Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast: Making Art Work
Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast: Making Art Work
#354: Beth Guerriero (Consultant for Arts Nonprofits) (pt. 2 of 2)
This week on the podcast is part two of our interview with Beth Guerriero. She is an arts consultant who works with regional and national nonprofits across the United States. Prior to starting her own consulting business, she spent nearly two decades working in academia and nonprofits. Beth has held leadership positions in a variety of organizations, including Rowan University where she was the Executive Director of Integrative Arts, and the City University of New York’s Harmony Program where she was the Director of Education.
If you're interested in creating or leading an arts organization, you'll want to hear Beth's approach to understanding each organization she works with and how she helps them to thrive. https://www.bethgconsulting.com/
Welcome to the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast, Making Art Work. We highlight how entrepreneurs align their artistry, passion, and vision to create and pursue opportunities to capture value in the arts. The views expressed by guests on the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the podcast or its hosts. The appearance of a guest on the podcast, the venture they represent, or reference to any product or service does not imply an endorsement or recommendation by the podcast or its hosts. The content provided is for entertainment and informational purposes only, and does not constitute business advice. Here are your hosts, Andy Heise and Nick Petrella.
Andy Heise:Hi, Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast listeners.
Nick Petrella:I'm Andy Heise. And I'm Nick Petrella. Beth Guerriero is with us today. She's an arts consultant who works with regional and national nonprofits across the United States. Prior to starting her own consulting business, she spent nearly two decades working in academia and nonprofits. Beth has held leadership positions in a variety of organizations, including Rowan University, where she was the Executive Director of Integrative Arts, and the City University of New York's Harmony Program, where she was the Director of Education. I will link to Beth's website in the show notes so you can see the variety of consulting services she offers. Thanks for coming on the podcast, Beth.
Beth Guerriero:I'm really excited to be here today.
Andy Heise:That's great. Well, and we know I think we know that a lot of people who work in arts nonprofits are not there to um become rich, right? They're they're there because they have a an affinity for for the work that they're doing. Um so but the just that last point you made about making sure the people that are working in these organizations are taken care of as well. Uh which is kind of which leads to my next question is understanding the needs of all these different stakeholders. We talked about earning the trust of those stakeholders, but they all have different needs um uh that have to be addressed. And so how do you approach that as a as an interim executive director?
Beth Guerriero:So yeah, so I gotta say I am absolutely stunned by how many organizations I walk into that do not have a any kind of strategic framework or vision or plan. Just like that is so stunning, shocking to me.
Nick Petrella:So they're purely reactionary.
Beth Guerriero:Uh yes.
Andy Heise:Yes, um, across kind of across the board and quo, and hopefully nothing happens, or and then we just keep doing the same thing. Okay, all right, yeah.
Beth Guerriero:Yes, yes, and that and I'm talking about that now in 2025. Five years after March of 2020.
Andy Heise:Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:So so like it's not like we don't know that something.
Andy Heise:Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Beth Guerriero:Like, like, like, and and and so, okay, fine, right? Um, and and my advice now and the organizations I work with is I'm not even talking about a plan, a five to ten year plan. I'm I'm actually recommending a one to three year framework for organizations. And so, like, I'm working with an organization right now, um, very actively, and and a lot of the modeling I'm doing with organizations, and these are the smaller orgs, like let's say $100,000, $200,000, is to just like have a retreat and build out a one to three year framework. And I feel like that's a really viable model for organizations because how can you, I mean, with the amount of chaos that's happening in the art sector or the nonprofit sector in general, how can you really think to five years or 10 years at this point? But like, can we put something on a two-page document that can be a meaningful framework that can sort of guide us, that can have some flexibility that can tell us what are our, you know, what's our vision statement, what are our artistic goals, what are our KPIs, what do we want to do with marketing, finance, human, you know, these different business areas that could be, you know, helpful to guide us so that our board, our arts folks, our program staff are all kind of on the same page. And so this has kind of been my my go-to for best practice for folks, and it's it's it's been good. So that's that's kind of how I've been guiding folks in general. It's sometimes challenging because coming in as an interim, if you think about the trajectory of organizations as a bell curve, um, you get to a point, you have like uh an idea at the beginning of the curve, and then they grow, grow, grow as organizations. And where I come in to this point is at the at the cusp of the curve at the end, and they are at a point where they either need to cycle back around in their life or they need to, or they're gonna kind of fall apart. And that point where the cycle back around happens, and there's a great diagram for this that I can share at some point, just uh it's actually on my website. Um, but the the thing is that um that's also the point of taking risk, because if you think about how risk works in organizations, um the original initial idea itself to start an organization is a risk. And so um, and they've been doing something for so long, oftentimes they have been successful. And oftentimes organizations are afraid, and this is the leadership of organizations, and if we're back in that idea of the ED and the A D model together, and you've had a long-term artistic director, they're not in a place necessarily to realize that they've taken a risk in the first place to start an organization or something like that, to be able to get to the headspace of now we need to take another risk of some kind to come back around again and cycle through the growth process. Um, and so sometimes we see that this is going to be the organization is now in a financial struggle and they're not able to quite come back around again. And then this is where we see organizations closing. And so this comes back into I think something with growth mindset versus a fixed mindset or scarcity mindset also kind of taking, you know, taking over. So that that is really the other thing that sort of um is tricky, and so it's a lot of it, I think, is education and trying to explain these things over and over and saying here's what we can do and how we can try to get there to try to turn things around again and going through process. And sometimes you can do it, and sometimes it just can't quite get there. And they spend on all of their, you know, the rainy day funds, and that's kind of it for the organization. But you do the best that you can.
