The Mission Paradox Blog

Eternal battles

Adam Thurman — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

Life we go easier if you accept the following:

1. You will always be conflicted about the interaction of art and commerce.

2. You will never find a perfect balance between giving your audience "what they want" and leading them into different directions.

3. There will never be enough money.

4. Organizational politics will always be a part of your life. That's true even if you create the art alone. You'll probably need to partner with others to get that work seen, which means working with organizations, which means dealing with politics.

5. No matter how you do things someone, probably someone close to you, will think you are doing it wrong.

6. Somone will tell you, "it's ok to fail" and then go nuts when you actually do fail. That is there problem, not yours.

7. You will always need to manage your own artistic career. You can have helpers, managers, etc. but you always need to be the CEO of You, Inc.

Getting them to "Hell Yeah"

Adam Thurman — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

In 2009, entreprenuer Derek Sivers shared his "Hell Yeah" philosophy to making life decisions. Here's a quote:

"If I'm not saying 'HELL YEAH!' about something, then say no."

I think it's a good way to make life decisions. It also should help inform your approach to connecting art to audience.

The goal to all the "stuff" that you do, i.e. making artistic programming choices, the marketing tactics you use . . . the goal of all of that is to get your audience to say "Hell Yeah, I need to see that".

Not, "maybe I should see that."

Not, "that looks interesting."

The goal is to trigger the sort of emotion response that makes people want to jump up and be a part of your artistic experience.

Is that hard? Of course it is. People (like you) are jaded. They have too many choices. They have been sold a bill of goods far too often.

In spite of all that, "Hell Yeah" is still the goal.

If you approach your artistic and marketing choices with that point of view, then it will help you make the sort of interesting, exciting decisions that are necessary.

I'll give you a case in point. Direct your web browser toward the website my team created for a production.

The whole idea of that website is that if we give our audience enough interesting angles, enough cool pictures, enough nice music to stream while they are working, then it will slowly move them to "Hell Yeah."

Now that's just one approach. There are a lot of good ones out that there that have nothing to do with the web or technology.

Just remember what the goal of all this should be.

The Flip Side of the Dark Arts

Adam Thurman — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

I'm not suprised that a lot of people dislike the idea of marketing/selling/advertising/etc.

Sometimes, I dislike too.

Marketing can be the ultimately dark art. I cringe when I see a commercial that shames some women who dare eat a cupcake. I shake my head when I see a car or beer commercial that preys on a man's insecurities.

It breaks my heart when I see a politician or pundit use words or phrases that are designed to tap into our "lizard brain".

Marketers have long understand what science is just starting to show. We are not rational actors. We can be influenced. We can be persuaded. Images, words, sounds, all of those things can work together to bring out the negative end of human behavior.

But there is a flip side to all of that . . . .

The flip side is that effective marketing/communication/advertising/whatever can be used to bring out the best in us.

It can help us to become more critical thinkers. It can help us find more joy in our lives.

It can help us to find things (like your art) which are designed to feed our mind and our soul.

Part of what I like about working in this particular field is that on my worst day, all I did was try to connect some people to some art.

With all the bad ways that marketing can be used, I think that's a good use of the craft.

At it's core, marketing is about spreading ideas and emotions. Used the wrong way, those ideas and emotions can damage lives.

But used the right way and in the right hands (your hands!) marketing can connect people to ideas and feelings that make the world a little bit better.

That is a pretty cool thing.

The need to fail: Reconsidered

Adam Thurman — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

It's a trendy thing to talk about failure. In the arts world we are always discussing the need to take risks, try new things, etc.

Of course you can't discuss those things without considering the flipside, failure.

But I worry that this "need" to fail can easily become an excuse for a lot of really unhelpful behaviors:

Sloppiness.

Lack of execution.

Poor planning.

That sort of thing.

I've had to learn (the hard way) that the only failures that move us forward are the ones where you prepare and execute to the best of your ability . . . and then things just don't work out.

There is plenty of room for that sort of failure.

What there is no room for is the sort of things that get labeled as "failure" but is actually a series of predictable, avoidable, f*ck ups.

If you want to be a valuable part of any team or project then you've got to make sure people understand the difference between real and fake failure.

That means you have to place an emphasis on proper execution, clear communication and all the other boring (but vital) stuff that makes anything meaningful happen.

Anything less then that and you (and your team) may find yourselves spinning your wheels for a very long time.

Repost - Power and the Arts

Adam Thurman — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 11:29:01 -0600

I like this one so I'm reposting it. New blog post on Monday

What we offer

Adam Thurman — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks, offers his thoughts on selling the live experience

"We in the (live) sports business don’t sell the game, we sell unique, emotional experiences. We are not in the business of selling basketball. We are in the business of selling fun. We are in the business of letting you escape. We are in the business of giving you a chance to create shared experiences. I say it to our people at the Mavs at all time, I want a Mavs game to be more like a great wedding than anything else."

Those thoughts can be applied directly to connecting people to the live arts experience.

