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It Takes A Village To Get Everyone To Take Vacation

January 29, 2025

by:

Joe Patti

Another interesting research piece that Bill Byrnes included Management and the Arts was related to burn out in non-profit organizations. A brief excerpt recounting the efforts the behavioral design firm ideas42 embarked on in 2018 appeared on Behavioral Scientist website in September 2024.

What the ideas42 team found was that staffs were engaging in a lot of performative work activity. They would address tasks that were easy to tick off lists or engage in work that made them look busy. The result was that by the end of the day, they were just starting to address the big project they were supposed to be working on.

There is probably a lot in the article that reads like an argument for allowing work at home. Among the things that were slowing people down were calls, emails, and people just dropping by to chat. It took workers an average of 23 minutes, 15 seconds to reset and refocus on their work after being interrupted. Another issue was getting called into meeting that weren’t necessary.

Among the factors contributing to performative working was the mistaken impression that co-workers and supervisors were working as much, if not more, than themselves and they needed to keep up. In fact, others may have been taking lengthy breaks from work and were checking in hours later.

At work, all people see are others working. When they see late-night emails or texts, they often assume that their coworker or boss has been working all day and night without interruption, when in fact they might have been walking the dog or having dinner with their families. That life outside work doesn’t register because they don’t see it. (Often people don’t want to share their lives outside work with coworkers and bosses to preserve the busyness myth that they’re always working.)

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The folks from ideas42 worked up a number of initiatives to shift the work culture of the organization. One of the things they found was that the interventions that worked least were focused on solving work-life balance issues for an individual whereas the ones that worked best were focused on solving the issues for the whole organization. Essentially, the work-life balance doesn’t get better for the individual if they perceive they are out of synch with the overall behavior of the whole.

Among the things they implemented were having supervisors model they behavior they wanted for the whole organization: visibly going to lunch, taking vacation time, talking about the time they are spending with family and friends. Eliminate the late night emails and texts. Similarly, the number of meetings and those needed to attend the meetings should be reduced.

People should be encouraged to schedule more slack time in their weeks to allow for the fact that tasks will take longer than expected. That way you don’t feel like you are behind because there is unscheduled time in which to make progress. Along the same lines, people were encouraged to schedule vacation months in advance when the future calendar is not cluttered with projects and meetings. Those scheduling time off a couple weeks in advance often try to do so around things already populating their calendars and will either take less time off or feel anxious about doing so and work from their vacation.

Along those lines one of the most interesting intervention ideas mentioned in the article was “vacation roulette.” Everyone that hadn’t taken vacation in a 90 day period would get a note copied to their supervisor listing their vacation balance and encouraging them to take time off.

They then sent them an invitation to take a random Monday or Friday off and signed the note, “From your vacation fairy godmother.” Often, the managers would encourage workers to take a break.

[…]

….during the “vacation roulette” intervention—where managers were copied on an email encouraging employees with high vacation balances to take a day off—participating organizations saw a boost in days off for over 20 employees, and the highest rate of vacation taking for India-based employees in 5 years.

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Art(ist) Education, Business Models, Leadership, New Initiatives, Working In The Arts

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When Where You Say You Are Is Who You Are For

January 28, 2025

by:

Joe Patti

Colorado Public Radio has a weekly Q&A feature they run. A recent question about why some sports teams are named for Denver and others for Colorado even though they are all based out of metro Denver reflects the ways in which technology and connectedness change our perceptions.

Reporter Ben Marcus noted that older teams like the Denver Nuggets and Broncos are generally named after cities because many cities in the state had teams which would play against each other. In that situation there was value in emphasizing associations with the city.

As cable television helped distribute games to larger audiences, team owners recognized there was value in creating broader geographic associations. Marcus cites the examples of the Florida Marlins and Colorado Rockies baseball teams.

Not to mention there was financial benefit in appealing to a broader geographic base. Apparently the residents of Denver rejected a tax increase to support building a stadium for the Rockies. However, voters in the adjacent cities of the Denver metropolitan area approved the tax measure and the stadium got built.

And the Rockies draw attendees from throughout the state, a situation the executive director of the Colorado Baseball Commission attributes, in part, to the name.