Nick Petrella:Yeah. Beth, let's switch topics. Uh let's switch the topic to fundraising since you have a lot of development and fundraising experience. Do you have any tips for arts entrepreneurs and how they can fundraise?
Beth Guerriero:I have a lot of tips.
Nick Petrella:Okay.
Beth Guerriero:Yeah. But I'm gonna I'm gonna give three right now. Um so uh the first is to um make as many connections as possible.
Nick Petrella:Okay.
Beth Guerriero:Um it's to just just be there, like to um be able to meet as many folks as possible, to show up, um, to be in the rooms, um, and to be able to um just be able to just get there. Um, it's hard sometimes, I think. I'm an extrovert, if you can't tell. Um, if you're an introvert, I think it's a lot harder uh to be able to explain yourself. Um, and that gets to the second part, which is to be able to explain what you do, to demonstrate what you do really well, because artists really are exceptional and in any of the fields in the arts. Um and um sometimes it's challenging um in some of the avenues to be able to explain what you do, right? And so I think these things go hand in hand. And so getting into the rooms and always saying yes to being in the rooms is like I think the most critical part of it, right? So a thing happened to me in March where I was at an event and I knew this person was like a major billionaire venture capitalist, and they left him standing alone for 10 full minutes. Nobody talked to him. He was eating cheese and crackers, it was super weird. And I knew exactly who he was, and so I went up and I talked to him. Um, and he is now my LinkedIn friend. Um, and so so hey, you know what? Never ever like always take those opportunities, never like let those opportunities, you know, go away. So um, you know, and I explained to him some of the things that I do, and he told me about venture capital capital investments and things like that, and that was pretty neat. So um, so be able to practice those things, like get in front of a mirror, even if you're like awkward and an introvert, like practice being able to explain what you do, um, you know, get in front of friends and practice it, all of that stuff is super important. And then we kind of already talked about this idea of diversification of fundraising. Um, but you have to kind of know your audience for that, because there might be like it might be in somebody's specific area a little bit easier to go after one of these things, like a little bit more corporate or a little bit more donor. So, like having a clear read on that is also very important as well. So, think about the spaces in which you run generally and like try to harness that and then also still diversify so you're not like if something drops out, it's not like a really big crisis in your financial world.
Andy Heise:Sure.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, don't keep all your eggs in one basket. Yeah, so that comes up a lot here as well. So it's good for people just what are they doing now, take stock, and then how they can pivot and adhance. It's great.
Beth Guerriero:Yeah, exactly.
Andy Heise:So with your variety of um um experiences, have you seen any any outstanding things that were creative, uh creative organ or creative organizational models or innovative things that nonprofits were doing, and you're like, oh, that's that's that's pretty cool.
