WIREDGOV

Our cultural leaders are a precious resource.  We at the Arts Council value the enormous contribution they make to championing our sector’s creative ambition and to providing opportunity for all.  We welcome the conclusions of this timely report.  It is frank about the challenges our leadership faces, navigating a world characterised by complexity, scant resources, polarization and division.  It is also positive about what our sector leadership can achieve, given the right support.

We are proud to have been a partner with Clore Leadership on Leadership Now, a series of assemblies for cultural leaders that explored the rapidly evolving world of work. The assemblies formed part of our ongoing commitment to listen to and invest in the sector’s leaders and emerging leaders, so we can support and respond to their needs.

Through the assemblies, we listened to a cross-section of the sector and heard about the complex environment in which leaders now operate. This ‘new normal’ requires them to understand and adapt to a multitude of challenges, including new technology, a polarized discourse, environmental responsibility and stressed funding models.  All of these challenges sit alongside shifting workforce and working patterns and changing expectations about what work can and should be.  

The assemblies particularly sought to hear from Black, Asian, ethnically diverse and disabled leaders, given evidence of the specific challenges they face.  We heard from them that, as well as dealing with the challenges experienced by leaders across the sector, they also carry the burden of expectation that they will act as role models and speak for their communities, face daily experiences of racism and ableism, and lack the access to many networks and resources that other leaders take for granted.  We’ve subsequently seen the weight of this burden became heavier for ethnically diverse leaders during the riots this summer.  

Clore Leadership’s report highlights the “weariness” that has emerged as a result of the multi-faceted threats and shifts, and the need for a chance to “dream anew” so our sector can thrive and grow. Together with Clore Leadership and other partners, we want to help support the development of the right mix of skills, confidence, ambition and care among boards, executive leaders and emerging leaders to help them, and the people they take with them, to thrive.

The Arts Council is pledging support for the World of Work in a number of ways:

• The Arts Council and Paul Hamlyn Foundation will co-fund a trial scheme of subsidised coaching and action learning opportunities for leaders of National Portfolio Organisations. We recognise how hard it can be in a stressful environment to pause – to carve out space for reflection, learning, self-care and solidarity – but all leaders deserve time to think, and these sessions will support this. This approach will offer bespoke support as well as strengthening peer networks and knowledge exchange. The funding situation is challenging at present so our funds for this initial programme will be limited, but we will evaluate it with participants to see if it has value and to inform future plans. 
• We will develop a new online resource that connects leaders to the range of support material available, whether via the Arts Council itself or through trusted, specialist providers, to ensure leaders are aware of opportunities for support, professional development and peer learning.
• Following on from the Leadership Now assemblies and the recommendation that funding bodies “reduce the reporting burden”, the Arts Council is actively working on ways to achieve this whilst still being able to use data to make the strongest possible case for public funding for creativity and culture, and to ensure that public funding and National Lottery funding is managed appropriately. We are in regular contact with the sector, and are undertaking user research and user testing to improve application processes, as well as reporting and monitoring requirements. Recent changes to National Lottery Project Grants appear to be improving the experience for applicants. We are also exploring how we can use technology to ensure our processes are as efficient as possible. We’ll keep the sector up to date with the progress we’re making over the coming months
• With all of these specific initiatives, we are committed to ensuring diverse leaders are supported and represented within them. The Arts Council is also supporting the conversation some leaders have initiated following the summer riots, and is committed to further work to address the needs of our current generation of diverse leaders across the sector.    
• This is an initial response to the assemblies. In supporting our leadership, we want to respond to creative ideas from the sector. Our resources are limited, but we are committed to an ongoing conversation about how we can continue to help our leaders flourish and have positive impact.  

In addition to these new steps, we have invested and will continue to invest in organisations (notably, Clore Leadership – one of our Investment Principles Support Organisations) and major programmes that support and strengthen cultural leadership.

Between 2019 and 2023, the £7.1million Transforming Leadership Fund supported 18 projects across England, enabling leadership to flourish and tackling the barriers that prevent diverse cultural leaders from emerging. Several of these programmes continue with support from the Arts Council, including Access All Areas’ work with learning disabled leaders, and the Creative Community Fellowship programme which has expanded to County Durham’s Place Partnership programme.  

We also continue to support targeted initiatives that address many of the challenges raised in the assemblies. We help the sector to: respond to opportunities presented by new technology and digital innovation through the Digital Culture Network, Digital Accelerator and our exploratory work on AI; test new business models and funding streams through our work in philanthropy and business innovation; and understand and respond to the climate emergency, through our work with Julie’s Bicycle, for example through the Board Environmental Champions initiative.  

Given the current, pressured environment, we are also offering flexibility in our funding agreements, managed through the support of our dedicated teams in each Arts Council area, so that organisations can tailor their activities and programmes when required. We know that sometimes, even with the most careful management, things don’t work out as planned, and we aim to be as supportive and flexible as we can.