Recruitment crisis in the arts?

For years, the arts community has railed against poor pay levels in the sector for arts managers. But ironically, while pay and conditions have improved somewhat, there seems to be a recruitment crisis in the arts which is manifesting itself most visibly in the field of arts centre/theatre management. This is particularly so outside of Dublin, where in the recent past, several positions have been advertised where Boards of Directors have had extreme difficulty finding suitably qualified arts managers. Garter Lane, in Waterford is a case in point. The centre had undergone a significant turnaround over the past three years, and the Board was offering an attractive remuneration package with health benefits, travelling expenses and additional supports such as relocation expenses if required. Garter Lane advertised, at considerable expense, twice in Ireland and once in the UK. The chairman of the interview process, Paddy Gallagher, was stunned at the response.

"There was not a single Irish applicant for the position of Artistic Director, which surprised us greatly," he says. "We were confident that the package we were offering was extremely competitive, and we felt that Garter Lane as an established venue would be attractive to an Irish arts administrator. In any event we offered the position to a very able UK arts manager, who turned the job down on the basis of a better offer in the UK. We then had to pursue the only option left of head-hunting suitable candidates around the country, who had not considered applying to the original advertisement. While we are very happy with our final choice, Garter Lane had to expend a lot of money and time to get the right person. We would have thought that with the growth in the arts sector there were lots of people to fill a position such as ours."

It appears, however, that the growth currently being experienced in the arts is outstripping the employment pool. The Arts Council recognises that there is a shortage of suitably qualified Irish people for the new wave of arts management positions. "The Arts Council is conscious of the problem," says Susan Coughlan, Local Arts Development Officer of the Arts Council. "Running an arts centre has become an increasingly more complex job, requiring a number of diverse skills. We believe, however that this recruitment difficulty stems from the success story of the economy, and indeed of the arts. There are simply more jobs now than people to fill them."

The more complex nature of arts management jobs in the 1990s is something which may be a bigger entry barrier than remuneration, and something which is causing a bleed from the arts into other employment areas. Kay Sheehy, now an RTE producer and the first Local Authority Arts Officer in the country, remembers her time with Clare County Council fondly.

"The job in Clare was in many ways one of the most enjoyable positions I ever had, allowing me an incredible amount of artistic freedom. My generation of arts worker was really the first to make a career out of arts management. We learned from people around us like Paraic Breathnach and Ollie Jennings in Galway. There was a sense of creativity and challenge, which had nothing to do with money. Increasingly, arts management jobs have become more administrative, which is a necessary part of professionalisation, but may not allow the 1990s arts manager sufficient creative expression. "I decided to pursue a career in broadcasting, partly to fulfill this creative need, and partly because the career path in the arts is fairly limited. I think my generation of arts worker was lucky, we had the fun times, we were the strange ones. Now, it is a lot more about policy and development and financial management, which of necessity will attract a different type of candidate."

This a point borne out by Annette Clancy, former Artistic Director of Garter Lane Arts Centre and now working as an Arts Consultant. "We have now come through the management of 20 years of arts facilities, certainly on a regional basis. The profile of those managers was of lots of artistic vision, and little or no management expertise. Now, the situation is being reversed and we need to look at the development of creative management which will marry these two concerns. As yet we have not done so, which I believe is contributing to the difficulties being experienced by Boards in filling middle and top management jobs." Anne Kelly, Director of the Arts Administration course in UCD, expressed surprise at the lack of Irish arts administrators applying for top management positions, but stresses that nearly all of her graduates are in employment, predominantly at starting levels. "Our graduates need to build up their work experience before they can apply for top management jobs. I have noticed that an increasing number of our graduates are being drawn into the area of film and PR and indeed into the area of further post-graduate study. "The majority of our graduates are women, and for many of them mobility may be a problem. Some of them are teachers on career breaks who would make fantastic arts managers, but who need to find arts management work in their local area, where their families are based. We also find that many of our students are taking up employment opportunities in Dublin, and are unwilling to move outside Dublin for more challenging jobs. It's part of the Celtic Tiger problem, students may have flats and apartments that they are loathe to leave for fear of rent hikes and the difficulty of finding suitable accommodation on their return to Dublin.".

Colm O'Kane, now 29 and a marketing manager at Kraft Jacob's Suchard Ireland, has increased his salary by 300 per cent since he left the Hawks Well Theatre, Sligo, where he was Assistant Manager for five years. "It's not just about money, it's also about product. As a marketing manager I've learned that poor product makes unhappy customers, and there is a lack of good theatre product at present. Boards in the arts are also categorised by self interest groups, which can lead to poor decision making. "That's not the case where I now work, and it would take a lot to draw me back to the arts. I'd look for proper remuneration, a pension plan and an excellent management culture. I have just bought a house in Dublin with my wife, Grainne, if I had stayed in the arts we could never have done that."

At the point of writing a number of new venues built under the Cultural Development Incentive Schemes, funded through the EU, are in the process of recruitment, and are all experiencing difficulties. Rory O'Connor, Chairman of the Model Arts Centre, Sligo, says his Board were conscious of the recruitment situation when designing the job of Director. "We put a lot of time into putting the package together and are offering a salary which is significantly higher than that normally offered, in the hopes of attracting a suitable candidate. While our interview process is still in train, I can say that our final shortlist is composed entirely of UK based candidates, of extremely high calibre."

O'Connor, who works in industry, feels the arts are no different to any other sector. "Ten years ago when recruiting in industry, you would look for someone with five to six years experience. Now, if you can get somebody with two years experience in the field, you're lucky and grateful. There are so many new arts venues coming on stream, those who are currently lower down on the management scale, are not getting enough time to skill up to enable them gain the experience to apply for a top job elsewhere - so it's a vicious circle".

This raises fundamental questions about the planning process in arts development, which has seen massive capital investment in infrastructure, without examining how these buildings are ultimately going to be managed. Will the arts become the equivalent of the fast food business - arts manager apply within?