What I Learned at the Summit – Part 1

This weekend was the 3rd Annual GLBT Economic Summit in Washington, DC. This was my second year in attendance and I learned so much again I thought I would share the big points in a couple of blog posts. The Summit is put on by the Office of GLBT Affairs, the Office of the Deputy Mayor of Planning and Economic Development for Washington DC, the Washington Economic Partnership and PEN- Metro DC’s LGBT Chamber of Commerce. As you can see, this Summit was no joke.

One of the Keynote Speakers was Harriet Tregoning the Director of the Office of Planning. Right away I sat there and thought, I will probably learn some business stuff but tying this into theatre is going to be tough. Then she delivered her keynote and she spoke about how DC should and can grow highlighting three ways to do so, Green Jobs, Retail and the Arts. Yes, the Arts took on a pretty big role in her speech. In fact she mentioned my company by name twice and she didn’t just talk about the big theatres but addressed smaller ones like the Fringe Festival and the Atlas Theatre.

She highlighted that in DC there are over 75,000 “creative” jobs. Which are everything from museums to media to theatre. She also said that of those jobs about 5,200 were in the performing arts. Most of the jobs were in media and communications in DC. In fact almost half of the creative jobs were in media.

Tregoning spoke about how we need the arts everywhere and how important they were to a thriving community. She said that the arts brought business to areas and helped with restaurants and retail. She encouraged us to think of creative ways to use empty space in the city and talked about having a rehearsal in a store front or even someone painting portraits and how that was more interesting than just an abandoned store front.

Why was I so excited about her speech? Because this room was full of business men and women, most of whom had nothing to do with the arts. Yet here stood someone from the planning office taking one third of her speech to discuss how the arts impact and should be thought of when planning the city.

Bonus – Tree Tweeting – She also was asked about trees in the city and she mentioned that you are responsible for watering any trees in front of your house even if it is not directly on your property. She went on to say that they are working on having your trees tweet you. This way you are reminded if the tree has not gotten rain in a while that you should water it. I just thought that was neat and had to share. More from the summit tomorrow.

Goals

I have been at my new job at the Harman Center for 7 months now.

When I came into the job I set 3 month, 6 month and long term goals. I did that after being employed here for a week. It is now time to review my goals. I know I have checked off most of them but some I still haven’t reached. Now that I have been here for over 6 months I need to go threw and look at the goals I set and revise and add to them.

I challenge you all to set goals. Even if you think they might be too far out there. Set them and reach for the stars.

Work Together

In these economic times we have to wok together. There are a couple of exciting things happening here at the Harman Center. One is Velocity DC which is a 2 night event that will showcase several local dance companies. The launch party was last night and very successful. The performances will be very affordable and an easy way for those not sure to venture into seeing dance. They will have short pieces from several styles. By doing this they will hopefully build their audience and do at little cost since they are all working together.

Another thing that I am working on is a “Gay Arts Weekend.” We are still working on a name for it but it will hopefully include the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, DC’s Different Drummers (the local Gay Band) and the local Gay Film Festival. I briefly talked about on a May posting in no detail. By putting all these groups together they will share in rental and labor cost and share in audience. In essence make their costs go down and income potentially rising by bringing three different yet similar audiences together.

In these times if we work with other groups and share resources and efforts I think we can make it through. I encourage other groups that don’t normally work together to find ways to do things together.

Other Side of the Coin

I am the Booking Manager for the Harman Center for the Arts. In my job I have to look at the best ways to fill the theatre during empty times. I have to do what I can to make sure we are giving our clients a fair deal yet make as much profit as possible.

There are some empty times next year that made me think, “What if I put on a show?” So I started to run the numbers. There is a relatively small show that I have worked on a number of times that I had in mind. Well after running the numbers many times I found out that I couldn’t afford to present that show. The risk was just too high. I would have to sell 90% of the house to break even. Producers have different numbers that they think could be their break even point but 90% is not one of them. I could do 60% but I would rather do 50% as my break even point.

Now I have to find ways to make it easier for people to make money here. There has to be a way that I don’t have to cut my profit but can increase the profit of my clients. I have a meeting with marketing and development soon and maybe some brainstorming will help me come up with some ideas.

One idea I have is to open up the program to our clients. Let them sell ads in our programs. We could get a cut of the profit and let them keep some because with out them selling the ad we wouldn’t have the ad sale anyway right?

When you are working with people try to look at things from their side. It could change how you operate and maybe give you some ideas to not only help them but help you.