Staying Relevant and Aligned in a Time of Innovation

A company’s best strategy is to stay up-to-date in regard to best practices, technology, and trends hitting the market every day. That’s exactly what Bhalla, Dyrchs, and Strack were conveying in the Twelve Forces That Will Radically Change How Organizations Workby identifying four areas of megatrends companies use to stay current in the market: technology productivity, shifts in ways of generating business value, shifts in resource distribution, and changing workforce cultures. I think the most important aspects of these twelve forces falls in shifting in ways of generating business value, specifically in agility and innovation. 

An as individual looking to pursue non-profit arts organizations, the industry is seeing a shift in traditional arts programming to more community centric creative expression accomplishing social change. Organizations such as the James Irvine Foundation and EMCArts (national community arts consulting group) are changing their frame by how arts/creative expression can affect a community, as oppose to how a community can affect the arts. This may seem like an easy switch, especially in enterprises where creative thinking is the foundation. However, as referenced in the Creating Shared Valuearticle by Porter and Kramer, creating economic value in a way that also creates societal value is vital for the relevancy of businesses today; a practice not often married effectively in arts organizations. 

Innovation in arts organizations has been seen through community social change. An example of this is taken from our own neighborhood with a partnership through the musicians of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and 412 Food Rescue. In the article, How Can Orchestra Musicians Fight Food Wasteby the Post-Gazette, it talks about how musicians from the symphony began volunteering to help stock and deliver food while also performing and giving concert tickets to staff and benefiters of the 412 Food Rescue. However, these are only individual musicians that are partaking in this initiative, not the orchestra as an organization. But why? There is a need for creative social change, and individual artists are taking initiatives to bridge creative expression with agility and innovation. But why aren’t organizations flocking at this opportunity?

Mission, Vision, and Values of nonprofits dictate the programming and initiatives of organizations. For established arts experience, funding and means for social change programming doesn’t align with the core of why their organization was founded. Amending a mission, vision, and values statement to stay relevant in an innovating market can be done, but often takes several years of discussion with stakeholders and board of director members.  The market for nonprofit organizations is constantly changing with new socially driven missions entering the market every day; a unique attribute that for-profit companies do not face. Conversations around how established arts organizations can contribute shared value economically and societally in a community have been in the works for decades to stay relevant and aligned to community needs and founding roots of organizations. But as relevancy continues to be questioned, arts organizations need to develop and stick with innovated strategies to appease an ever-changing consumer. 

References

[1] Twelve Forces That Will Radically Change How Organizations Work (Bhalla, Dyrchs, and Strack, Boston Consulting Group, March 2017); https://www.bcg.com/en- us/publications/2017/people-organization-strategy-twelve-forces-radically-change-organizations- work.aspx

[2] Creating Shared Value (Porter and Kramer, Harvard Business Review, January- February 2011)

[3] How can orchestra musicians fight food waste? (Jeremy Reynolds, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 2018); https://www.post-gazette.com/ae/music/2018/11/15/Pittsburgh-symphony-orchestra-412-food-rescue-charity-concert-partnership/stories/201811060094