission to enable the cultural sector to capture and communicate value, and easily demonstrate the vital cultural, social and economic outcomes that the sector generates for society.
Ongoing, rigorous measurement is essential for building a solid evidence base that contributes to the rich value story of the arts.
In 2024–25, Culture Counts subscribers in Australia, New Zealand and Asia collected feedback from more than 130,000 arts attendees, participants and artists.
This big data set celebrates the role of cultural events, programs and activities in fostering creative expression, facilitating connection, building social cohesion, amplifying marginalized voices, inspiring critical thinking, enhancing quality of life, and much more.
https://culturecounts.cc/r/arts-and-culture-benchmark-report-2024-25/3UWK3H/#0
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10th World Summit on Arts & Culture - Report
The 10th World Summit on Arts and Culture took place in Seoul, Republic of Korea from May 27-30, 2025. Presented in partnership by Arts Council Korea (ARKO) and the International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies (IFACCA), the program addressed the theme Charting the future of arts and culture and recognized that we continue to operate in a global context defined by crises, conflict and rapid change. The Summit brought together 406 delegates from 94 countries comprising artists, cultural practitioners, leaders and decisionmakers from the arts and culture ecosystem and beyond. They exchanged, debated and reflected upon how we might secure the future for arts and culture with a focus on how we position culture and its value, and current and future technological realities.
LINK TO REPORT:
https://www.artsummit.org/summit-report
Chapter 3 – Adaptive Arts Organizations
Chapter 3 focuses on the relationship between various external environments and arts organizations. For example, education, and arts education in particular, is one of these important environments that impact the arts organizations. The Trump administration has recently terminated the employment of Department of Education staff responsible for gathering and analyzing data. It is uncertain if reports like the one posted in Update #7 will be published in the future.
Meanwhile, organizations like the National Council of Nonprofits, Americans for the Arts, and other arts service organizations are ramping up their advocacy and messaging to their members. The link below is to the National Council of Nonprofits' website, which has been actively responding to the seemingly endless number of Executive Orders coming out of the While House that impact nonprofits. The second initiative is one that Americans for the Arts undertook in July to lobby the US Congress.
Meanwhile, in Europe, the Network of European Museum Organisations (NEMO) reports that “Polarisation is growing across Europe, and museums are feeling the effects.” And in Canada, the Shaw Festival is feeling the economic impact of the tariffs on its 2025 season.
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National Council of Nonprofits - Trends and Policy Issues
The National Council of Nonprofits is the only national, sector-wide group that integrates policy advocacy vertically (all levels of government) and horizontally (all branches of government). This holistic approach results in policies that support, strengthen, and protect nonprofits, especially small and midsized groups.
With the help of our state associations of nonprofits and national partners, we actively monitor what is happening in state capitals across the country to identify developments state by state, connecting the dots so that charitable nonprofits can see trends across governments, share information, craft solutions, and mobilize for action. In all our work, we strive to inform policymakers, journalists, the public, and indeed other nonprofits about the vital role that charitable nonprofits play in benefiting the communities they serve.
LINK: https://www.councilofnonprofits.org/impacts-recent-executive-orders-nonprofits
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Americans for the Arts Advocacy Example
Friday, July 11, 2025
ARTS ADVOCATES FROM KEY STATES HEAD TO CAPITOL HILL TO PUSH FOR INCREASED NEA AND NEH FUNDING
Legislative Fly-In focuses on securing adequate FY2026 appropriations for National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities
WHAT: In partnership with Americans for the Arts and its advocacy affiliate Arts Action Fund, arts industry leaders from across the nation are gathering on Capitol Hill to bring a message directly to Congress:
Federal arts funding creates jobs, drives innovation, and strengthens the vibrant communities where families want to live and work. Through the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), this investment reaches every congressional district nationwide—including rural areas and small towns.
Advocates are urging Congress to appropriate $209 million each for the NEA and NEH in FY2026—a modest $2 million increase that empowers state and local arts agencies, arts and culture organizations, and individual artists to build the creative infrastructure our communities need.