Beth Guerriero:Yeah, so I thought I'd talk about two that I'm really in admiration of. Um so one I'll talk about is the um goes back to the comedian music school model, um, but it's really kind of a little bit of a spin-off of that. It's the PMA, the Philadelphia Musical Alliance for Youth. So I don't know if you folks have heard of that program before. Um so it was architected in 2015. A mentor of mine is Helen Eaton, she's the um executive director. So what Philly did um is they pulled together all of the musical, the youth serving musical organizations across the city and decided to serve all uh the students that they could serve uh underrepresented in classical music. So this includes the school district, uh the community music schools, two youth orchestras, Temple University, um, countless other organizations, upwards of 20 organizations, and they wrote and got millions of dollars from the Mellon Foundation for like 10 years worth of grants to put like comprehensive music education for uh forward for in in all areas. Like a student coming into PMA would receive like lessons, classes, ensembles, and then college preparation uh extensively. So their students go to like Juilliard, NEC, Oberlin, things like that. This program is still going on. So when I was interim for Philadelphia Symphonia for the last nine months, this is my interim before the current one, I got to sit at the table as part of the PMA group for that cycle, which is really exciting, um, and to learn more about what they're doing. Um and they're tracking all these data on all this data on all these students and things like that to see where they're where they're going, what they're up to. One of their first students is now like a cover conductor for one of the major orchestras. I think it's like Chicago or St. Louis or something like that. So, right, 10 years out, like if they're doing this, I mean, like, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's just an incredible program. So I wanted to talk about that, um, that program for a second. And then the other thing I want to talk about, also Philly, because I'm originally from around Philly, um, is the uh I'm gonna call the no-name pops and the Philly Pops. I don't know if you all know about that, what's going on with them, because they're also incredible. So um the original Philly Pops, founded by Peter Nero, about four or five years ago, uh, went into complete financial bankruptcy, unfolded, and went in, they couldn't pay their bills at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia. And the musicians founded what they called the no-name pops. Um, they started their own 501c3 nonprofit. They were musician run, um, and they restarted um as the no-name pops. And um, they found themselves an executive director who was one of the former uh operations managers of the Philly Pops. And over the last four years, they have re-established themselves fully as their own orchestra in town. They've hired a full-time music director, they have uh re-re-established an entire season back at the Kimmel Center and they have rebuilt themselves, they re-got the name back of the Philly Pops, they heard Christopher Dragon, and this past July 4th, they had Ben Folds at on the parkway in Philadelphia. Um, and they have just completely revitalized uh Pop's music in the city, which was an institution. Um, but instead of having like um administratively run, they're now musician run, right, with the union and everything like that. And as a model for what community groups, like not community, but like musicians can do for themselves in entrepreneurship, it's just an incredible, incredible story. They started like four years ago from from nothing, um, like really literally nothing, and then they grassroots brought themselves back into something brand new and and amazing. Yeah, it's just been been been an incredible story to watch.
Andy Heise:Was it the shedding of the administrative burdens or decision makers, or what, what, what's the what do you think the the innovative piece there that's allowed them to resurrect this organization or in a new or not resurrect, but re you know, reimagine this organization?
Beth Guerriero:I think it's I think reimagine is a great word. I think it's all of it. I think they have um an enormously committed uh and a very different board, going back to our boards conversation. I'm very good friends with the treasurer of the board. I've known him for probably 10 years now. Um, and their board has just enormous energy. Um, what on their board is um Philadelphia Institution is Jim Gardner, um, who is the key anchor of the Philadelphia television station who now like gets up and emcees the concerts. It's like uh a whole thing, like there's just a whole uh vibe that's so different than the last couple of years. And um, they just have found like a their own, it's like a filicultural like thing that they're establishing and re-establishing that's just really, really cool.
Nick Petrella:I've always thought that having an engaged board or just having supporters, an advisory board, people who are willing to roll up their sleeves and work, it's actually worth at least as much as financial support.
Beth Guerriero:Oh, yeah. You know, yes. Yeah. So I would say it's it's kind of all of it for them as I see it. I mean, I know their ED pretty well, and and he also, as I said, he's spun off from the other organization. Um, his energy is incredible and his commitment, uh, Matt Covial, and um, and he's he's just a fantastic uh guy doing some great work. So those are the two that I think of as just being um, you know, that's kind of kind of my home city a little bit. So I can do that stuff.
Andy Heise:Those are great examples.
Nick Petrella:Thanks. Yeah. Um are you still in this Suzuki organization? You're still active in that?
Beth Guerriero:I oh yes, I am. I very much so, actually. I do do a good bit of stuff with them. Um I do teach a little.
Nick Petrella:So so how do you still find time to teach and manage your teaching schedule when you're away for a job for extended periods? Do you do a lot of traveling or how's that work?
Beth Guerriero:So actually, that's that's a great question. Um, so uh I have just a really tiny violin studio um and uh just three students, and I'm supposed to give them a shout-out, Daphne, McKenzie, and Benjamin. Um so um, but uh, and uh I just teach on I teach on Mondays three lessons. Um they're uh all Suzuki students. Um and uh this is it's just a really nice little block. A really cool thing though that happened uh was that uh one of my uh former viola students uh just got the Broadway lead on MJ the musical. He went to Michigan for musical theater, had it for five years. So we took a little studio trip a month ago because he just had his Broadway debut and he is the middle Michael Jackson on Broadway.
