Publications

 
 

What’s Trending @ Webb Mgmt: Connecting the Dots for Arts Warriors in a Brave New World

SEPTEMBER 2022 issue

View issue

Sign up to receive future issues here.

Actors rehearsing on stage
 

Running Theaters: Best Practices for Leaders and Managers

2nd edition now availablE

In Running Theaters, management consultant and author Duncan M. Webb reveals the best practices that consistently lead to successful theater operations. Culled from surveys and interviews with theater managers and experts in crucial functional areas, this guide provides important tips for all people who work or want to work in regional, campus, and community-based theaters. Updated to reflect changes in the field, this second edition includes information on recent programming trends, marketing in the digital age, and the evolving role of theaters in economic and community development. Chapters discuss topics such as:

  • Front- and back-of-house operations

  • Managing nonprofit and commercial renters

  • Building and managing a board of directors

  • The financial management of theaters

  • The necessary skills and attributes of a successful theater manager

  • The unique opportunities and challenges of operating historic, outdoor, and campus-based theaters.

Available via Amazon

 

The Performing Arts Center of 2032

In April 2007, Webb Mgmt hosted a conference in New York City to consider the future of performing arts facilities. Over the course of two days, forty performing arts facility managers from around the country worked through a series of presentations and discussions on audiences of the future, where performing arts disciplines are headed, what is happening in the area of arts funding and how, then, buildings should be planned and developed in order to succeed some twenty-five years from now. A narrative report outlining discussions and conclusions was then published in a monograph released by Americans for the Arts.

Durham Performing Arts Center

Durham Performing Arts Center

 

Development of Performing Arts Facilities in Western Resort Communities

Webb Mgmt completed an examination of the unique factors that influence performing arts facility development in western resort communities. Interviews and research focus on the communities of Telluride, CO; Sun Valley, ID; Steamboat Springs, CO; and Jackson Hole, WY.

 

New York City’s Foreign-Born Dance Workforce Demographics

By Dance/NYC, DataArts, and Webb Mgmt

This study mines recent survey data on the workforce of legally registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit dance organizations and of artists and projects who have entered into a fiscal sponsorship arrangement with a 501(c)(3) organization. It offers the most comprehensive assessment of the characteristics, needs, and opportunities of foreign-born dance workers ever published as well as key benchmarks to guide action and measure progress over time.

View report

 

Advancing Fiscally Sponsored Dance Artists & Projects

Commissioned by Dance/NYC and realized in collaboration with a coalition of research partners, this discipline-specific study focuses on the segment of independent dance artists and projects that have entered into an arrangement known as “fiscal sponsorship” with legally registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit institutions. By extending its purview beyond institutions and offering the first-ever comprehensive snapshot of the characteristics, needs, and opportunities of the sponsored dance workforce, Dance/NYC seeks to advance a dance ecosystem in the New York City area that is expansive and equitable and to generate innovations that directly benefit artists and their artistry

View report

Solo dancer on stage
 

Advancing Fiscally Sponsored Artists & Arts Projects: A Report for the City of New York

This report is a major contribution to ongoing cultural planning by the City of New York and a game changer in research and advocacy for the segment of independent artists and arts projects that have entered into an arrangement known as “fiscal sponsorship” with legally registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit institutions. Under this arrangement, sponsors provide financial and legal oversight and share their tax-exempt status.

View report

 

The Operation and Financial Performance of Historic Theaters

Webb Mgmt undertook a research project surveying all active historic theaters in North America and collecting information on their activities and financial performance. The results of this research were presented at the July 2001 Conference of the League of Historic American Theaters in New York City.