WHEN:
July 14-15: Meetings with key House Interior Appropriators
July 21-22: Meetings with key Senate Interior Appropriators
NOTE: The US Congress recessed at the end of July until after Labor Day. The pending legislation still has 35% reductions in funding for the NEA and the NEH in the House bill for 2026, and the Senate bill keeps the funding levels as they are. Of course, either of these outcomes will be better than the zero funding recommended by the White
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NEMO Barometer on political influence on museums in Europe
January 2025
The NEMO Barometer on political influence on museums in Europe confirms that political influence is affecting the sector. It highlights how societal polarisation is placing intense and often uncontrollable pressure on museum operations, threatening their independence and reputation as impartial institutions.
LINK TO REPORT: https://www.ne-mo.org/fileadmin/Dateien/public/Publications/NEMO_Barometer_on_political_influence_in_museums_in_Europe_2025.pdf
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How Tariff Tensions Spilled Into the Shaw Festival
Our theatre is a stone’s throw from the U.S. border. This summer, we’re feeling the heat.
By Tim Jennings, Macleans Magazine, July 8, 2025
The live arts suffered terribly during the pandemic and, five years later, the sector is still reeling. The Shaw Festival, the theatre company I run in Ontario’s Niagara Region, is one of North America’s five largest theatres, with a $40-million annual budget (roughly equivalent to Lincoln Center Theater). Relatively speaking, we are recovering well. We have more than 600 employees, produce between 11 and 14 productions across four stages from April to October—plus two holiday shows—and host upwards of 325,000 attendees a year. This summer, however, the political tension in the air threatens to destabilize things again.
LINK: https://macleans.ca/politics/how-tariff-tensions-spilled-into-the-shaw-festival/
Chapter 4 – Planning and the Arts
Chapter 4 has examples of excerpts from two arts organizations' strategic plans in Box 4.3, pages 118-120. Below is a link to a recent plan published by the Phoenix Art Museum. They worked with Shan Strategies in developing their plan (https://www.shanstrategies.com/what-we-do). The document is a good example of a comprehensive strategic plan of a cultural organization. Here’s an excerpt from their planning document.
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Phoenix Art Museum Strategic Plan 2024-2030
Phoenix Art Museum officially opened its doors in 1959, but the seeds of this Museum—located for more than 65 years at Central Avenue and McDowell Road—was first planted more than 40 years prior, nurtured in the minds and through the actions and imagination of a group of thoughtful, passionate women who believed our desert home deserved an art museum. Together, they cultivated that early dream into a still flourishing reality today, more than 100 years later.
Today, this legacy continues through the determination of advocates, supporters, and friends who believe in expanding access to the visual arts, and in Spring 2023, with this history of service and boundless resolve in mind, PhxArt embarked on the strategic-planning process. Over 12 months, a core Task Force with representatives from the Board of Trustees and executive and senior leadership, with the guidance of consulting firm Shan Strategies, envisioned the next five years in the Museum’s history, drafting new mission, vision, and values statements and outlining the strategic priorities, goals, and actions that would align every Museum division in the common pursuit of excellence and an audience-centered approach. The larger Board of Trustees and several staff working groups representing all levels of Museum operations have workshopped and provided feedback on the deliverables set forth in this document.
Link to document: https://phxart.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/StrategicPlan_2024-2030_full_v3.pdf
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Disaster Ready?
It is likely that most arts organizations did not plan that their NEA grants would be withdrawn after they had been awarded. While having an NEA grant rescinded may not constitute an existential crisis for an arts organization, there are plenty of other disasters and emergencies lurking out there that could. The Performing Arts Readiness project offers a range of services that appear to meet an important need. Here’s an excerpt from their website.