Speaker 4:Wow.
Beth Guerriero:Um yeah, I was like, I never knew you could dance, dude. Yeah, and he got up there, and I had him for five years on Viola, and he was like the principal of the youth orchestra, our local youth orchestra and everything. And um, he gets up there and he comes in as Michael Jackson from age 16 to 24. He got to do thriller. And I had like, right, and he dropped out of U Michigan after as a sophomore now. He just finished sophomore year, and he calls me and he's like, I got this thing, and I was like stunned. So he's got a year now in uh on Broadway, and then he says he thinks he's gonna go back. I don't know what's gonna happen.
Nick Petrella:But that's the best thing. He did a studio trip and that's the best thing about teaching. You never know what a student's gonna do.
Andy Heise:And it's all the viola players that surprise you, I think. Right?
Beth Guerriero:So it was uh it was a real moment. So we took a studio trip up, and um, and then they all came back after that, and they were practicing a lot more.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, that's right. Yeah, right. Motivation. But they're practicing dancing.
Andy Heise:Watch a thriller on repeat. Moonwalk on you did teach him how to dance. Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:I didn't know he could dance at all. I mean, like that's never happened.
Andy Heise:That's not part of the Suzuki method, is it?
Nick Petrella:Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:We would do a bulk in the stomach to the telemach.
Nick Petrella:That's when they matriculate out of Suzuki into dance. Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:Right, right, right.
Andy Heise:So have you seen um any shifts in what funders are looking for from arts organizations over the past few years? It's been uh it's been an interesting few years. I mean, coming out of the pandemic and and then and then with with uh federal support uh dwindling.
Beth Guerriero:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think the private donors are gonna get where they want to give, you know, at the end of the day. And um, you know, I think that um the really committed private donors, um, some of them are even increasing, which is promising um and and good to hear. Um and uh I think that uh I think it they're eventually gonna be tapped out, which is worrisome. Um, and I worry about the long-term um landscape of things. I think that the more that arts organizations can work to be collaborative and have and build deeper partnerships, the better off we're gonna be. So that's you know my best advice for all of that. Um, but it is promising when I see um who was it that just um the Anne Casey Foundation, I think it was, or was was just giving more um more gifts because of the NEA. I think that was the Anne Casey Foundation. Um, you know, just recently released something like another couple million dollars. And so some folks are are sort of doing that in response, but it it won't be enough. And you you know, that's it's a huge problem, it's a huge issue. Sure.
Nick Petrella:So before Andy gets to the final three questions, just want to unpack the financial stability and support. So talked a couple times, time of this recording, NEA, NEH, there have been cuts that are affecting arts and humanities. So beyond spreading uh eggs in different baskets and then just seeking different fundraising revenue streams, what else can arts organizations do to ensure they have stability in the near to midterm?
Beth Guerriero:Yeah, I mean, I think they have to strategic plan, right? I mean, they have to do as much strategic planning as possible. Um, I think that they have to take a serious look at what programming they're giving. I think they have to look at diversifying how they're bringing in revenue as well. Are they um generating revenue as well as fundraising? Because um any revenue coming in uh could be helpful. Like, are we able to charge tuition for things? Are we, you know, able to do things like that? Um it's it's really tough. Um, I'll tell you two things that I think are indicative of this. So while I'm in this interim placement, I was also uh in an interim development director role for four months for a major arts organization in New Jersey. And on the Friday night when the NEA cuts came in, I had spent nine hours printing out donor letters that whole day that were like really nice, really nice donor letters. I'm using air quotes again, um, in an in a normal year. And then it was 10 o'clock at night, and I got frantic test texts from the ED saying we had a hundred thousand dollar funding cut, which is 10% of our budget, like you know, in executed contracts, like you know, in executed contracts, we have gone through the entire process. Um, you know, these contracts are fully executed.
