Study of Chicago Arts Groups Finds Potential Leadership Shortage

JOB MARKET

Chicago arts groups face serious challenges as their leaders prepare to leave their posts and those groups look to a new generation to fill those slots, according to a new survey by the Illinois Arts Alliance Foundation, a 20-year-old arts advocacy organization.

The survey, which examined job satisfaction, compensation, and leadership succession at Chicago arts groups, was conducted in collaboration with the Cultural Policy Center at the University of Chicago. It surveyed 76 executive directors of arts organizations and found that 24 of the respondents had founded the groups they lead. The survey revealed that 53 respondents — about 7 in 10 — plan to leave their jobs within five years, and half of the total plan to retire from their current position.

Those empty chairs, however, may be difficult to fill: Fifty-eight of the executive directors surveyed said their organizations had no succession plan in place. Of the remaining groups, only four respondents reported having a formal plan, while 14 said their groups had made informal plans for leadership succession.

The executive directors reported high job satisfaction, with 58 ranking their satisfaction a four or greater on a scale of one to five, with five representing the highest satisfaction. On the same scale, respondents showed they were less pleased with their salaries, with only 41 of the executive directors ranking their satisfaction with their pay at four or higher. Job stress outranked salaries as a source of dissatisfaction for arts-group leaders surveyed.

Concurrently with the executive-director study, the foundation surveyed 81 “emerging leaders” of Chicago arts groups, selected by their organizations’ executive directors and from a list of members of the city’s Department of Cultural Affair’s Cultural Network, an informal consortium of local arts groups.

Of those surveyed in this younger generation of arts-group workers, most — 52 respondents — reported that they plan to stay in the nonprofit arts field. They ranked their groups’ artistic reputations, missions, and relationships with other staff members as their most important sources of job satisfaction. Respondents named conflict with their organization’s management, their groups’ finances, job stress, and lack of time to complete all of their work as their greatest sources of dissatisfaction.

The “emerging leaders” told the foundation’s researchers that on-the-job training and mentorship are the most helpful kinds of training for them. Thirty-six of those surveyed said they have an informal mentor, and three said they have a formal one. However, other forms of formal guidance appear to be lacking for many: Thirty-seven of the younger workers said they have never had a formal job evaluation at their organizations — and neither have 33 of the executive directors surveyed.

Executive directors and emerging leaders pointed to other obstacles that may hamper their job satisfaction. Seven of the nonwhite respondents to the executive director survey — or 65 percent of all nonwhite respondents — reported experiencing discrimination by their colleagues, board members, or the public served by their charity. Twenty of the respondents reported experiencing discrimination based on their sex, and 13 reported experiencing bias due to their age. Among all respondents to the emerging-leaders survey, 31 reported having been discriminated against because of their age, while 15 reported gender bias and 7 reported being discriminated against on the basis of race or ethnicity.

The Illinois Arts Alliance Foundation is seeking a grant that will allow it to widely distribute its data. In the interim, a summary of the findings is available free from fabris@artsalliance.org.

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