The Clyde Fitch Report: Were you to visit the ‘About’ page of the website of Minnesota Dance Theatre (MDT) this week, you might notice something curious: the board of directors is “To Be Announced.” Recently, the entire board, some 20 individuals, resigned en masse. They sent a note to the press, stating they “are no longer able to serve the needs of the organization going forward,” and have since been unreachable for comment. MDT’s press release response is upbeat but ambiguous, merely acknowledging “the commitment of the recent board to the mission and vision” before switching to happy talk about the company’s future.
2 comments:
This Board walk out is a bit shocking, and it makes me wonder what could have possibly caused the entire board of this company to walk out at the exact same time. It seems as if, whatever happened, it was an event that was sudden and highly unfavorable by the board. The company must have done something very morally or financially wrong in order to lead their board from abandoning them. At one point, the members of the board joined the company because they agreed with their mission. This sudden abandonment makes me believe that the Minnesota Dance Theater did something to completely go against their mission in a way that totally turned the board away from the company altogether.
I find this story incredibly juicy, and wish I had been a fly on the wall at that meeting. I appreciate the author's conclusion that stops just short of questioning whether the non-profit structure is appropriate for most artistic endeavours.
On one hand, once non-profits reach a certain status, their boards become larger (case in point, a 20 person board sounds absolutely insane to me), and tend to be wealthier, "patron of the arts" types. I'm familiar with several organizations at home whose boards have driven away executive director after executive director because they allow them no leeway to adapt their practices and do their jobs.
However, I also am aware of several organizations whose founders/executive directors have held tight control on every aspect of the organization, which has expanded past the point of them managing everything effectively. In those cases, the board seems to be kept largely in the dark, and in fact, chosen ("encouraged to run") because they'll let the ED keep running things the same way they've always been run, which isn't helpful either.
I wish there was a way for the arts to function on both a small scale and a commercial model. It can't, because government funding/tax-deductible donations are so integral to producing, but I wonder the point at which the balance between board and director becomes less stable/helpful and more dysfunctional
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