Piestewa Peak, Phoenix Mountain Preserve, Phoenix Arizona
This was supposed to be a book.
I should have known better. Every time I think I’ve mastered something, events conspire to remind me that there is (so much) more that I still don’t understand.
An experienced hiker (which I’m not) would have understood this immediately. Having approached a mountain first seen from a distance and then having climbed to its summit, the experienced hiker would have expected the view to reveal so many MORE mountains still to climb.
Like many people who endeavor to advance the marketing, audience development, public relations and ticket/admissions-selling functions for arts organizations and cultural destinations, I think I’m pretty good at evaluating a situation, engaging the insights of others, assessing options and ultimately making a strategic decision. In fact, I’ve spent most of my career doing that.
But lately, I’ve come to question whether strategy really matters.
Strategy is the ability to stick your flag in the ground and declare out loud, “This I know! This is certain! You can safely stand with me here. Upon this solid foundation we can stake our future.”
Yet, faced with profound global economic difficulties, intransigent national political challenges, worrisome demographic trends and (the opportunity of) ever-fast-evolving technologies, it is extraordinarily hard to find and agree upon a stable place upon which to build a strategic plan.
So I launch this blog with the suggestion that we live in a post-strategic society in which the act of having a plan is not nearly so important as the continual effort to adjust to an even better one.
I don’t surf either, but I imagine that the expert surfer already understands that success is measured not by one final result, but by their ability to sustain themselves from one moment to the next. It’s not the goal that matters but rather the ability to make continual adjustments that allow you to advance from your current situation to your next – whatever it may be.
I ask a lot of questions. I generate many ideas. And those who know me know that I’m not shy about offering opinions, either. I was INTENDING to fill a book with a whole lot of all of that. Yet, two years into the effort, I realized that such a publication would have implied that I’d actually FOUND some answers or figured out some fundamental truth. The truth is I don’t know that I have found ANY of the answers. – nor do I believe that anybody else has quite figured it out either.
Please understand that I am not advocating the wholesale abandonment of strategic plans and the lengthy processes that arts & cultural organizations go through to create them. I am solely suggesting that they are completely inadequate to the challenges we face.
I don’t (yet) have a better suggestion. But together, I hope we’ll use this blog to explore the possibilities…
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Fascinating post, Matt. I for one would be interested in reading your book.
I’m wondering if your talking about institutional strategic planning or specific planning for marketing and sales, because I see very little of the latter happening. In fact, I see an awful lot of organizations still using marketing strategies that Danny Newman dictated over thirty-five years ago.
My inclination is to say we need newer, better strategies but I’ll wait to hear your thesis unfold.
Best of luck with the blog!
Trevor – I’m definitely talking about strategic planning for marketing and sales – and I agree with you completely. I have great respect & appreciation for what Danny Newman accomplished – but substantial pieces of his work are obsolete. Stay tuned – there’s MUCH more on that subject coming shortly!