Andy Heise:This is like the money's spent basically. Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:Right, it's spent, it's spent. We're supposed to be reimbursed for these funds. Um, okay, so I'll come in Monday and we will rewrite the letters, you know, and we've spent all this time on this, right? So here's our resources already. So back we go into the office Monday, and now we've rewritten and redone all these letters, and we're going through the campaign a second time. That's one organization, right? Um, I'm not sure if you folks are aware of the work of uh my colleague Rob Diemer at SUNY Ferdonia. Um, he's incredible, he runs the Institute for Composer Diversity. But what he also did during that time, and I was helping him with this project, is he actually cataloged in a spreadsheet, pulled from the NEA all of the organizations that receive funding, and cataloged over a thousand organizations and $42 million worth of cuts. This is generational trauma. Like we cannot get this back. So how are they coping? I mean, it's it's no good. My my colleague in South Carolina so was looking at the NEH cuts, and what we don't understand, what I don't know, and what's not fully clear, is the impact on the state arts councils because we can talk about, I don't mean to be bleak, but this is the situation in which we find ourselves realistically, we can talk about the NEA cuts at one level and how that impacts the direct funding at the national uh federal fund funding levels, but there's also the state pass-through funding. And what has not been clear, and I don't know that anybody's really talking about this, is what has happened to state pass-through funds. Um, like, and and this has been very blurry, but my my colleague from South Carolina forwarded me an email saying that the state the South Carolina councils had been fully cut. Now, I've asked other folks because I'm working with so many organizations, and one of my colleagues in Wyoming said they hadn't received anything, and a colleague in New Jersey said they hadn't received anything, and I'm not sure what's happening now, state to state, and I would really like to know because states have been very quiet, and I asked Pennsylvania and he didn't get back to me. And so it's really questionable what's happening because that trickle-down effect we have yet to see, but I'm wondering about it.
Nick Petrella:Yeah. Do you think there's uh there's reason for artists, or would you encourage artists of any kind to get involved politically at the state level?
Beth Guerriero:Do you mean with the state organizations or in terms of state organizations almost, I don't know, almost like lobbyists. I think that it could only benefit artists in this moment. And I say that from the headspace, as someone who's working in an organization that's not an arts organization right now, um, but that was able to successfully fundraise almost $400,000 and make a strong case for it. But I think that the more present we can be in this moment um to show what we do, I think we have to show up.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Beth Guerriero:And I think I think that that's really, really important because um because I think it's it's really um I think it's really tough. And and I think that um, yeah, so so I don't know. I think um there's a lot of problems. I mean, New Jersey has a really good arts landscape, but I think speaking nationally, I think it really varies, right? State to state. So so that's another another factor as well.
Nick Petrella:Gotcha.
Beth Guerriero:Yeah. Not trying to be bleak, but but I I do think it varies state to state, you know, in terms of um how strong the councils are at the state level. Um, that's at least my impression. Um, and uh, but I don't I I think we can't lose them, you know, and that that's worrisome. And what that trickle down is gonna look like, you know, is also um something. And then there's also like county level funding and whether those things happen because individual artists practicing, right? So many of them rely upon teaching artists rely upon, you know, a $3,000, a $5,000 grant. And my concern is, are those things gonna start to go away also?
Nick Petrella:Well, this is unfolding in real time, and I think what in the next six months we're gonna have a lot of answers. Yeah.
Andy Heise:Yeah.
Nick Petrella:From the time of this recording, yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah.
Andy Heise:Well, Beth, we've reached the point of the interview where we ask all of our interviewees the same three questions. And the first question is what advice would you give to others wanting to become an art entrepreneur?
Beth Guerriero:Um, okay, so I didn't start as an art entrepreneur, I started as a violinist. So I think into my violin skills on this, and and I would say that I'm uh always trying to listen as much as possible as a violinist, but also to the world around me, and that would be my advice, and always trying to learn about more things. So that would be my advice on that.
Nick Petrella:Great. What can we do to ensure the arts are more accessible and reaching the widest possible audience?
Beth Guerriero:Um, I think we have to do as much as we can to um engage as many people as possible and help everyone have a seat at the table. I mean, everybody should be involved in the arts. And so that's what it comes down to for me.
Andy Heise:Lastly, what's the best artistic or entrepreneurial advice you've been given?
Beth Guerriero:So um I don't know if you all know Stan Thompson. He's incredible. Um, from uh uh well, anyway, um so he once said, say yes to everything at first and then think about the value of your time. Um and so I think when you're just starting out um in the arts uh and in the sector, like you end up saying yes to like as many things as possible. And then from there you sort of craft and think a little more carefully about what is the value of your time. Um, and so I think about that a lot, and I try to make really smart decisions about how valuable my time is. But at first I often say yes to like a lot of things and then kind of hone in on that. I love that.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, it's great. Well, Beth, it's it's been great to hear your thorough approach to understanding each organization you work with and then designing ways to help propel them forward. It's been a lot of fun.
Beth Guerriero:Thank you so much. This has been great.
Announcer:Thanks, Beth. Thanks for listening. If you like this podcast, please subscribe. Visit Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast.com to learn more about our guests and how you can help support artists, the arts, and this podcast.