Performing Arts Readiness Resource
The Performing Arts Readiness project was formed in the recognition that performing arts organizations are especially vulnerable to disasters and emergencies which can halt performances, sometimes indefinitely, and can put an organization out of business overnight. Emergency readiness is the key to resiliency and recovery: the better prepared an organization is, the more quickly and effectively it can respond to emergencies and crises, re-open for performances and programs, and return to normal. The Performing Arts Readiness (PAR) project supports a variety of programs to increase knowledge and the ability of performing arts organizations to create and execute emergency recovery plans. The PAR project will offer free webinars and onsite training, conference presentations, grants, and tools to help build the field’s capacity for disaster preparedness.
LINK: https://performingartsreadiness.org/
Case Studies of Preparedness Situations:
A fee-for-service option is available for about $60 per year:
Chapter 6 – Staffing, Board, and Volunteers
Pages 214 to 218 in the sixth edition summarize how unions play a key role in many arts and culture organizations. The article excerpt is the latest update about the firing of the dancers in the Dallas Black Dance Theatre. While there was a settlement reached, the labor dispute expanded into concerns about its board governance and the dance company’s management practices. The company also suffered a great deal of reputational damage because of the way it conducted these firings.
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After labor charges, Dallas Black Dance Theatre forms task force to build ‘community trust’
KERA, By Elizabeth Myong, Arts Access, Published April 14, 2025 at 8:00 AM CDT
Dallas Black Dance Theatre has launched an advisory stakeholder task force.
The task force hosted its first meeting on March 25 and will convene monthly to eventually put forth recommendations about its policies, fundraising, governance and engagement with employees.
The news comes after the dance company reached a settlement for over $560,000 with the National Labor Relations Board in December to compensate 10 fired dancers and three whose offers of employment were rescinded.
Following the settlement, Dallas City Council cut about $248,000 in funding for cultural programming from the dance company for its 2024-25 year, which spans from last October to this September.
Last year, North Texas union organizers, community members and Dallas City Council members spoke out against Dallas Black Dance Theatre’s treatment of its former main company dancers. Some called for a look into the governance of DBDT’s board members and dance company leadership.
LINK: https://www.keranews.org/arts-culture/2025-04-14/dallas-black-dance-theatre-taskforce?
Chapter 7 – Leading in the Arts
First, here’s an example of a new organization founded with the purpose of fostering a network of leaders to respond to the leadership challenges facing people working in the museum world.
Second, if you are in an arts leadership position, you would not want to have the kind of article recently published about the Sarasota Ballet’s toxic culture being shared. Interestingly, after it was published, the Ballet’s leadership response to the news article was to essentially ignore it and instead state, “It would be inappropriate and unprofessional to discuss our dancers’ abilities, attributes, or frailties publicly.” I guess gaslighting could be added to the list of actions taken by the ballet companies' leadership.
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Here’s an example of a new organization founded with the purpose of fostering a network of leaders to respond to the leadership challenges facing people working in the museum world.
MuseumExpert.org is a community of museum professionals – past, present, and future – who are seeking career fulfillment.
Whether it’s returning to a museum, transferring skills to an adjacent field, or ensuring your museum staff members are seen, heard, and valued, MuseumExpert.org exists to support museum professionals in all stages of life and career.
We do this work because we believe that informed, skilled, and connected people propel and sustain institutions, and skills developed through museum work lend themselves to a lifetime of achievement and contribution.
LINK: https://www.museumexpert.org/
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Sarasota Ballet dancers leave in droves, citing toxic culture and instability
Published On: June 13, 2025 5:58 am, Last Updated: August 6, 2025 12:23 pm
By: Carrie Seidman | Suncoast Searchlight
Over the past two decades, the Sarasota Ballet has transformed from a little-known regional troupe to an internationally acclaimed draw, thanks to the vision, connections and drive of Director Iain Webb and his wife, Assistant Director Margaret Barbieri, who have made the ballets of British choreographer Sir Frederick Ashton the company’s signature.
But that winning formula appears to be faltering.
