board of directors

Are you a habitat or are you an animal?
animal-habitat-activities-for-kids

Are you an animal or are you a habitat?

Rambly Friday thoughts…

I’ve been pondering a bit about the last post on non-profit boards and the artists that do (or don’t) love them. Many of the response people have posted back on the old Facebooks have been rather positive (effusive even) on the ways in which the board has supported and pushed them further than they could have gone on their own.

Point taken.

For some, clearly, a board structure can work well. If you are an organization with an alignment of mission and artists within it and a board constructed in the right way, the power structure that worried me in the last post could be a non-issue, leading to a super helpful and beneficial relationship. So it’s nice to hear from these folks and take inspiration from what they’ve done that’s working.

There are, of course, examples to the contrary. (And I’d guess these folks are probably a lot less likely to proclaim it to the internet public.) And something I’ve realized that goes along with this question has something to do with the role of the artist in the non-profit sector more generally.

I think of it as the trade off between being an animal and being a habitat.

Ok, so first off, let me admit that I know that this metaphor was something I heard from someone else at some point in the past year. But for the life of me I cannot remember who or where and for the internet of me I cannot find a source to help reference. So fair warning that what you’re about to get is a rumination on someone else’s concept, possibly expanded or re-imagined out of its original context.

So back to animals and habitats. When we examine people involved with generating works of art we start to think about their place in the field by examining two extremes.

On the one hand we have artists: the lone writer slaving away on a novel or play, the painter in their studio, the choreographer crafting a movement sequence. These people are the animals – they are individual beings with individually motivated goals. Animals consume resources – they want studio or rehearsal or office space, they need money for their own time and possibly that of a collaborator, and stuff to make what they do like clarinets or clay or costumes – and mostly they only want those resources for themselves.

And on the other hand we have habitats. Habitats are places that animals occupy, sometimes for a short time and sometimes for their whole lives, to obtain the resources they need. We can think of an arts organization like a habitat – places artists occupy to get the resources they need to survive. The same way that a deer occupies the woods and takes advantage of the trees and streams and soft downy leaf beds, a doe eyed creator might plug into an arts org in order to get access to space and stuff. Audiences are also occupants in this imagined world in the sense that they come into the habitat to receive resource – namely the art that – as well. And for organizations that mix the arts with other kinds of services (social change, youth programming, education) there are likely other occupants with needs and influences on this place as well.

In the simplest scenario, a lone master painter (the animal) makes work and then a gallery (the habitat) exhibits and helps sell that work to the adoring public. A theater company presents a new ensemble’s work. A residency program houses a new novelist in the midst of their writing process. Animal gets resources to help sustain it and the habitat is made more vital through the animal’s presence.

So though they often work in tandem, it’s important to see that the larger goals of the habitat and the animal are different. The animal’s goal is to survive and get as many resources directed at it as possible to be comfy and well fed. The habitat’s goal is to support the ecosystem of all the animals and plants within it.

To extend this saccharine metaphor just a bit further, you can think of the non-profit board like a conservation club. They themselves enjoy the habitat and see the beauty and usefulness of it to the creatures in it even if they don’t directly pull resources from it. They may work actively in that habitat to keep it tidy and unpolluted. They may raise money to support and extend its boundaries. They may simply go and admire its worth and encourage other animals to take advantage of all the habitat has to offer. The board’s job is to make sure that the habitat is sustained for the many kinds of animals that interact with it.

The kinds of things a board does are good for the habitat as a whole. And generally that means it’s good for the animals in the habitat as well. But let’s say there’s a drought. It’s possible to keep the habitat from drying up completely a board would change the number and kind of animals it offers shelter to. If there’s an influx or if one kind of animal suddenly goes through a massive increase in its appetite, it may have to cut off a certain group for the good of the larder whole. They may even shift some aspects of the habitat to help ease the burden on some parts of it. In short, the goal of the board is to sustain the entire networked ecosystem into the future.

In my view, the vast majority of creators just want to be animals. But many of us at some point find that there are a scarcity of habitats in general or of ones that are hospitable to us in particular. And so we begin to start operating a little like habitats. Some people make that switch and realize that they actually like being habitats. Some even end up finding that the tired and constant scrambling life of an animal is happily left behind. For others, they are animals who don habitat clothing for a while in order to feed themselves in particular.

The problem with moonlighting in habitat world in order to support your animal self might now start to become obvious.

To run a habitat requires different skills than being an animal. To keep the habitat going you have to pay attention to the other animals that are interacting with your resource. And if you are one particular individual animal, the concerns of the habitat may or may not align with your own individual goals for survival and thrival. (I know thrival is not a word. But it should be, no?). To succeed at keeping the habitat going, you may end up making choices that cut off your own food supply. Your conservation league, with the best of intentions, may end up saving the habitat a little animal started at the expense of the animal itself.

Which is how, I think, some artists end up starting non-profits that feel like they lose their control over their work. Your aim to become more habitat-like to serve your individual animal self is for naught because you ended up killing the animal. These are the cases, I think, where artists can end up hating the boards that they serve under. It’s not that either is doing anything wrong. They’re just aiming at different outcomes. One is trying to sustain a place; the other is trying to sustain themselves.

The closer your goal is to being an individual artist and making work that is essentially the output of your singular vision, the less the work feels like a “public” good. What happens to you if your mission is to create works of a particular edgy theater or cultural dance style and you suddenly realize you want to start shifting your focus into something else? If you’ve built a habitat out of a mission, assuming you the animal will always belong there, you might find yourself frustrated and at cross purposes. And though one of the most wonderful things about the artistic impulse is its desire to innovate, change and grow this isn’t always possible in a habitat. And even when it is, it takes a far longer time and laborious amount of effort.

