Read Online They Told Me Not to Take that Job: Tumult, Betrayal, Heroics, and the Transformation of Lincoln Center by Reynold Levy - Free Book Online Page B

million was raised for the endowment.
    A third lucrative source of recurring contributed income funds, Lincoln Center’s largest, is called the Great Performers Circle (GPC). The GPC is ably led by four distinguished Lincoln Center trustees of long standing: Renee Belfer, Bart Friedman, Roy Furman, and Ann Ziff. They, together with staff, have attracted 104 members to this body of supporters. Each contributes $35,000 annually. This donation entitles members to attend three events that take place annually in spectacular private homes or very attractive public spaces.
    A sumptuous meal is served. In the most intimate of settings, artists such as Lang Lang, Kelli O’Hara, Emanuel Ax, Laura Benanti, Joshua Bell, and Audra McDonald have performed and mixed and mingled with guests. It is a terrific way for generous supporters of Lincoln Center to become acquainted with great artists and with one another.
    The GPC raises about $3.4 million annually. It is as if Lincoln Center enjoyed a 5 percent “draw” on a permanent endowment of $70 million. The membership of the GPC and the sum it raises for Lincoln Center quadrupled between 2001 and 2014. The trustees in turn engage corporations and professional firms with which they are closely associated in the life of Lincoln Center. The institution benefits enormously from that collective, pro bono, intellectual firepower.
    Lincoln Center has also benefited greatly from the tenth initiative undertaken, one that has the potential to transform Lincoln Center’s operating budget and the way in which it conceives of its mission in the twenty-first century. It originated with a staff recommendation to establish an institutional consulting practice. Most trustees reacted favorably. They maintained that as the largest, best-known, and most consequential performing arts center in the world, Lincoln Center is frequently called upon to offer advice and guidance to its traditional and new counterparts around the world. Site visits; delegations; technical assistance; and one-on-one counseling of visiting staff, board members, and foundations from the four corners of the earth are virtually an everyday occurrence at Lincoln Center. Key trustees became convinced that the strength of Lincoln Center’s brand and its accumulated knowledge could become an entrée to remunerative consulting.
    If one of Lincoln Center’s foremost assets is the combined talent of its incumbent staff, then why not exploit it to improve our institution’s financial performance, to benefit our clients, and to enrich the experience of key employees, eager to tackle new and different assignments? This line of reasoning, in turn, caused us to reflect on whether and how Lincoln Center might help to improve the design and management of arts centers and promote international artistic exchange. For me, such activities fell right smack in the middle of Lincoln Center’s mission. They are part of what it means to be the world’s leading performing arts center in the twenty-first century.
    It was this mix of considerations that prompted the board of directors to support my conviction that by entering consultant territory, we could at once further our mission, attract and retain world-class staff, substantially enhance our net revenue, and learn a great deal about ourselves in the bargain.
    Lincoln Center Global (LCG) is the name of our consulting practice. A gifted staff member, formerly a Broadway producer and a Harvard Business School (HBS) graduate, Kara Medoff Barnett, led this unprecedented initiative. She performed with distinction. We decided to start small; our first client would be China. Soon afterward, the Harvard Business School, Harvard University, Mitsui & Co., Brown University, the New Orleans Musicians Village, and a performing artsand education center in the Phoenix metropolitan area called Consolari joined the city of Tianjin as LCG clients.
    Overall, this major alteration of Lincoln Center’s economic model took