Nearly half the company’s dancers — including its top two female principals — are leaving after a season marked by strained relationships with leadership, internal strife and what the dancers describe as a toxic work culture.
The exodus can’t be attributed simply to attrition, a labor dispute or artistic sensibilities. Instead, it presages a reckoning between legacy and evolution, artistic control and dancer autonomy, reverence for tradition and a need for change.
Interviews with 13 of 18 departing dancers detail an environment of fear, favoritism and frustration they claim is perpetuated by the very leadership that helped raise the company’s profile. Though all declined to have their names published — citing “career suicide” — their statements were corroborative and in line with sentiments expressed by a former Sarasota Ballet dancer who was willing to go on the record.
LINK: https://suncoastsearchlight.org/sarasota-ballet-dancers-exit-toxic-culture/
Chapter 10 – Marketing and the Arts
Since the publication of the sixth edition of Management and the Arts in 2022, the use of artificial intelligence software tools has exploded. In fact, Chapter 10 doesn’t use to phrase AI or Artificial Intelligence relative to arts marketing. To remedy that, here are two examples of how AI has become an essential tool to assist arts marketing (and fundraising) staff as they go about their work. The first example from Optimize.Art provide an overview of multiple resources to employ using AI. The second example is a link to Capacity Interactive’s new tools for arts marketers to try.
AI-Powered Marketing: 14 Advanced Strategies for Arts Organizations in 2025
Optimize.Art, June 20, 2025
The intersection of artificial intelligence and digital marketing has created unprecedented opportunities for arts organizations to connect with audiences in more meaningful and efficient ways.
As we navigate 2025’s complex digital landscape, AI-powered tools and strategies have evolved from experimental novelties to essential components of successful marketing campaigns for theaters, museums, orchestras, and cultural institutions of all sizes.
These technologies now enable arts marketers to create more compelling content, target audiences with remarkable precision, and optimize campaigns in real-time—all while stretching limited marketing budgets further than ever before.
This comprehensive guide explores how forward-thinking arts organizations are leveraging AI to transform their digital marketing efforts, from creative generation and audience targeting to campaign optimization and performance measurement.
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10 AI tools for overwhelmed arts marketers
Get access to a 10-piece GPT toolkit designed by Capacity Interactive (CI) specifically for arts and culture marketers. Every tool includes built-in guidance, best-practice prompts, and is pre-engineered for the tasks you do every day.
Scroll down to review 10 short videos showing the AI tool they have created to assist with many of the routine tasks arts marketers engage in.
Link: https://capacityinteractive.com/ai-toolkit/#Toolkit
Chapter 11 - Fundraising and Development
Here are three updates for Chapter 11. First is the latest report from Giving USA about giving in 2024. Next is an overview of compensation for fundraisers and lastly, a scholarly paper that investigates how something as mundane as a signature in an appeal communication can impact giving.
Giving USA 2025 Update
The 2025 Giving USA Foundation Report was released in June, showing a 3.3% inflation-adjusted increase in total giving in 2024. A one-page overview of the report is available at the link below. You can compare the 2024 report to the data shown on pages 452-457 for the 2020 (See Fig. 11.2 and 11.3).
Giving to Arts, Culture, Humanities in 2024 was 4% of the total, matching 2020. The total giving was $25.13 billion of $592.50 billion, and it increased 6.6% when adjusted for inflation. The detailed report showed that:
Fundraising performance contrasted across different types of arts organizations, with museums generally reporting stable or increased giving compared with 2019. Museums saw stable or growing individual donations, while performing arts organizations, especially theaters and opera companies, faced declines in attendance and mixed fundraising results (Giving USA 2024, page 280).
It is important to note that while overall giving increased, the number of gifts actually declined and “Major gifts and capital campaigns played an outsized role in 2024, with seven- and eight-figure gifts driving a sharp increase in total capital support” for the arts, culture and humanities (Ibid).
It was a banner year for arts giving, but it is possible there will be fewer major gifts in 2025. Also, as noted earlier, NEA matching grants were rescinded and organizations are scrambling to raise money to fill the loss in funding they expected.
