Bruce Whitacre

Out of the Northland: A Legal Win-Win

Posted by Bruce Whitacre, Dec 09, 2010 0 comments


Bruce Whitacre

Bruce Whitacre

At the NCTF Board meeting this fall, we invited Louise Chalfant, the Director of Education at the Guthrie Theatre, to talk about her programs targeting professionals.  (See  http://www.guthrietheater.org/learn.)

Our guest speaker slot is usually offered to a distinguished artist, an artistic director, a major producer, someone one would normally consider of interest to the managing directors and high level executives on our Board.  This time, we wanted to share the special programs Louise and her team have created that are quite unique in their scope, their consistency, and their success.  It was an eye-opening presentation.

Louise is building a very important new bridge into corporations and professional firms for her community, and the country as a whole.  Success such as hers makes a strong case for companies to engage with the arts the Shugol report cites, but at an all new level.

Over the past few years, in conjunction with board members and corporate partners (more on this, below), Louise and her team have crafted the rather likely but exciting range of professional training for employees: leadership, team-building through improvisation.  Sporadically, many theatres have offered this to specific corporate partners, but few do it consistently.  However, there are many for-profit, small-scale companies of actors who have entered some of these arenas.  Louise’s focus, which she emphasizes time and again, is that she brings Guthrie-level standards of excellence to these programs.  Many were tested on the companies of Guthrie board members before entering the curriculum.

But Louise’s brilliant stroke was to follow the lead of one attorney on her board.  He advised Guthrie to explore ethical and diversity continuing education programs for attorneys, who are required to take such courses to maintain their license to practice.   These tailored sessions draw from the scripts of the plays onstage at The Guthrie, and utilize expert panels to draw out the relevant points.   A couple of hundred attorneys gather at The Guthrie in Minneapolis to witness each course session.  So far, so good.  But Louise still needed a marketing partner to reach the legal community.   So she searched for a company that could help.

Voila, Thomson Reuters now offers webcast courses taped at the Guthrie to attorneys all across the country both in real time, when the courses are held, and afterward via their website.  Legal Continuing Education is a key competency of Thomson Reuters.  And it’s great: actors get AFTRA pay for being part of the program; The Guthrie gets a licensing fee to support the great work they do for kids; Thomson Reuters and the legal community have a new way to meet their Continuing Legal Education requirements from the comfort of their offices.

Our discussion at the Board meeting was, how can an association like National Corporate Theatre Fund help make more companies aware of outstanding programs like this?  How can we help more theatres explore their local competencies and create more ways to engage with companies?

But the real question for me is, given the potential for win-win partnerships like this, why aren’t companies clamoring to become involved with cultural organizations?

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