In my own day job, I'm in the midst of trying to connect people to this. When I'm doing that I try to remember that no one is buying a ticket "just because".

They are doing it because they are excited to be part of a world premiere.

They are doing it because it is a night out for friends.

They are doing it to connect with something that is important for THEM, not for us.

We (the theatre, the musuem, the orchestra) are not the point of all this. We are the hub. We are the medium that allows others a reason to connect and experience something together.

When we forget this, things tend to go bad quickly.

The arts can't just be a more expensive, slower, less convenient version of TV or movies. It has to be more to thrive. Part of getting to that more means understanding who really matters here.

It isn't us. It isn't you.

It's them. It's the people who take the journey from their safe, warm, homes and plunk down cash.

What are you offering them?

The battles you fight

Adam Thurman — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 09:00:00 -0600

This is my 8th year working in the arts as some sort of a "professional". I've learned a lot in that time. One of the most important lessons is the need to pick your battles.

The arts are an imperfect world. There are numerous problems. But you'll drive yourself insane if you try to build a career (or an organization) that somehow solves all of them.

You need to give yourself the freedom to decide which issues you are going to try to fix and which you are going to leave to others to address.

For example, last week a big ass thing erupted when someone tried to argue that theatre (and by extension most art forms) are "for white people." There was a time when I would have spent a week tearing that argument to shreds. I let it pass for two reasons:

1. Many other people handled the issue so effectively.

2. For me, the issue of diversity and the arts has been settled. Any person with a copy of the recent census and a basic understanding of demographics knows that the US is moving toward a more diverse world.

So I'm fighting other battles. For me, I'm more interested in helping others understand how they can integrate their artistic ambitions and their career ambitions.

I'm interested in helping organization adapt to the changing world.

Those are my fights.

What battles are you choosing?

Once in a while

Adam Thurman — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 09:06:00 -0600

Here's my last thought for the year.

The world of the arts is just like the world itself. That means it can be beautiful, ugly, fair and unfair at the same time.

The people in the arts are just people. Just because someone wears the label of artist doesn't mean that they are creative, noble or good partners. The artist label also doesn't mean that person doesn't understand business or strategy.

Arts organizations are just like any organization in any field. Some are awesome, many more are mediocre. A few are horrible places you should avoid at all costs.

My point is that this place isn't necessarily special. If you entered the world of the arts hoping to avoid the issues that makes the world in general a challenging place then you will be disappointed.

But on the other hand . . . .

The reason I stay in the arts is because every once in a while something magical happens. Every once in a while art puts something special in the hearts and mind of those who receive it and create it.

Those moments are worth fighting for.

I hope you had a fantastic 2011. I wish you the best for 2012. See you on Monday, Jan. 2nd

The Raised Hand

Adam Thurman — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 09:07:00 -0600

A few days ago I found out that my day job is going to receive an honor that recognizes their efforts to bring diversity to the stage and the audience.

This isn't the first time that such efforts have been recognized but it is still nice to see that others notice. It has also been nice to play a small role in helping bring in a diverse audience.

Over the past few years I've moved away from a lot of the arts/diversity talk. The issue is still very important to me. In fact, I think the nonprofit arts sector general challenge to recognize and empower people of color, younger people and just those with different ideas is the elephant in the room.

Any successful field reflects the future and all too often the arts reflects the world that was.

But I also think that the blueprint for success is there. There are plenty of organizations and industries that have tackled these challenges. Those who want to learn from those lessons can do that.

At the core, it's a very simple idea. You open the door. You share power and responsibility with those who don't necessary look or think like you. You continue to do this until it becomes an institutional habit.

I've never seen an organization who honestly wanted a different, more robust, more diverse culture fail at the task. It doesn't happen overnight but it always happens.

I've never seen a token, bullshit effort, win over the long term. That's just how it is.

But I've got to admit, it breaks my heart when I see some well meaning person making a "case" for diversity in the arts. It's almost 2012. If people still need a case before they embrace where the world is clearly going then they are already in a lot of trouble.

I truly wish that those who care about diversity in the arts would stop making cases and instead look for the raised hand.

Look for those who raise their hand and say "we get it, come help us."

Let's use our limited time and energy to assist those who want to embrace the future. Let's assume that embrace is authentic until it is proven otherwise.

I think that's the obligation we have.

Help those who want it. Ignore the rest.

The Myth of Effort

Adam Thurman — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 09:27:15 -0600

Few things annoy me more then the myth that if you just "try hard" success in the arts (or any field) is inevitable.

Effort is really overrated. You can try hard and flop just because you're trying hard at the wrong things.

Effort only helps when it is combined with a strategy makes sense.

In fact when I'm helping folks directly one of the first pieces of advice I give them is to stop trying so hard and really think about what they are doing and why they are doing it that way.

Why are you marketing your work that way?

Why do you have those sort of revenue projections?

Why are these people a part of your team?

Once you ponder those sorts of questions, your efforts will go a lot further.