The complex questions surrounding what board members do, what staff members do, and how they relate to one another are among the most important and challenging issues of nonprofit governance. How do board and staff build a governance partnership that reflects:
Boards are not — and should not — be static. To be effective, they must change and evolve as their organizations change and grow. Many years ago, Karl Mathiasen III wrote a paper for BoardSource in which he identified three different and quite distinct types of nonprofit boards that develop as their organizations grow and change.
This classic work by Jan Masacka is now more than 25 years old, but the basic information is still relevant, and helpful to anyone new to the inner workings of a board of directiors.
There is no single method for conducting a chief executive assessment, but boards and chief executives are more likely to find the assessment constructive if it is implemented in a thoughtful and planned way. BoardSource encourages boards and chief executives to follow the ten steps outlined in this article.
Selecting the appropriate space in which to present your productions is akin to picking out a personal residence; it is your business home.
There are three possible roads down which you may travel. All are valid, depending on your intentions and resources. These possibilities are
Each has its own advantages and disadvantages, which this article explains. It also explains the legal components of each in detail
The choice of whether to organize as a nonprofit depends on what you want to accomplish and what sources you expect to tap for your funding. A for-profit theatrical entity aims to return a commercial gain to its shareholders or investors ("angels"). A nonprofit does not. For a theater company, a nonprofit status is just a different way of doing business.
To be recognized as tax exempt by the IRS is a wonderful benefit for most theater companies. It opens up a lot of economic benefits that are not available to commercial theater entities.
Strategic statements and lists don’t mean much on their own. Like any important tool, the value doesn’t come simply by having them, but from how they’re used and embodied by your theatre’s brand. The tools in this article explalin how to create statements of purpose, mission, values, and more, providing the guardrails to keep your theatre company on a consistent path in the larger, big-picture sense, as well as in terms of day-to-day decision-making.
Strategic Planning in Nonprofits (SPiN), a step-by-step guide to achieve your mission, is a project of Nonprofit Association of Washington, the state association that makes sure nonprofits have what they need to succeed. SPiN was funded by the Satterberg Foundation, and seeks to expand the capacity of nonprofits to achieve their mission. SPiN was designed to give you the knowledge and tools your organization needs to plan so that you can better achieve your mission.
This report from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) distills and analyzes key themes from 12 listening sessions led by the National Endowment for the Arts in the spring and summer of 2024. The sessions included a wide range of U.S. nonprofit theater field representatives and explored contemporary challenges and innovations within the sector. December 2024
Arts and culture organizations increasingly look towards large-scale fundraising campaigns to achieve their visions while stabilizing their financial models. So, how does an arts and culture organization know it is ready for such a major undertaking? This article explores how board and senior management leaders can objectively determine if this is the right time for their organization to launch a large-scale fundraising campaign. It also examines the steps in the preparation and planning phases that are key to a successful campaign.