Success off the field, however, is undeniable. Despite being one of the worst teams in baseball last season, an average of 31,361 fans attended games.

“A lot of the attendance at Rockies games even now are people coming from other parts of the state,” said Macey. “Grand Junction and Lamar and also from a lot of the surrounding states. So having Colorado as the name is kind of all-encompassing, and helps attract all of those people to games.”

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I bring up this story to inspire some thought among arts organizations about whether there are elements of their name and branding which creates psychological and perceptional limits about who they geographically serve which is in conflict with the organizational vision of who they serve.

I know there are a number of arts organizations who effected a name change to encompass a larger geographic area. The first that comes to mind is the Honolulu Symphony becoming the Hawaii Symphony about 10-15 years ago.

But before anyone makes that change, you may want to consider the bit of insight shared at the end of the Colorado Public Radio piece which suggests streaming technology is increasing the geographic region of people which might form a relationship with an organization:

Jason Hanson, the historian, said the rise of the internet and streaming services means team owners may one day think globally, well beyond cities and states.

“You could easily imagine some kind of shake-up in the NFL, where a team moves, and as their new name picks you know the Rocky Mountains or the Pacific coast or something that would be bigger, that would have sort of more meaning in other parts of the world.”

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Audience Relations, Building Public Will For Arts And Culture, Marketing/PR

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Getting An Early Start On The Show

January 27, 2025

by:

Joe Patti

League of American Orchestra’s Symphony.org site had an interesting piece on concert start times recently. It wasn’t really surprising to learn that organizations were experimenting with different start times to better suit the needs of their audiences.

I was, however, surprised to learn that in 2006 and perhaps even more recently, there were classical music recitals starting at 10:30 pm and selling out. (Though perhaps to be expected given they were in the city that never sleeps)

In 2006, a New York Times critic reported that the Mostly Mozart Festival’s “A Little Night Music” concerts, held at 10:30pm, were “almost always sold out,” and raised a question: “Why should cabaret acts and jazz sets be able to start late, but not classical recitals?”

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The general theme of the article is that people’s expectations have changed, especially post-pandemic. The Houston Symphony apparently tried an earlier start time about a decade ago only to revert back to their regular time when the change proved unpopular. However, they have recently shifted to 7:30 pm to 8 pm and not only was it well received, surveys are showing a trending preference for a 7 pm start.

To some degree they credit the increase in people who are working from home who don’t have the commute from office to the theater with perhaps a trip home and dinner in the mix. Though other organizations report complaints that earlier start times don’t provide enough leeway between work and the performance so there isn’t one standard best time for all communities.

In some places they are finding that matinees are better attended than evening performances. In my own experience I am seeing that trend with renters who specialize in choral and operatic genres as well as recitals by dance schools. This probably isn’t news to many since the core audiences for both types of shows tend to want to be home earlier.

The article quotes Gwen Pappas, vice president of communications and public relations at the Minnesota Orchestra, referencing the fact that people are used to being able to access their experiences on demand.

There are many ways in which a communal performing arts experience can’t be individually curated but where we are able to give people options. They really seem to appreciate it.”

In 2023, the Minnesota Orchestra moved its Saturday night concerts to 7pm and introduced 2pm concerts on select Saturdays. Some subscription programs come with any of four different time options over a week: 11am, 2pm, 7pm and 8 pm.

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My first thought is that with so many different options for concerts to start, there might be some headaches communicating the different times to inattentive single ticket buyers. The last concert they attended started at 8 pm, now they are late for the 7 pm concert or vice versa. You might be arriving for what you thought was a 2 pm matinee only to find everyone leaving from the 11 am event. I suspect they have found some good ways to address that issue, though there will always be a few people who overlook the reminders, etc.

Audience Relations, Building Public Will For Arts And Culture

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Where Would You Like To Sit?

January 22, 2025

by:

Joe Patti

Bill Byrnes recently released a resource update to his textbook, Management and the Arts which included a research article about what factors influence what seating locations ticket purchasers prefer in a concert venue. (Note: Bill was the head of my degree program at Florida State University when I earned my MFA in Theater Management.)

