By Emily Sullivan, Arts & Business Council of Greater Philadelphia

Throughout March and April the Arts + Business Council of Greater Philadelphia held its first ever leadership program targeted towards the arts and cultural nonprofit and creative for-profit sectors. This program, called Designing Leadership, was a five-session-long series that helped professionals develop and strengthen their leadership skills through exercises and discussion. What makes Designing Leadership unlike any other leadership program in Philadelphia is that it was specifically designed for arts and cultural nonprofits and creative for-profit professionals. The exercises and lessons designed by the facilitators were specially crafted to target common challenges faced by the arts, cultural and creative communities. Designing Leadership was made possible thanks to support from the Knight Arts Foundation, as well as Bank of America and SEI. The program was developed in partnership with IBM and The Wharton School of Business. Facilitators from IBM and Wharton helped design curriculum that would challenge participants while guiding them through practices that they could apply to their careers.

Each of the five classes targeted different aspects of leadership—from conflict management, coaching styles, collaboration and sustainability. The final class culminated with a mentor session, where five mentors from the Greater Philadelphia community met with participants to offer real-life advice and experiences. The mentors included Sean Buffington, president and CEO of the University of the Arts, Ray Carballada, president of ShootersINC, Jane Golden, executive director of Philadelphia’s Mural Arts Program, Gail Harrity, president and CEO of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Wendy Wurtzburger, independent retail and brand consultant. That evening we celebrated the accomplishments of the participants with a formal graduation celebration and reception.

Prior to the first session, participants were asked to take the Thomas-Kilmann Conflict (TKI) assessment, which analyzed how they approached conflict. This assessment was used throughout the first class to develop a variety of conflict management skills. Activities like the TKI assessment helped create a scaffold for the participants to build upon along the five-week journey, where they were continuously challenged to evaluate themselves and their strategies with a critical eye. The exercises used by IBM and Wharton helped to grow and expand each of the participants’ understanding of themselves and their leadership styles. Throughout the course participants frequently remarked that they were able to apply what they learned in their work between sessions, which opened the floor for others to discuss how they were handling leadership experiences differently after beginning the Designing Leadership program.

One of the most exciting aspects of Designing Leadership was the continued opportunity for the participants to build a strong network of colleagues from various backgrounds. In every session individuals were able to help one another solve problems and share advice based on their own experiences. While each of the participants had leadership experience in common, they all came from differing backgrounds, whether they were from a nonprofit, for-profit or a large or small organization. The experiences the participants shared helped ground many of the exercises in real-life events, which added another layer of value to the already exceptional curriculum provided by IBM and Wharton.

Thanks to the generous support of the Knight Arts Foundation, Designing Leadership has become an ongoing program that will run once a year through the Arts + Business Council of Greater Philadelphia. For more information on Designing Leadership, please visit our website at www.artsandbusinessphila.org/dl. Stay connected with us for future updates on all of our programs and events. We look forward to seeing you next spring for Designing Leadership 2015.