Which I think behooves the creator to really think hard about what they are trying to do before they sign that 501 c 3 paperwork.

Do you want to become a habitat or an animal?

And make sure you’re making choices that help you become that.

– A

Is there any artist that loves their board?

This is likely to be the first in a series of spewed thoughts about a super complex topic – the pros and cons for the artist of interfacing with the non-profit.

I’ll say two things:

1)   I am generally anti non-profits for the majority of content generators, especially for small ensembles and individual creators. I try to be as informed as possible but I am also sure I will say any number of uninformed things. I’m trying to parse through a larger number of still evolving thoughts about how money and the arts and sustainability and still having time to actually make work all intersect. In some ways, this is an attempt to elicit challenges to assumptions I have to help me get more info.

 2)   I’m on the precipice of possibly joining the board of a relatively large and impactful organization. I’m interested in joining a board to see what it actually is like to be a part of such a thing, and to see what kinds of art “organizations” do and don’t need such a thing.

So I want to start with a question I’ve had on my brain for a while: Are there any artists who, if given the choice, would actually want to keep a board of directors if they didn’t have to? I know that many of my peers have talked to me about learning to find meaning and usefulness and sometimes even joy in the people they’ve invited to be part of their non-profit board. But if they weren’t required to find a way to live with this set up, would they still do it?

This is the question that I wonder about all the time. It’s the reason, or at least a very large part of the reason, that I haven’t myself made the non-profit leap. It’s because I fear that at it’s core, the non-profit system really isn’t set up to serve the way that I personally make stuff. Here’s how I see it: a non-profit is an entity whose primary mission or core values are prized over the generation of profit in the pursuit of a given activity.

I think many, probably most, artists who currently exist in the non-profit sphere are down with this. We’re not in it to be millionaires. We’re in it because we believe in the necessity of the thing we do to be shared with others. If we had food and housing and money to raise kids taken care of, we’d probably give it all away for free. So the point is not that our entity can’t make a profit, can’t create a surplus of funds, but that in essence the surplus isn’t the point of the work. The work is the point of the work. And in the US this means that a non-profit can pay its employees and buy things related to the work it does, but that anything above and beyond this expense doesn’t go to some group of investors but stays within the entity to be used to make or do more of the stuff they make and do.

So far, I’m in. Now on to who’s running the show.

According to Foundation Center’s website a non-profit board of directors:

“Is the governing body of a nonprofit organization. The responsibilities of the board include discussing and voting on the highest priority issues, setting organizational policies, and hiring and evaluating key staff. Board members are not required to know everything about nonprofit management, but they are expected to act prudently and in the best interests of the organization. They approve operating budgets, establish long-term plans, and carry out fundraising activities.”

So think about this. In a non-profit the ultimate status and hierarchy lies with the board. At the end of the day they are the people most responsible for the running of the entity. It’s the board of directors in this set up that are tasked with ensuring that the people who are employed by the organization are doing just that – carrying out the mission of the company.

And it’s here that I really start to wonder if we are trying to put a square peg in a round hole.

Think about the work of an individual artist or small ensemble. What is their mission as a creator or group of creators? What are they trying to do, really, at the core? To make their work in the best way possible. To follow their own artistic impulses. When they define a “mission” it may have a lot of fancy words, like mine does:

Swim Pony Performing Arts: Loud, strange and never seen before on earth! Swim Pony is committed to the creation of unique live performances that are joyful and defy tradition in order to bring contemporary audiences beyond their experiences of the every-day.

But really, these words are just my attempt to try and explain what my personal artistic impulses are. They are my attempt to give name to the ever-shifting series of interests and impulses Adrienne Mackey has in making stuff. They are the way in which those impulses expand to include a variety of people who get involved with that vision.

Which means that were I to incorporate the mission my board would be responsible for is “To make Adrienne’s work the most Adrienne it can be.”

Here’s a scenario where I chafe a little: What happens when a company founded by an artistic director under what is in essence a single visionary’s work is at odds with its board?

What happens when Jane Doe Dance Company’s board says that Jane Doe is wrong about what upcoming project will best to uphold the standards of the Jane Doe mission? At the end of the day, in this structure, when push comes to shove the board has the power to tell Jane Doe that they know better than she does. They are empowered in this structure to tell an artist that they know better about how their work should be made.

I’m not saying that this happens often. Or that most people end up in this position.

I’m saying that’s the power dynamic that is structurally implicit.

And to me that makes no sense.

There are ways to still work within the system. But at its core I think this is the wrong dynamic. It’s the wrong delineation of responsibility. I am all for advising and contribution. I believe that artists should get input from the outside about how their work is best made and how it might be financially sustainable and responsible. But at the core, I don’t agree that the final responsibility for a creator’s product can be located outside of the creator.

Yes if it’s an organization that promotes a kind of artwork or genre.

Yes if it’s an organization that curates a type of work.

Yes if it’s an organization that is at its core a habitat for artists to plug into.

But I don’t think so when it’s an organization whose sole mission is the work of a single artist’s vision.

And if that’s true, I think we need to be honest that this is probably the wrong way to do it. That the non-profit structure wasn’t designed with this in mind.

Or maybe I’m wrong.

Help me see otherwise…

– A