As part of the study, the authors created a hypothetical concert venue which they used as the basis to ask people about their seating preferences when seeing a favored artist performing a favored genre of music including what price they would pay, whether they preferred reserved or general admission. Additionally they wanted to explore how willing people would be to purchase a VIP package based on cost and type of access they might be granted.

Six levels were chosen for the VIP package attribute, each comprising different combinations of three VIP services: meeting the headlining artist, taking a backstage tour, and accessing the venue early to watch the soundcheck.

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Noting that people may have different seating preferences based on the venue they were attending, the researchers conducted a pre-study survey to determine the best general characteristics for their hypothetical venue.

Each area differs in terms of distance from the stage, elevation, and viewing angle. Variations in distance and angle were communicated to participants through the hypothetical venue map, as displayed in Table 1. Additionally, participants were informed that Areas 1 and 2 were located on the ground floor, Areas 3 and 4 on an elevated level, and Areas 5 and 6 on the upper level.

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Here is an example of how the choices for seating, pricing, and VIP package was presented to survey takers when the artist was Taylor Swift.

Among the findings of the study are that people value being closer to the stage than further away. Reserved seating is more valuable than general admission seating. However, for people with children and older respondents, reserved seating held significantly more value. The researchers suggest that people without children and younger attendees are generally indifferent to whether seating is general admission or reserved. Whereas those who are older or have children are more willing to pay a premium for reserved seats.

In terms of the VIP package, people were more interested in meet and greets with the artist than backstage tours and early admission to soundchecks.

In terms of price, the study found that there isn’t a lot of consistency associated with specific consumer characteristics and as a result, there are limits to what artists can charge based on assumptions about consumer groups.

…there is little evidence of substantial preference heterogeneity associated with consumer characteristics. This is turn implies that limits exists with regards to musicians’ ability to practice price discrimination by targeting specific ticket types at particular consumer groups.

Furthermore, the evidence on variation in venue area preferences implies that there are limits to the returns musicians can generate by employing between—and within—venue area price discrimination.

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While I was reading this study i was comparing their findings to the writings of folks like Sean Kelly at Vatic, a company that specializes in using data to dynamically price venues in order to optimize ticket revenue. My first thought was that because they were having people choose huge sections of seating, they weren’t really drilling down to discover the specific preferences people have about their seating and the price they are willing to pay.

When they look at those yellow sections in the maps above, they are imagining themselves sitting in a specific seat for which they would be willing to pay the suggested price. Ten seats to the right or left of that (or away from the aisle), they may not be willing to pay as much.

On the other hand, the researchers say there is much more capacity for musicians to generate revenue through offering VIP packages. People seem to show a greater willingness to pay more for those experiences. Though there is a suggestion that the mix of experience and cost would be specific for each artist to discover.

However, research shows that offering VIP packages can create dissatisfaction among non-VIP fans so artists who wish to cultivate an environment of fairness may choose not to offer them. Similarly, dynamic pricing may also result in a perception of unfairness. There is apparently an association made between dynamic pricing and non-traditional distribution methods which appear to disadvantage the average ticket buyer.

Indeed, the use of dynamic pricing may be constrained by consumer concerns associated with perceived fairness, and the disdain consumers typically display for non-traditional allocation methods (Sonnabend, 2019; Roth, 2007).

Indeed, important parallels exist between the contemporary experience with dynamic pricing and that of ticket auctions, the use of which has declined over time despite evidence that it enabled the market to work more efficiently (Budish & Bhave, 2023). If consumers continue to respond with repugnance to non-traditional pricing strategies in the music industry, understanding how musicians can engage in optimal posted ticket pricing when organizing concerts will remain important.

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A couple caveats to note. 1 – There were a number of hypothetical elements in this study despite referencing real music artists. 2 – While there are lessons applicable in other areas, this study was conducted with self identified attendees of five specific genres of music – Pop, Rock/Alternative, HipHop/RnB, Dance/Electronic and Classical. It doesn’t include other music genres, theater, musical theater, family theater, dance, etc., so may not be completely reflective of the preferences of those audiences. Nor may it be applicable to smaller venues.

Arts Facilities, Audience Relations, Pricing

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