One bright spot is that starting in the 2026 tax year, individuals and married couples who don't itemize deductions will be able to claim a new deduction for charitable contributions. The deduction will be capped at $1,000 for single filers and $2,000 for married couples filing jointly. It isn’t clear that this change will have a major impact on giving to the arts. We will have to wait until June 2027 when the Giving USA 2026 report is published. One other change that may suppress giving for those who itemize their taxes is that the new tax law requires them to give 0.5 percent of their income before they get a charitable deduction, and it caps those deductions at 35 percent.
LINK to Giving USA Website for free infographic of 2025 Giving Overview:
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Fundraiser Compensation
Chapter 11 offered little information about compensation for those doing fundraising in nonprofits and arts organizations. A salary range was mentioned in Box 11.1 on pages 443 – 444 in connection with the job posting from the Cleveland Art Museum. You can also consult Tables 12.1 and 12.2 for more information about salaries relative to the cost of living.
The recent 2024 compensation report by the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), which is only available to members, provides insights into a wide range of salaries and benefits across 16 subsectors in the US and Canada. It should be noted that only 12.9% of their 33,000 members, or about 4200 responded to the survey.
One subsector reported on included arts and culture, but the number of survey respondents was small and therefore, it is difficult to generalize about fundraiser compensation in the arts. Those caveats aside, AFP reported the median salary for “Chief Development Officers” (85 responses by CDOs) was $90,000, while the category of “Other Fundraising Staff” had median salaries of $50,000 (23 responded). Comparable numbers were reported in Canada.
There are also variations in compensation that were reported based on geographic regions in the US and Canada along with population, years of experience, age, race, gender, and education. There are 74 different tables of data published in the report.
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Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) Compensation and Benefits Study
AFP members in the U.S. and Canada answered an online survey for the 2025 AFP Compensation and Benefits Study in January and February 2025. The survey invitation reached AFP members in the U.S. and AFP members in Canada. A total of 2,844 members returned survey responses by the cut-off date, for an overall response rate of 12.9 percent (emphasis added).
Compensation—Mean and Median Overall
In the U.S., the mean (average) salary of survey participants decreased by 0.2 percent, to $96,449 in 2024 from $96,621 in 2023. In Canada, the average salary decreased by 0.1 percent, to $98,376 in 2024 from $98,487 in 2023.
The median (mid-point: half are above, and half are below) salary in the U.S. in 2024 was $87,672, and in Canada, it was $87,275. The U.S. median was $83,000 in 2023, and in Canada, the median was $90,000. Thus, the overall median increased by 5.6 percent in the U.S. and decreased by 3.0 percent in Canada.
LINK to July 9th, 2025 AFP press release: https://afpglobal.org/news/us-fundraising-salaries-show-stability-median-pay-outpaces-inflation-according-2025-afp
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OPEN ACCESS RESEARCH PAPER
Why Larger Signatures on Solicitation Letters Increase Donations
Keri L. Kettle, Sara Penner, Kelley J. Main
Journal of Philanthropy, First published: February 23, 2025, https://doi.org/10.1002/nvsm.70011
ABSTRACT:
Donation solicitation letters contain a signature block featuring the personal signature and name of the individual endorsing the letter. In three studies, we find that the size of the personal signature appearing in the signature block predictably affects donor responses to solicitation letters, with larger signatures generating bigger donations. We first observe this effect in a large-scale field experiment conducted with a hospital foundation: for the identical solicitation letter, increasing the sender's signature size generated nearly 100% more donation revenue. In two laboratory experiments, we find that individuals who receive a letter with a larger personal signature are willing to donate more because they believe the organization will have a greater impact. We discuss theoretical contributions to our understanding of identity symbols and practical implications for non-profit organizations.
Link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/nvsm.70011
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Update #9 will be posted in January of 2026.
Thank you for visiting the 6e website for updates to Management and the Arts.